Brought to us by The Write Image in Rockville, Maryland, we love this letterpress wedding invitation set. The letterpress invitation itself is printed in 2-color letterpress in pearl and black inks and showcases a customization of our Vettore motif using a portrait orientation. The reply card and letterpress rehearsal dinner invitation are printed in 1-color letterpress in black ink, a really great way of keeping letterpress affordable without sacrificing style or elegance.

Since launching our Social Occasions album this past spring, we’ve had the opportunity to create some fabulous custom letterpress invitations for clients worldwide and it has been such a pleasure. These letterpress invitations were printed for a 40th birthday party and feature a lantern motif printed in black and gold inks. We love these elegant letterpress invitations, which were printed for an evening cocktail celebration for an international client. Talk about a fabulous way to ring in your 40th birthday!

In light of the recent tragedy in Haiti, Smock is eager to get involved to help out with the ongoing relief efforts. For two days only, January 20 – 21, we will be donating 100% of sales on our website to Doctors Without Borders, a humanitarian organization actively involved in bringing medical aid to the people of Haiti. All items on our website from our Everyday collection are included in the sale, including our letterpress greeting cards, eco gfit wrap, letterpress thank you cards and more. Stock up on all of your favorite Smock goodies and help us help Haiti with your purchase!

(Please note that custom printing orders are not included in this promotion.)

It’s getting to be save the date season here at Smock as couples prepare for their upcoming 2010 weddings, so we wanted to share this sweet letterpress save the date. It is our Nevis design printed in pewter ink with corner rounding, brought to us by the folks at Fancy That in New York City. New for 2010, Smock is offering free letterpress save the dates when you order a suite of wedding invitations with outer envelopes and a reply set. Ask your local Smock dealer for details!

These pretty letterpress social stationery pieces are from our Juine suite featuring a folded social note and a grommeted hang tag. Both are printed in olive and azalea inks, and the envelope is lined in our mondsee pattern printed in azalea. The hang tag features our Smock Clermont calligraphy font while the social note showcases Farringdon, one of the standard monogram options available in our Social Occasions album. Thank you to our friends at Alphagraphics in Chicago for bringing us this cool customization!

A while back we featured Cydney’s first birthday party and today we wanted to share a few more photos of the custom letterpress birthday party invitations we created with Debra Saba of Luxe Expressions for Cydney’s party. The invitation itself was a 2-color letterpress card printed in custom shades of fuchsia and navy with pretty fuchsia edge painting. It featured custom patterned backing paired with a matching envelope liner and came enclosed with a 1-color letterpress directions card. We love this invitation set!

Smock was recently featured in InStyle Weddings in a spread about elegant eco-friendly wedding invitations. Our Rhon letterpress wedding invitations were featured, showcasing our sustainable bamboo paper.

A big thank you to Debra Saba of Luxe Expressions who sent us this clipping of Smock featured in The Atlantan Brides. A Smock bride and groom had their beautiful wedding featured in the issue and a custom version of our Haddington letterpress wedding invitations was also showcased.

Thank you so much to both InStyle Weddings and The Atlantan Brides for featuring Smock!

Smock designer, Amy Graham Stigler, was thrilled to be whisked off to New York City this fall for a photo shoot with Better Homes and Gardens. The photo spread can be found in the December issue of the magazine, where she he talks about her design inspiration and her love for stationery. Today she’s sharing her behind the scenes take of what the experience was like in front of the camera.

The day was such a whirlwind. Since it was the first week back to school for my kids the trip was condensed – I flew out to NYC Thursday afternoon and flew back Friday evening. The shoot was all day Friday in Chelsea. The space was a beautiful loft overlooking the Hudson. As I arrived a few minutes early I snuck out on this little side porch, sipped coffee and enjoyed the spectacular view. It was heavenly. After my little moment of peace in the morning the rest of the day was a flurry of activity and commotion. Racks and racks (and racks) of clothes were rolled in. Shoes and jewelry and make up was set out and organized. The set was built from ground up; painting and all. The photographers, the art directors, the prop stylists (etc etc)…all did their thing.

