Tag Archives: Art Supplies

Origami Wishes

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Today I’m working on my New Year’s ‘cards‘ that I will send to some close friends. I don’t do xMas cards anymore, call me a rebel but I try to make a difference and not follow the crowd blindly so I craft my own ‘cards‘ and try to turn it into something special each year instead of the regular stuff that is out there in the supermarkets. I want those that are special to me to receive something special, it’s about making the effort…

I’ll use my favourite paper that I bought in London at the Chinese wholesaler where I used to get my Asian groceries. I bought loads of the coloured kind and only a few sheets of the paper I’m now using for the ‘cards‘. The girl at the till asked me why I bought that much paper so I said to her that I’m a graphic designer and I just love the quality of it. She just responded with a quiet ‘oh…’ but I realised what she was thinking.

You see, this paper has a totally different meaning to the Chinese than it has to me, to me it’s ‘just’ another piece of beautiful paper that I can use to design something special. Paper made of rice or bamboo fibers with a beautiful coarse texture of ‘laidlines’. To the Chinese it’s ‘ghost money’ and used as an offering to worship the ancestors and to ensure that the spirit of the deceased has all the good things in the afterlife.

I don’t see why I couldn’t use it for another purpose: I think I’m only complementing this beautiful paper. I’ve chosen to hide my New Year’s wishes inside a cute Origami design and since it’s all handmade I’m only gonna send a few to a select company of people. Only those who will appreciate the effort, so instead of the ‘usual’ twenty five xMas New Year’s cards, I’ll reduce that to ten this year. Why only ten people?

Because I’m limiting some friendships… It’s time to shift the focus from others to myself and some of these so-called friendships simply seem too unbalanced so I’d rather nurture the more rewarding ones. I’d like to thank those who sent me a (digital) xMas message, some came as a total surprise to me *happy smile* Mine is -as you can read- still in the making and soon on it’s way around the world *wink*.

‘This above all: to thine own self be true.’

~Shakespeare

©Zesty Gal Beautiful paper… waiting to be cut and folded

©Zesty Gal Beautiful paper… waiting to be cut and folded

Creative Collector

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I have this addiction for colours, paper and ink or to be more precise about the latter: the process of printing. Each as a separate drug or a combination of them will give me my ultimate high. I can’t remember at what age this started but I do remember what it started: felt-tip pens and ‘vouwblaadjes’. At times my mum would take us to the toyshop after nagging her for hours, explaining that we ‘just wanted to have a look around’. My brothers would go for Playmobil or Lego toys, I’d always make a beeline for the craft and art supplies section.

I would be instantly mesmerized by the organised ranges of colours no matter what it was: beads neatly arranged by colour in their separate compartments, crayons or felt-tip pens sets sorted by the colours of the rainbow and 250 sheets packages of square and coloured paper called ‘vouwblaadjes’ used for the Dutch version of origami: paper folding art. I still know a thing or two about paper folding and whenever my mum would buy me a package of ‘vouwblaadjes’ I would try my best to keep it neat and in exactly the same order of colours.

Not just the folding paper, I also had to keep my felt-tip pens arranged by the colours of the rainbow. You see, all these craft and art supplies were treasures to me and of immense value. I wanted to enjoy this for as long as possible which meant you’d have to look after it and keep things tidy and neat. My parents always encouraged creativity over grades: both have amazing drawing skills and my mum has a degree in fashion design and sewing. School was important, just not as important as a natural skill set, the grades were good anyway.

This is how it all started. These days resulting in a large variety of beautiful designed labels: food, whisky and wine, intruiging [Moleskine] notebooks, Talens Acrylic paints, Daler Rowney brushes, Conté crayons, Derwent watercolour pencils, Derwent color pencils, Van Gogh soft and hard pastels, hand-made paper containing cotton fibers and embedded leaves and/or flowers, Joss paper, wrapping tissue paper, rice paper, blue airmail paper, Chinese ink and nib pens, Pilot fineliners, Staedtler markers, glitter pens and my good old fountain pen…

And what I just mentioned is probably not even half of the things I have neatly stored away in my cool chest of drawers flight case… There’s another collection of graphic design tools, like a Pantone Color guides set, cutting tools, drawing tools and lots and lots more. So you see… this is why I could not resist the urge to buy those two notebooks last Saturday, it’s in my genes…

Blame my parents *wink*

Aladdin’s cave: Paper

Aladdin’s cave: Pencils

Aladdin’s cave: Pastels

Aladdin’s cave: Vouwblaadjes