I can’t tell you how proud I am to start introducing Torrie Asai for Besotted Brand! Torrie is a new to lettering and by some twist of fate I have ended up becoming a bit of a mentor to her.  I saw that she had not only talent, but drive; what she lacked was confidence in her role as ‘creative’. I believe everyone has the ability to be creative (one of the main motivations behind this here blog), it just manifest itself in different ways for each individual (some people are great cooks, good with computers or numbers, organizing, even getting dressed, etc.  There’s many variations of creative!), it’s recognizing what you are creative at and working on it that will make your gift shine. I honestly can not believe how far she has come from our first correspondence, she’s worked so hard to develop her lettering practice (note she doesn’t even do this for a living!) and it really shows.  I even tapped Torrie to do the lettering for my last branding client, which is where she developed the style we used on this first offering, we call it ‘Sofia’.  We wanted a feminine, modern flowy hand that was still legible and Torrie nailed it.  We have more offerings coming before holidays, but I was just too excited after I received the sample above that I didn’t want to wait!  A huge congrats to Torrie!

Since I am anxious to show her work off I urge you to tweet and pin it, why?  Well, it would be nice to support a fellow creative but also because I will be giving one away of course!  Just answer the following question by Sunday, October 20, 2012:

What are your creative talents?

I will announce the winner next Monday, October 21, 2012.  Good luck!

P.S. I will be back later today with a tutorial on stamping like a pro on the cotton drawstring bags!

P.P.S. Use the code freeship01 to get free shipping on any of the stamps this week!

P.P.P.S. Torrie just turned me on to this new blog by some powerhouse internet celebs, I think you’ll like!

Some heavy hitters in the lettering world are teaching both on-line and in person classes this month, for those wondering where to get started I have listed some great places to visit!

For those of you that haven’t signed up yet for the Molly Jacques Skillshare class, what are you waiting for?  I have enrolled but being that it’s hard for me to do anything these days I still haven’t had a chance to watch!  I have heard good things about the class, that it’s a great place to start for beginners. Speaking of beginner’s if you are new to Skillshare you can use my instant discount and get the class for only $10! Seriously, what’s stopping you? And for those that have taken Skillshare classes in the past I have been begging them to give you all a discount since I do know a lot of you are signing up for multiple classes and it does add up, I promise to keep you posted if they will oblige me on this! If not, then I will keep my eye out on alternate resources.

Another fave Mary Kate McDevitt, you may have seen her work in your local Anthro as she has done a lot for Chronicle Books is launching her new class ‘The First Steps of Hand Lettering-Concept to sketch‘ It doesn’t launch until October 16th, but I am anxious to sign-up!

The darling + talented (and nicest person on earth) Maybelle Imasa-Stukuls will be in Australia next week a Megan Morton’s School for a week of classes, there’s all day and half day available, some are sold out but I see a couple still open.  I want to go to  Australia so badly and Megan’s School would be one of my dream, stops. Sign-up here!

The extraordinarily prolific font designer Jess of Magpie Paperworks has launched another winner of a font!  I don’t know how she is doing it, because putting together a font is not easy, especially when they are as robust as Jess makes hers, and to continue to introduce coveted fonts at that?  The woman is obviously a genius.

Some other fonts you may like are the sweet Mina and Carolyna.

P.S. Do you have a class (any class, it doesn’t need to calligraphy/lettering centric) that you think I should know about?  I get asked about classes for specific locales all the time, especially international ones, so please let me know besottedblog [at] gmail [dot] com

P.P.S. Jessica Hische of Drop Cap fame is teaching a lettering class (that looks amazing) in November!

I nearly knocked down my fellow patrons at the supermarket over the weekend when I saw the cover of Domino and the words ‘we’re back’ printed on the cover. I couldn’t have put this in my cart fast enough and even patiently (patience is not my strong suit) waited until the following morning where I could have a few minutes to myself before work to peruse it. Well…I so want to tell you that I loved it and it was even better than before and I am so happy I am going to implode, but I was left a little dejected, it was not the Domino of yore.  There were some odd choices like putting a model on the cover versus the owner of the interior, since that was how they used to do it, it was confusing when I saw the interior and it belonged to someone else. I worked in interior design for years and I can tell you that there are a bazillion photogenic and uberly talented designers that could have graced the cover and showed off their stunning interiors, really bazillion would be a low number, they do explain why they did this but I think they shouldn’t have budged on the format unless the apartment was so amazing it would have blown your mind then maybe. The apartment featured?  It’s lovely but really it’s a toned down version of Jenna Lyon’s former Park Slope flat, the same chandelier, same body style on the sofas and creme and brown tribal rug, same fireplace, maybe it’s even the same place (she did sell it after all).  It’s just not something that I haven’t seen before, now when I saw Jenna Lyon’s place for the first time I was WOWED, and you know I am a neutral loving, subtle palette kind of girl but I love when someone has such original vision (here’s another peek).

