My coworker and friend Dawn does these amazing parties and bridal showers and weddings. She makes things for them, and brainstorms awesome decor. She’s trying to do it more publicly, as a professional, and needed business cards, and so she asked me to help, which I gladly agreed to.

If you read her blog, you know she’s a lover of vintage things, especially fabrics and handmade home items. Lately she’s been really interested in vintage clothing labels, so she asked for a simple card that mimicked a clothing label, with her contact info and her name on the front. She had an idea for the back, which was to sew a scrap of fabric from her extensive collection to the card, and let the stitching show through to the front.

I came up with a script version of her name, chose a color palette, and printed up cards in five different colors. I must have looked at 200 vintage labels as I was doing this (but oh so much fun), and made much use of my Wacom tablet. Then Dawn took them home and assembled them, adding a little pinked edge. I think they came out great:

She has the best eye for color combinations and textures. I made sure to print a solid color on the back of the card, so that if the fabric curled a little, you’d still see something designed:

(I love the fabrics she chose.)

Some more photos (taken with her lovely camera):

Such a great project! (Thanks to Dawn for all the great photos!)

And then, as an extra little thank-you, this bag was on my desk this morning (photo not taken with Dawn’s spiffy camera):

When we’d gone to Sam Flax to choose paper, I had tried a tea sample and debated whether or not to buy it. Dawn’s quick response was, “NO,” and thinking that she was helping me with my self-control, I thanked her  and didn’t think any more of it. But inside that little bag was this:

The tea and a fancy tea mug! That Dawn is sneaky. And awesome. And a great design client.

🙂