Dear Everyone ~
Earlier this month was my birthday, and I was overjoyed to receive such a bounty of papery gifts & real mail from workshop students, other customers & friends! From hand-folded envelopes to assorted bonbons, both to eat and to display, here are just a few delicious details.
My postal muse, a.k.a. AK, sent me a suite of surprises, all wrapped in a chorus of Cambridge Imprint patterns. The largest item is a book (Fresh Water for Flowers, which I’m so looking forward to) and the card atop it is the handiwork of our mutual friend Maralee Kielborn, who is more than masterful with a micron pen. Alyson had received this card penned by Maralee (blank on the back) a couple of years ago, and kept it for the perfect occasion, which turned out to be my birthday! The smaller bonbons contained to be wood type, including a big BZS, a tiny u, and an extra Z, so I can spell BuZZ.
Robb, who is BZS’ Cambridge Imprint origami folder & arranger, sent a festive envelope that enveloped me with delight. He fashioned a protective “portfolio” bearing part of a Japanese paper fan, with the inscription From a big fan. He enclosed elegant ephemera he hoped I’d enjoy, most notably several sheets of personal stationery from Charing Cross Road—but not the eponymous London bookshop at No. 84! This was from the Playboy Mansion on Charing Cross Road in the Holmby Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles. So, this treasure is tangential to my collection of hotel stationery, because when I was young, my parents took my brothers and me to the Playboy Hotel in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. Robb also bestowed upon me five vintage Chicago postcards, including a particularly lovely one of the interior of the Garfield Park Conservatory.
One of my newest correspondents, Audrey Kuhn (Alyson’s niece), sent a magnificent handmade card that also arrived exactly on my birthday. Her theme was a bouquet of beautiful B’s, and it was beyond bon, a mix of hand-lettering and collage. The back was brimming with B-words, including her sign-off: Brightly Beguiled by Bari. Audrey was a lettering artist for Trader Joe’s before becoming a photographer and gourmet correspondent. Her birthday envelope to me is at the top of the post.
Carla Jacob, Bookful all-timer, bookbinding enthusiast, and avid correspondent, happened to be in Chicago and brought me a selection of delectable confections. She embellished the clear container with Cambridge Imprint shards & scraps!
A few weeks ago, chocolatier & paperista Wendy Sherwood was travelling through Chicago and stopped in the shop to chat & to wrap. She gifted me an incredible assortment of her hand-marbled papers, pristinely presented in an envelope she had hand-folded from food-grade glassine. After her visit, Wendy sent me this delicious envelope she had made from a Cavallini calendar page that she had hand-cancelled.
Last and littlest, but not least, look at my card from my friend Melanie’s granddaughter Ellie! She hand-folded the envelope—with a bit of help from Melanie, of course—and she chose the page from a 1980s Martha Stewart magazine. I love how she’s colour coordinated her endearing collage with the ink she wrote her greeting in… And I’m beyond delighted to have an “early Ellie” work of art.
I am ever so grateful to be the recipient of such thoughtful & creative birthday keepsakes—and tickled to see “BZS” materials & inspirations boomeranging back to me!
Boundless joy, Bari