Greenwich Adventure!

Yesterday was a long day of driving, but totally worth it. I drove about an hour down to New Haven to pick up Meggie Pops, then we drove almost another hour down to Greenwich, CT. They have very twisty roads there.

We got a great parking spot and set out on foot to Kate's Paperie. It turns out that the Greenwich store is closed. Boo Hiss. To be fair, the website does say they're consolidating locations, but that's the kind of thing you don't figure would just up and close. Especially since Greenwich is such a market for that kind of thing. It looked like it was a pretty big store too; the location is still there and marked with the name, but with nothing inside. Sigh.

 Luckily, Kate's wasn't our only goal. We first stumbled across a Papyrus. We almost felt dirty going in there, after coming down for something a little higher-end, but I'm glad we went in.

 

 

just one shelf at Papyrus

It's the biggest Papyrus I've ever seen, and it had some great stuff that the stores around here don't have, including paper by-the-piece - individual cards and envelopes in varying sizes and colors. MIX AND MATCH!!!

Meggie Pops checking out the project center at Papyrus.

It also had a neat display for the store's sample "save the date" custom-print options:

Our other stop of the day was here: http://www.theresesaintclair.com/  The Therese Saint Clair stationers.

I got some beautiful things here, including this gorgeous "telegram" letterpressed set by Oblation:

The owners of Therese Saint Clair are a husband/wife team; the wife is just a sweetie who graciously allowed us to take pictures and gabbed with us about the love of paper; while the husband, it turns out, runs a blog/website of his own called The Stationers Guild. It looks pretty cool but I haven't gone through in depth yet. He sort of offhand invited me to write for the site occasionally....there's a thought.

I think my favorite item of the day had to be the Forgetful Gentleman's boxed correspondence set:

More information on this neat little box can be found here.

 The item that I really wanted but didn't buy?
It was a tie between two things, one at Papyrus, one at Therese Saint Clair.

Mediaevalis envelopes, no matching mini note cards. $38. Too expensive, but you should have felt these. Fantastic paper.

Little business-card sized papers letterpressed with phrases in French. I think this boxed set runs for $29. ADORABLE but too impractical (says the girl who can never have enough paper).

On the way back, the Pops and I had a singfest - Moulin Rouge, Jill Hartmann, Madonna, the Tarzan soundtrack (because in addition to fine paper we also both love Phil Collins), and a few more. We saw an SUV that took a digger and was on its side, plowed halfway into a snowbank. The resulting traffic jam slowed us down but on the upside, more time for singing.

For next time, I'm working on a post (maybe a post series?) featuring some of my favorite papers. I'm also thinking it might make sense to do scheduled updates - I'm thinking I'll do them on Monday nights, weekly. That way it keeps this page from being less sporadic, and also forces me to commit to getting something creative done regularly - both of which are good things!

been a long time!

Hi anyone out there! It's been a while - holidays, vacations, and at least one family crisis.

With the new year in full swing, it's time to revive the Paperie Project!

MeggiePops and I are headed down to Greenwich today to raid Kate's Paperie and another place called St. Clair Stationers & Engravers (you need an appointment to get in, tres fancy!).

We will put pictures up when we get back - don't forget, Valentine's Day is coming up!! I'm sure there will be a lot of red and pink when we return!

cyber mondays!

Just got an email from Kate's Paperie and thought my fellow paper fiends might like to know!

BOXCAR PRESS OPEN HOUSE!!!!

I just received this in my email.  I may have done irreversible drool-damage to my keyboard.

   

You can find more information here.

here come the holidays!

Okay, so the first post about a paper store - delayed.  However, here are some cute holiday finds for you to ooh and aah over! 

For anyone who doesn't know, letterpress makes me drool like few other things can.  So, it's only natural that I'm a big, big fan of the letterpress calendar by Jack and Lulu. 

It's VERY cute - especially because, hey, it has a STAND.  January's anchor is a favorite image, and I love the little skull and crossbones for October!  I could see this on my desk.

For another calendar option, check out minted.  They do photo calendars, custom calendars, cards, stationery - all kinds of neat stuff.  They should probably go in our sidebar, actually.  I like this card - a tree made of words.

As a paper-loving bibliophile, I'm all about booky gifts.  A couple of my favorites so far (aside from gift cards to bookstores) are the pointing bookmark and the Postcards from Penguin.  The first is this cool bookmark that elastics around half your book and has a little hand that points to exactly where you left off, like so:

 You can always count on the MoMA store to have neat stuff like that.

Postcards from Penguin is described on the Penguin Books website as follows:

"A collection of 100 postcards, each featuring a different and iconic Penguin book jacket. From classics to crime, here are over seventy years of quintessentially British design in one box.

"In 1935 Allen Lane stood on a platform at Exeter railway station, looking for a good book for the journey to London. His disappointment at the poor range of paperbacks on offer led him to found Penguin Books. The quality paperback had arrived.  Declaring that 'good design is no more expensive than bad', Lane was adamant that his Penguin paperbacks should cost no more than a packet of cigarettes, but that they should always look distinctive. 

Postcards from Penguin

"Ever since then, from their original - now world-famous - look featuring three bold horizontal stripes, through many different stylish, inventive and iconic cover designs, Penguin's paperback jackets have been a constantly evolving part of Britain's culture. And whether they're for classics, crime, reference or prize-winning novels, they still follow Allen Lane's original design mantra. Sometimes, you definitely should judge a book by its cover."

So, some good places to start when thinking of the paper-lover in your life or, if you ARE a paper lover, thinking of yourself.  (We all need to think of ourselves more, don't you think?)

 I will try to get out to a local paperie to start the journey this weekend but, failing that, I'll post photos of some of the favorite papers currently in my possession.

Cheers, and happy holiday planning!   ~leila bee ^_^

baby steps

There will be a first adventure this week, with a starter store for those of you who are new to the wonderful world of fancy pants paper. ^_^  Stay tuned!

testing, 1 2 3

Welcome to the paperie project, the online home base for our paperish explorations!