In a week I go to NYC for the National Stationery Show; this is my favorite show of the industry! Beautiful paper, adorable greeting cards, stickers, and, of course, the artists that created these pretty pieces are always easily accessible and more than thrilled to gab about their work. Like Masha Dyans (right).I love Dyans' artwork, it's whimsical, pretty, and so intricately beautiful! Aside from her work adorned on greetings, she has also done T-shirts for both Target and Urban Outfitters, funky, fun, and colorful T's indeed.
Another company I love is Red Cap Greetings, designs and artwork by Carrie Gifford. Gifford's illustrations are adorably enchanting and some are just a wee bit dark. I love, love! The cards are all letterpress and include touches of color on thick paper stock.
Shown here is Two Scoops which, for some weird reason, completely reminds me of my parents. It's two silly, semi-dorky, but sweet people completely in love with each other enjoying a favorite pastime, eating ice-cream together.Lucky for me I have made some good friends in the industry and do look forward to seeing them all again as well catching up with new acquaintances from last year, and meeting others for the first time.
Events of the show include judging for the Best New Products Awards, the opening night party at the Rainbow Room, and the reception and ceremony for the Louie Awards. Um, The Louies Awards you ask?
The Louies are the Oscars of the greeting card industry.... yes they have awards for greeting cards and people go nuts for the Louies! It's pretty funny. Each year before the event and ceremony I receive the big box of nominated cards here at the office—this is a good day. All the cards are considered the best of the best, and once the Louies are over and I have covered the event, guess who gets to enjoy sending out some cute cards every now and then!?
I'm really excited this year as I often try to seek out different cards to feature in my section for the magazine. I often find out about different cards and artists through a Google Alerts listing that sends me all the stories relating to cards. This one company I found has the cutest little creations! The company is called LeClair Handcrafted and the artist is Corinda LeClair.
I contacted LeClair to get a card in the magazine, and after talking for a while I mentioned the Louies to her. LeClair decided to enter for the first time, and guess what? She is a finalist!! It feels good to have just a wee bit of a part in helping her get more exposure... Of course it also confirms that my taste rocks! Ha! Okay, but I do highly recommend you checking out her creations! LeClair takes vintage images, reproduces them and adds embellishments, such as ribbon and glitter, and places them on pretty card stock with matching envelopes. So cute!Like at last year's show, and the NYC Gift Fairs, I again get to try another (new to me) New York City hotel. Last year's hotel was a real trip! I stayed at The Gershwin, next to the Sex Museum! The inside was bizarre, slightly run down, and had a very starving artist feel to it.
The moment I got in my room I thought "nope, I can not stay here." I mean just that previous month I was at the Waldorf for goodness sakes! But as much as I adored the fluffy bed and plush carpet, the overall stuffiness of the hotel bored me, that is why I sought out something a little more exciting... and exciting is what I got. Warning if the hotel is very reasonably priced and uses the word boutique in its description, than indeed be wary!I was convinced the bed at bed bugs. Lucky for me, the show producers of the Stationery Show also work the hotel and hospitality shows and in speaking with the media supervisor she told me about all the fun things she had learned about bed bugs. So once I checked my mattress and all was clear, I felt a lot better. Thankfully the place grew on me, by the time I left I felt like it was my own little seedy apartment in NYC. Just look at my room below, it even had hardwood floors!
Mean hardwoods floors at that—as when I was in a rush flying about the room getting ready and missed my pierced ear when trying to hook an uber cute red shell earring from Ms. Mingo, I missed and that floor certainly snapped my earring in pieces. It was very sad.Ahhh well these tales aren't so exciting...maybe to me...I guess the point of my post today is this: I am busy, but I'm missing J's World and my five faithful readers... I will write more and am excited for the next couple weeks. I will come back bearing pictures of my new hotel experience at The Dream Hotel in midtown.....please may it not smell like the W that I stayed at last Feb... not sure what the attraction is to W Hotels, do you know they spritz all the rooms with this god-awful annoying perfume? Headache city!
Please do remember to check out my other blog Abode for the latest in what happening in J's Home World and more of what designs, artists, and random little objects inspire me!
xoxo
Gossip Girl
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