It is long past time to be sharing these photos that have been inspirational to our brides.
We have had the great fortune of having our paper and ribbon goods featured on many talented designers, artists and photographers Instagram feeds. While we have our own feeds (ote_seattle, and of_the_earth) they really don’t hold a candle to the creative skills shown in the photos we have seen.
What we have planned here is to share with you the many photos with proper attribution.
If you do end up sharing these with your friends and family, please be sure to give the appropriate nod or mention of the original group of skilled individuals so their work is not in vain.
Lotka Seed Paper Invitation – Letter and Line Studio
Styling: @bixbayandpine Photo: @toniechristine Original post: @letterandlinestudio
Florals: Moelleux Events
Silk Ribbon: Of The Earth Florals: @moelleux_events Photographer: @alyssaryanphotography
Floral design by Smashing Petals Hand dyed silk ribbon by Of The Earth
With the new year comes one of our favorite events, The Seattle Wedding Show. The creative energy has been flowing in our studio and we have designed some beautiful new invitation suites and hand dyed silk ribbon colors for the upcoming wedding season. Stop by our booth to take a sneak peak or visit our updated website. Now mobile friendly!
http://www.custompaper.com
6 x 9 handmade seeded paper wrap with belly band and poppy5 x 7 recycled panel with handmade paper print5 x7 handmade seeded paper panel with queen anne’s lace2.5″ hand dyed, cream and gold, bias cut silk ribbon
Seattle Wedding Show
Washington State Convention & Trade Center
705 Pike Street, 4th Floor
Seattle, WA 98101 Of The Earth booth #1124
Saturday January 14th, 2017
10:00am to 5:30pm (ticket sales open at 9:30am)
Sunday January 15th, 2017
10:30am to 5:00pm (ticket sales open at 10:00am)
Tickets are $17.00 per person and can be purchased at the door.
Children twelve and under are admitted free.
Come to the show Saturday, get your hand stamped on the way out, and come back Sunday for FREE.
This time of year always has us scrambling; rushing to pack and ship orders in time for the holidays, rushing to get gifts wrapped for friends and family, rushing to complete our end of year inventory, rushing up and down I-5 to visit our loved ones.
Now that the new year has begun the next rush is on. Our annual local bridal show begins next weekend at the Washington State Convention center which was built right over I-5 where it passes through the center of downtown Seattle. We have new designs to add to our existing line of plantable invitations. We have new equipment going into this bridal season that we bought at last year’s Stationery Show in NY. We have just 7 more days to put the finishing touches on the invitations that we hope resonate with our Seattle customers.
Once that show is over we begin building a new (sturdier) crate for the NY Gift Show that runs Jan 31 – Feb 4 at the Javits center. At the end of February we are excited to be participating for the first time in the largest show of its kind in the nation: The SewExpo http://www.sewexpo.com/. We are excited to be part of the show and look forward to meeting many of you there.
We are excited to see what these next few months bring but want to give a quick shout out to a couple of our 2014 customers who shared their photos with us.
Here is a photo of our Earth Silk ribbon that Heather Edgar sent.
She runs her own business: Evergreen Flower Co. of Columbus, Ohio and was kind enough to send these beautiful photographs. Thanks Heather!
Earth Silk ribbon on a flower bouquet.
One thing we love about the Seattle Wedding Show is the special connections we make with our local brides. We met Rebecca and Thomas at last year’s wedding show along with Rebecca’s mom. They were that couple you meet who you can see married forever, their shared energy and enthusiasm were infectious. We had a great time working with them on all of their wedding plans, this pair was doing it all! They loved that we offered so many do it yourself options as they were planning to do just as much as they could (including making their own rings). After their event they shared their wedding web site with us (which is where this photo is from). You should take a look!
Seattle couple assembles Of The Earth invitations at home.
Lastly we were excited to work on these holiday cards with a great creative team from Darien, Connecticut. Thanks for letting us share your project Jim! GW Hoffman
I love giving a beautifully packaged gift but struggle with the potential waste produced by feeding my pleasure in that. Being a paper maker and ribbon artists I am surrounded by beautiful products and ever expanding combinations of colors, flowers and materials. This year I have some new items to add to my packaging arsenal. Plantable gift tags printed with beautiful water color designs. Not only are they functional but they will biodegrade and produce an array of wildflowers.
