The Girls Friday


Because packaging is the first impression, I spent my free time this week creating some attractive (and book-like) envelopes for my typewriter trading card sets. I wasn't sure what sort of packaging I wanted for them at first, so I did some looking around at different options. I settled on a template for an Artist Trading Card Envelope that I found on Mirkwood Designs (they have great templates for all sorts of paper-folding projects, including one for a Library Card Book Pocket). I had to adjust the measurements to fit my cards because I made them a little bit larger than the standard 2.5 x 3.5" trading cards.

I measured out the envelope template on a manila folder because it would give the envelope sturdiness, and then cut it out. Then, I glued the envelope to the back of some beautiful printed papers from Paper Mojo. After the envelope template was covered with the decorative paper, I folded the tabs down, creased them well with my bone folder, and glued them in place.

Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell in His Girl Friday (1940)
Then I had to pick out a sort of title for this trading card set. I decided on "The Girls Friday" after watching the 1940 Cary Grant film His Girl Friday with Rosalind Russell as reporter ace Hildegard "Hildy" Johnson. To be truthful, I first got the idea after reading this blog post from Uppercase Magazine. But I didn't feel I'd be truly qualified to use the name unless I at least watched the movie first (which I ended up enjoying very much). It just felt perfect. I wanted something that evoked the idea of office girls, secretaries, etc. I took the fact of the main character's name being identical to the name I gave to my first typewriter as a sign that this was definitely the right title for my project.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"Imago" on Hannibal season finale

Image
While watching the eagerly-awaited season 2 finale of Hannibal (one of my absolute favorite TV shows of the moment), I was happily surprised when a vocabulary lesson emerged mid-conversation between Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham. — "Do you know what an imago is, Will?" — "It's a flying insect." — "It's the last stage of a transformation." — "When you become who you will be?" — "It's also a term from the dead religion of psychoanalysis. An imago is an image of a loved one, buried in the unconscious, carried with us all our lives." — "An ideal." — "The concept of an ideal." Of course this term, in both of its definitions, has some great significance for me. It is a word I didn't even know until I stumbled across it in my dictionary browsing and knew immediately that this is the title of my chapbook . It was perfect. So when it snuck up on me again in my favorite TV show, in
Read more

There are birds here

Image
We are now in the full porch-swing of summer, which means Summer Poetry Salons at my beloved Lit House. In celebration of the second salon of the summer on June 24 (tomorrow!), I was given the unbelievably fun task of designing and printing a letterpress broadside for Jamaal May's poem "There Are Birds Here,"  a love song for Detroit. As much I loved this poem on my first reading (and second and third), it was a particularly difficult design challenge. Don't get me wrong — there are so many ways  to illustrate this poem because it is so packed with images. But to illustrate it in a way that actually adds to the text, that builds on the complex foundation set down by the poet — that is the challenge to be met. That is the challenge we always aim to meet at the Literary House Press .   So that means no birds and no buildings. For me, those are the two most obvious, but least important images in this poem. Those details are just the shell around the actual poem
Read more

On the end of a year & a decade: 2019

Image
In this last month of the year, I've had five poems accepted by three different literary journals and two new reviews of my book appear in The Cincinnati Review  and Harbor Review . I also completed the letterpress printing of the Rossetti Prize broadside for American Literary Review , designs for four more digital broadsides , and the initial edits & contributor proofs for Cherry Tree 's sixth issue. Whew! It's been an amazing and overwhelming and utterly fulfilling year ; and I'm riding into the new year on 2019's coattails.  Also featuring the gorgeous handmade scarf that Jehanne Dubrow wove for me this past year. One of my favorite December inventories will always be reflecting on a year's worth of personal accomplishments and progress. By the time the end of the year arrives, it's so easy to forget all that happened just a few short months ago. Making a list has a way of bringing it all into perspective. Here's my roundup for the yea
Read more