One thing I was happily surprised about was the new editor-in-chief, none other than former Domino staffer Michelle Adams (of Lonny mag fame).  That girl is a success story and in my few dealings with her, she has been beyond kind. I am sure having a lot more cooks in the kitchen contributed to how this issue played out, but I know she has the chops and the love of Domino to bring it back to its former glory.  Now that I have probably ostracized myself from any future Domino dealings maybe I should go into what I liked?  I liked the gift guides, but I am a sucker for gift guides in general, what would have been amazing is if they contacted Ez for her gift guide prowess, every year Ez’s guides are so worth the wait, but I digress. I loved that they featured Etsy artists within the gift guide round-up, when I first started on Etsy in 2007 editors wouldn’t want to feature you with just an Etsy shop, I love that it is now not only accepted but highlighted-go indie!  There were no ads throughout the book, interesting. I hope they continue to do a floral feature, I would love to see Amy Merrick’s work!  I actually have more input, but I will hold my tongue and wait for the scathing email  from Domino. I do want this magazine to make a comeback even if it is only seasonal so I am hoping that the next offering is a lot more meaty and has more of what we loved of the original mag–keep it light, keep it clean, keep it original, introduce us to new ideas and new talents and don’t make it so aspirational that we can’t afford anything within the pages.  Go Domino, I know you can do it!

As I roll into my 8th month I am trying not to panic on what needs to be done before baby B. arrives (according to my checklist a lot). One thing is definitely not going as smoothly as planned and that is naming her. I had always thought that I would name her after my paternal grandmother, but that name has rose in popularity so fast that it has become the #1 girls name in America according to the Social Security records name popularity site.  Being bestowed a unique unisex name (which I love) I want my daughter to have the same affinity for her own name and also I like having a name that is not so common, to me it feels special, albeit I did try to get people to call me ‘Jenny’ at one point in my youth but no one went for it.  I also wasn’t planning on having such a vocal partner when it comes to names. My husband who is usually relaxed and agreeable has become the ax ‘thrower downerer’ on names, giving each one an instant kabosh and when asked why gives me the frustrating answer, “just don’t like it.” I am someone that needs to know why, I can’t have a name tossed away so flippantly. So, when I offered up ‘Seren’, which is Welsh for star, he answered, “It’s a name of a poisonous gas”. It’s still pretty though. I would like to start calling her something and we have narrowed the names down to half a dozen choices, which I like to go over with my husband every.single.day which has prompted him to say, “If I agree to one of the names can we stop this discussion?” Uhm, no! Is he nuts? It’s her name, it’s supposed to be fun not a chore. I love ‘Keaton’ which I heard on a little girl a while back which has multiple meanings one of them being ‘baby hawk’ which I thought was both sweet + strong, but that one was thrown out almost before it rolled off my tongue. I knew of a beautiful and quirky doctor named ‘Prudence’ and have always thought it was so delightfully old-fashioned, but may actually just read ‘old lady’. ‘Clementine’ which was the name of Winston Churchill’s beloved wife has actually started to rise in popularity which takes away from its appeal for me, but wasn’t of appeal to her Papa so there’s that. I loved a host of French-centric names ‘Martine’ (Marty), Almandine, Esme (wow, did this one rise in popularity!), Colette (my husband thinks it rhymes too much with ‘toilet’), Adeline, but those were all nixed as well. So here I am back to my six, but figured maybe there’s an unusual unisex name that I haven’t heard of yet that you might know of?  It’s worth a try to ask and it seems like everyone has a few spare baby names that they love but aren’t going to be using (or have a partner that has vetoed the name), so are there any unisex baby names that you love that you would like to throw into the Baby B. name pool? Please be my guest, I am open to hearing anything and everything! I am especially partial to both literary and nature names, or of course unusual classics but those seem to be very popular right now.

And if you are struggling with naming your baby, business or fictional character for your novel I have made a little list of name sites that I have been enjoying:

Appellation Mountain-The commentors always seem to have a lot of suggestions so if you like a name scroll through the comments for even more ideas!

Baby Name Genie-this has a fun little feature wherein the genie offers up 3 baby name wishes.

Baby Names World- I like the look up by origin feature.

Nameberry -I think the forums are better than the actual site!

The embossing adventure continues!  These steps will work on all cardstocks but white ink on kraft/chipboard is my most requested so I thought I would oblige. The above image is what a typical white ink would look like stamped on a kraft or chipboard stock (the sample shown is industrial chipboard) it’s not horrible, it’s more rustic, not the result that I want (and I assume from the emails I get neither do you). The problem lies in the surface, the chipboard is porous and fibrous and has a tendency to ‘eat’ the ink it also is not a smooth surface which is not optimal for stamping on (again, I recommend Paper Bag from Paper Source for a nice kraft look carstock + smooth surface).  To begin embossing I highly recommend investing in an embossing buddy type tool (you can refer to the full embossing supplies list here), this tool removes static from your surface and will ensure that your embossing powder will only stick to the actual image you stamped instead of leaving globs of powder all over your surface.

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