These tiny seed paper tags are printed with a watercolor reproduction of four of the flowers that will sprout from this paper. Three each of the four prints are included in each package for a total of 12 cards priced at $3.50 a set. They measure 2.25″ tall by 1.25″ wide, and look lovely attached to a wrapped gift, bundle of bake goods or tucked into a bouquet of flowers being delivered to a friend.
The staff at Of The Earth have been having a great time creating new products with our recently purchased dye cut machine. One of our new favorite items are these plantable hearts.
They come in plain or printed seeded white cotton paper (shown above) as well as seeded pink or purple larkspur paper . Packaged in sets of 50 they retail for $11.00 a pack ($15.00 if printed).
In this incredibly busy week as we gear up for the new bridal season and work on last minute plans for tomorrow’s flight to New York to set up our booth at the National Gift Show in Manhattan I was stopped for a moment, long enough to sit down even to enjoy a piece of mail that the dripping wet postman just delivered. It was a hand written thank you note from a woman in North Carolina who runs her own Calligraphy business. She sent us one of our own seed embedded envelopes back in the mail with beautiful hand lettering on the front and a business card and note on the inside.
I think this can stand as a clear testament to the power of the personalized mailing. I know everyone is busy, I know I am busy, and yet this simple act of handwriting really can stop someone in their tracks for a few moments and draw their attention to the message you are sending.
For all of you brides out their considering printing your guest’s names instead of hand writing them, don’t. Just take the extra time to let the people (you care enough about to invite to one of the most exciting days of your life) know that you really care. You really want them there and your own handwriting spells it out for them. It is that personal touch missing from so many areas of our lives today. Your extra effort will be noticed and appreciated. It really does make a difference.
Okay so clearly we don’t all have amazing handwriting like the image above, but still you have family you can enlist to help, you can pick up a book or watch a video demo for pointers and tips on improving your own handwriting. Start early and it will be manageable, and worth it.
Here is a quick look at the Northlake Wedding Program for the Center for Urban Horticulture event space. We are using our Earth Silk ribbon blend #016 in conjunction with the lotka seed paper, black print and a light weight slate background. We think this says Whimsical Romance! What do you think?
We have been getting ready for a new partnership with a company looking to promote our papers. You may have heard of them; scoutmob.com. They find companies they like to feature their goods and tell their story which hopefully leads to selling their products. We are excited to see what the response is from their customers. They have asked us to share a bit about our work which triggered an impromptu photo shoot. I thought it would be fun to share that shoot here on our site so you could see what they do with the raw files. I will add a link here to the scoutmob sales feature when it is online. They will be offering discounted retail prices off of the handmade paper and bags they have selected.
They chose some of our seed papers and some non-seeded lotka papers, some papers that we make here in Seattle and some from our facility in Nepal. We are looking forward to see what the scoutmob customer finds interesting.
Somewhere to put your feetTools for paperSharp steelWatch those fingersPaper pulp – Recycled lotka fibers
DIY (Do It Yourself) weddings have far surpassed the trend status and are now becoming a popular practice for creative, budget-minded couples who want to put a personal touch on their event without breaking the bank. Some of the most lovely and unique nuptials we have ever seen (or attended) are those where the couple put their stamp on the ceremony and reception. All you truly need is an open mind, some extra time, a few helping hands, and a source for inspiration.
On our invitation supplies page you can find many of the tools and materials you need to construct any of the hundreds of invitation styles we display. We have templates and instructions for free here.
Our plantable seed paper box was part of a DIY wedding profile in the Minneapolis St. Paul paper’s “Aisle Files”. We will soon be adding video demonstrations of the detailed finish work we create, like the lovely leaf seen on this seed paper box.
Cotton Seeded DIY Kits with Eco-Twist Paper Ribbon
For those of you who want to handle every aspect of the invitation process, we offer almost everything you need to make your invitations at home: cotton linters to make your own paper, seed and petal inclusions sold by the ounce, paper folding and tearing tools and all the blank paper and envelope stock you need to print and mail your invitations.
Whether or not you take a DIY approach to your entire wedding, or choose to tackle certain projects here and there, we hope we have provided you with a few feasible options in the invitation and favor departments. And, if you ever have questions on any of these topics, please don’t hesitate to contact us directly.
