E is for Envelop(e)

Dear Everyone ~

The Abecedary is progressing nicely, albeit a bit more slowly than I had anticipated, because it has become more elaborate, more multi. Our entry for E, for example, features an envelope. Not an illustration of an envelope, an actual envelope. Not a little tipped-on envelope, but an actual full-page envelope.

This envelope was hand-folded by Alyson (a.k.a. my postal muse), sans template, from Selvedge Indigo, one of her “tip-top five Cambridge Imprint (CI) patterns.” The envelope measures 5½" x 7½", and I will bind it into the actual spine of the Abecedary with the other signatures. It will nestle neatly between D for (Decoration) and F (for Folderol). The envelope flap is 2½" deep and happens to align elegantly where it joins the back body, which has a 1¾" throat. This alignment serendipity is one of the joys of covering, wrapping, and enveloping with CI patterns, especially the geometrics.

Ruby wrote envelop(e) on a pair of BZS ’peccably perfed labels (The red-bordered version is not visible at this moment, but will be…) Inside the envelope, we’ve ensconced a pair of BZS postcards and, for good measure, a petite glassine holding the four corners Alyson nicked out to make the envelope and two tidbits from the selvedge of the CI parent sheet. Janet Hoffman, the winner of the Abecedary, is hereby encouraged to entertain the notion of enveloping other/additional snippets (t)herein.

In related “news,” we are delighted to debut three refreshment palettes for the MORE Art of the Hand-folded Envelope kit, for those of you wanting to hand-fold more envelopes out of fabulous papers. All three palettes present an abundance, probably a profusion, of papers (all handily cut to 8½" x 11") we love to slice and score and fold and glue. Plus cover-weight papers by French Paper Co. (in Michigan, not to be confused with Atelier Écluse in Montreal) for making backless envelopes and enticing notecards.