My main liason’s were Jonny Lichtenstein, the fashion stylist, and Better Homes and Gardens Editor Kelly Phillips, and they were both really special talented people. And they were very encouraging…since I really had no idea what I was doing, especially when it came to “modeling.” Probably the most notable thing about my day was just that there were so many people buzzing around, attending to me. At one point I was being interviewed, make up was being applied, my clothes were being adjusted, shoes were being put on and earrings were being clipped…simultaneously. It just struck me as so unique really since, with three kids, I am usually the one attending rather than being attended to. The actual photography-taking turned out to be quite fun (and a bit silly – with a wind machine and all!)…despite the fact that I really (really) don’t love having my photograph taken.

Like my three year old daughter, I actually love to play dress up. I love clothes and shoes and I absolutely adore jewelry and accessories. I am a vintage girl so I usually play with old stuff but it was fun to see what is out there right now. I am generally not a big trend watcher but I definitely got a glimpse of what is going on in fashion right now by being a part of the shoot. Thankfully, tights are in because I am such a fan. And I live in Wisconsin where they are essential this time of year.

What was your favorite part about your experience with BHG?

Definitely the process. It was such a unique experience…so different from my usual workday – FAR more social. The people I met were sooo kind and fun. And I love NYC.

BHG asked you a little bit about your design inspiration – can you share what’s inspiring you now as we head into 2010?

I am invoking Milton Avery, one of my favorite favorite painters. Think graphic and strong and colorful.

For all of the fun, check out the December issue of Better Homes and Gardens and Happy New Year from all of your friends at Smock!

For those of you still finishing up last minute shopping, we wanted to take a moment to share some of our favorite gift giving ideas this holiday season. I polled the Smock team for their suggestions for great presents and honestly wish I could be the recipient of all of these incredible gifts! These ideas are sure to please.

Smock’s creative director and designer, Amy Graham Stigler, is in love with upcycled mittens made from old sweaters. (You can visit Simple Up for easy to follow patterns for making your own hat and mittens.)

Smock co-owner Debbie Urbanski recommends Cannellini heirloom beans – these beans are so delicious you’ll never go back to grocery store beans again. In fact, they are so popular, Rancho Gordo was sold out of them for nearly a year!

My personal favorite gift to give this holiday season is a great hand-poured soy candle (or two) from Linnea’s Lights. Not only are the fragrances amazing, but the packaging is simply divine.

Our client coordinator, Lindsy, is a big fan of this pretty embroidered clutch from Free People. It’s a lovely gift for any lady in your life like a sister or a special girlfriend.

Beth Ann, one of our in-house graphic designers, is gifting this great recipe basket from Longaberger this year. This handcrafted basket is the perfect gift for the cooking or baking enthusiast in your life.

This idea is quite near and dear to our hearts – our office manager, Carrie, took old salvaged books and created cool boxes by hollowing them out and lining them in scraps of our eco gift wrap. She’s filling each with fun little goodies for her family and friends.

With Christmas and New Year’s Eve just around the corner, we wanted to share a few more of the lovely custom letterpress holiday cards and invitations we’ve been printing this season. The first is a custom letterpress holiday invitation, a piece we printed for our friends at Paper & Chocolate in Dallas. It is printed in festive red ink with red edge painting paired with an envelope lined in our iznik pattern in grass ink.

This letterpress holiday card, brought to us by Cotton Idea Studio in Newport Beach, California,  features space to attach a photo and is printed in a unique holiday color combination of pool and spring inks. The card was then edge painted in pool.

These custom hang tags are the perfect holiday gift tags, printed for Buchanan Ink in Nashville. It is letterpress printed in spring ink then hole drilled and grommeted for the making of fabulous holiday packaging.