Hello!

Paul Haslam, director of the fantastic printers Benwells (I designed their identity a few years back) recently asked me to create a promotional mailer for his business. Paul wanted to have something to send to existing clients, and also to send out to potential new clients. I decided it would be great to create something that not only showcased Benwells’ particularly fine work, but which was also something that people could actually use.

So, I had a think about the sort of things you might send or receive in the post. Which got me thinking about postcards.

Now, it’s not that often you get sent a postcard these days. Email, texting and social media have usurped that role for themselves.

But when you do receive a card – well, it feels just great. It shows that someone thinks you’re worth just a little bit of effort – they’ve stepped away from their computer, found a card, then found a pen (that works), carefully hand-written the card, found your address, bought a stamp, and even walked to the postbox. Probably in the rain. (Actually, that’s quite a bit of effort – they must really like you.)

So I teamed up with Benwells to create some postcards that are a pleasure to send, and a joy to receive. A couple of limited edition packs of postcards in fact – one pack, ‘Thanks’, to say thank you; the other, ‘Greetings’, to say hello.

I created two alternate sets of packaging for the postcards – one set for Benwells, and another for We Made This. Both feature white foil-blocked Nomad Buff sleeves, and are sent out in tear-open Colorplan envelopes – green for Benwells, grey for We Made This.

Each pack contains ten different cards, all using delicious G·F Smith papers.

I don’t want to give the game away by showing you the whole lot, but here are just a few from the Greetings pack.

‘Howdy’ features a white foil on Woodside Garden Pine:

‘Hola’, echoing the Spanish flag, uses a yellow foil on duplexed Colorplan Bright Red and Factory Yellow:

‘Ey up’ features a white foil on a fantastically thick (1200gsm) Nomad Bedrock:

And then there’s the Thanks pack:

‘Much Obliged’ is blind debossed on 400gsm Moondream:

‘Lots of Thanks’ features white and super-diffuser foils on Colorplan Dark Grey (with a Buckram emboss) duplexed with Colorplan Factory Yellow:

‘Fanks’ uses a copper foil, again on the Nomad Bedrock:

The reverse of each card details the process used to print it, and what stock it’s printed on. So even if you don’t decide to send them on to anyone, they’re still really useful.

I (and Benwells) will be mailing the packs out over the next couple of weeks – so keep an eye on your postbox.

Thanks!