chewy inspiration

my client who was having twins needed baby shower invites, but had no idea what theme she wanted — or even what gender her babies were.  all she knew was that she needed suggestions, she needed them quickly, and she knew that ID Stationery could help.

i like to think of pop culture references that my client (and their guests) can relate to, and with twins i automatically thought of the doublemint gum commercial.  you remember:  “double your pleasure, double your fun” — the commercials featured twins, both male and female.  i thought this might do the trick.

after sharing my vision with the client — she loved it!  so i went to work. i thought it would be cool to have the invite look like a pack of doublemint gum.

this is where the idea started:

the inspiration: doublemint gum

here’s what we came up with:

the final invite and gum favor

i personalized the card as much as i could.  used the client’s last name (mcgee) instead of “wrigley’s”, and instead of “doublemint”, i went with “doubleinfant” (i know it didn’t rhyme exactly, but the “int/ant” sound brought it together i thought).  in place of the price, we had a countdown to the babies’ arrival (from the date of the shower).  i remembered the “Plen-T-Packs” of gum, and thought that would be a cute thing to add.  instead of putting the quantity of sticks, i put the quantity of kids.  I changed “naturally and artificially flavored” to “naturally sweet, no artificial flavors”…and i made it a “new” product.  i finished it off by putting it in an open ended kraft colored envelope — which reminded me of the little brown bags you would get from the candy store.  the card was a hit, and it worked out well as it was also gender neutral.

the client asked if we could take the idea further and actually make gum wrappers, as she wanted to give out packs of doublemint gum out at the shower.  i was excited to oblige.

baby stationery suite aka sweet baby stationery

i had a baby girl a few months ago, and i wanted to share the stationery i designed surrounding her birth celebrations.  she was my first little girl (i have two boys) and i wanted to design something sweet, modern and feminine for her stationery suite.  i didn’t want to go the traditional pastel pink route either.  i used a strong, yet feminine bright pink, with indigo colored trim.  i used the ladybug motif, italicizing the “lady” for a girl, and went with the modern square shape for the invite and announcement.

below is what i came up with.

the shower invite:

the registry insert:

the outside of the folded favor tag:

the inside of the favor tag:

the thank you card:

and finally, the birth announcement:

we are family

one thing i love to do with stationery is create what i call a “stationery family”. 

you see it in corporations/businesses all the time — they create a Corporate ID.  they’ll have corresponding stationery (complete with their brand and logo) on all materials, implemented in a complementary way.  so, for example, if the company has a bold, modern style business card, that style will be repeated on their letter heads, business envelopes, etc.

i like to bring that sense of branding and uniformity to stationery.  it’s a very classy way of branding your event.  i’m not just talking about having an invitation with matching envelopes — i’m talking about having an invitation (of course with matching personalized envelope), but also with matching registry card inserts, direction cards, thank you cards, and even favor tags. 

here’s a baby shower “stationery family” i created a while ago.  the “stationery family” included the shower invite (with corresponding preprinted return address envelope), the gift registry card, the direction insert, the favor tag, the thank you card — and even the actual birth announcement!

everyone (the host and recipients) loved how everything was tied in together…and so did i!

here’s one example of a stationery family:

I would be glad to help you create a “stationery family” for your next event — just email me at ingrid@idstationery.com!