First anniversary of opening our shop .....

We can't believe that it will be a year tomorrow since we opened our little gift shop and to celebrate we are giving away a goodie bag filled with some of our lovely products.  All you have to do is start to follow our blog and leave a comment on what you would like us to blog about and we will pick a winner at random, so good luck and start following!!! .....

Indian Summer.....

These photos show the view from our studio window, needless to say not much work has been done today.  We have been trying to design our new ranges, but have been easily distracted with the lovely sunshine outside and with shopping online for dresses for The Henries (The prestigious greeting card awards) which are in 2 weeks time.  We have been nominated in the Gift Wrap category via Glick so are very excited.  We can't believe we are having this glorious weather so late in the year, lets hope it last a bit longer.

Personalised Birthday Banners ...

Our completely unique personalised banners are now available to buy on Notonthehighstreet.com.

Any wording is available, the banners measure 120 cm long x 25 cm wide and come in a set of three.  Christening, wedding, birth announcements, 1st birthday and any occasions can be specially designed for you.  Please contact us for more details.

Paperchase Delivery

This week has been very busy, we have been packing up our second order for Paperchase as well as keeping up with our christmas orders.

All hands on deck helping to pack up as we do all of our own warehousing, packing and distribution on our premises, to make sure that everything gets out on time.

Rhys, our courier loading the huge order onto the truck.

We have also been sending out our christmas orders to our customers.

Camper Van and Union Flag Gift wrap and Bags

Our very popular camper van and Union Flag designs have been brilliantly transformed into fantastic quality gift bags by Glick, we have recently completed lots more designs and are looking forward to seeing the finished results.

Life is just a bowl of Cherries.......

......on that note, have a nice weekend!!! xxxxx

Photo Shoot for New Paper Salad Website ...

Last week we styled our own photo shoot for all of the products we have chosen to be featured on our new website that is being constructed at the moment.  It took all day and we still haven't finished.
We didn't realise how much stuff we have got, personalised banners, invitations, cards, gift wrap and bags bespoke canvases and prints and now new money boxes, each product was styled and photographed separately.  We haven't got everything back from the photographers but here is a preview of what we have seen so far ......

We got to eat all the lovely cakes at the end of the day ...

Thanks to Lee and Andy from Manchester Print Services for all the photography.

We would love to hear everybody's comments.

The Ladder Club & London 2012 Design

Next month will be our third year talking at The Ladder Club, a crash course in greeting card publishing, run by Lynn Tait, of the Lynn Tait Gallery. Held once a year to help people trying to break into the greeting card market, it is full of essential information that would otherwise take years to find out! We attended when were thinking of making the leap from designer to publisher in 2004 and it helped us enormously. We were honoured when Lynn asked us to speak as we felt we had learnt so much over the years and had lots to give back to new publishers. The only problem is that we are not natural public speakers and standing up to talk in front of a room filled with over 100 people is nerve-racking, especially as some people struggle to understand our Northern accents!

The London 2012 design is going to be used as an example to show how different print finishes like flitter and foil can effect a design. More posts on The Ladder Club to follow!!

Personalised greeting cards.....

Today we have been working on creating alphabets for a liaison with a new print on demand online greeting card company.

We have hand drawn fonts in various styles to match our card designs, this means that when the cards are personalised they will look cohesive.

Our designs are due to go live on the website later this month so we will post the link when we get the go ahead.  We are looking forward to seeing how it all works ourselves.

Paper Salad's Card and Gift Shop

Just a few pics taken in our own shop.....

We now do personalised birthday banners.....

We have new stock arriving at the end of the month, ready for our (dare we say the word!!) Christmas

Shopping events.

Stockports 1st Film Festival

We are sponsoring the animation category at this event which is happening this weekend.

New Spring Seasons Designs....

Samples packed up and ready to go to our agents and distributors.

A couple of our new designs.  Our first sample set went out yesterday and there was an order waiting for us this morning.

Our new spring seasons brochure is ready for all of our trade customers. Please contact us if you would like one.

A day in the studio at Paper Salad

Our job really is a dream come true, we both enjoy, drawing, colouring, sticking and making something appear that we have created and can share with other like minded people.

Today we are designing a new gift wrap which we will licence to Glick. They already licence a large selection of our designs for gift wrap, gift bags and roll wrap and they are proving to be very popular.

Look out for the finished artwork in a later post.

Brand new blog!

Hello and welcome to the colourful world of Paper Salad!