Weddingbee PRO
Hello everyone! I’m Kimberly, the owner of the letterpress stationery company Blue Ribbon Design. I am so excited to be contributing to Weddingbee Pro and I can’t wait to start sharing ideas, inspiration and insight into how to select the perfect wedding stationery and get the most out of working with a designer. That said, let me tell you a little bit about myself…
Before I started Blue Ribbon, I worked at museums and galleries doing research, writing and editing for exhibition catalogues and other art-related publications. My favorite area of study was (and still is!) works on paper, and after designing my own wedding invitations I decided to combine my love of printmaking with graphic design, andvoilà, Blue Ribbon was born.
I have always loved pattern and ornament and draw inspiration from all sorts of decorative arts including textiles, package design, jewelry, and china patterns (to name a few!). I live in lower Manhattan with my husband and our dog, Oscar, and when I’m not running my business, I’m usually out and about looking for inspiration for future designs - I look forward to sharing my findings with all of you!
(ed’s note: This post is a continuation of Anne’s Mobile Monday series.)
This last week was kinda slow because I was really sick with a wicked flu and ended up having to cancel a lot of appointments so I wouldn’t cough all over people and gross them out. I didn’t have much of a voice the entire week, and thus didn’t feel much like venturing out too often unless I really had to. My poor husband was forced to make a few calls on my behalf and to be my translator when I sounded like I was speaking alien. If it weren’t for having a meal with the interns and needing to take Misty out, I probably wouldn’t have left the house at all. I really learned to appreciate not talking, however I still had hundreds of emails that required my fingers to do lots of walking. This week I’m happy to say that I have my voice back and I’m about 95% healthy again- just a few sniffles here and there which I’m keeping under wraps with some antihistamines. Technology also seems to be back on my side once again, so I’m looking forward to lots of productivity this week!! Woo Hoo!!
Last week we got the chance to visit Dilek Sezen, a San Francisco jewelry designer, in her Union Street studio. She recently launched an affordable wedding jewelry line that is just stunning!
About 5 years ago, famed professor and writer Lawrence Lessig sent out a mass email in response to the insurmountable number of emails in his inbox. Here’s what it said:
Dear person who sent me a yet-unanswered e-mail, I apologize, but I am declaring e-mail bankruptcy.
I think most of us have a love/hate relationship with email. We love it because it’s so convenient. We hate it because its convenience lends itself to overuse. In this world of blackberries (I confess I’m addicted to mine) and iphones, we carry our inboxes with us, and they’re a constant reminder of the work we have yet to do.
Currently I have 1885 unanswered emails in my work inbox, and I get hundreds of new emails daily. I regularly sit and power through emails for 4-5 hours straight. It’s not the most productive use of my time. I think if I answered every email I receive, I’d never get any work done. Another problem with email is whenever I have to write a difficult one, it takes me much longer than it would if I’d just had a conversation with the person. I want to make sure that I say the right thing since whoever I’m writing to will have a copy of my email to read or forward on for all eternity. 
We currently use gmail for business to power Weddingbee’s email. As soon as I respond to an email, or decide not to respond to an email at all, I label it and archive it so that it’s out of my inbox. I tend to answer emails as they come in throughout the day if I have time, and then power through a bunch in the evenings or on the weekends. I have yet to figure out a system that enables me to respond to everyone I need to in a timely manner, and doesn’t take up large chunks of my day.
What systems do you use to manage your email? Are you ever overwhelmed by the volume of email you receive and want to declare email bankruptcy?
My meeting with Nichole and Kerrie Underhill was one of the most fun consults ever. We laughed, we gushed, we brainstormed…and the vision for this energetic wedding emerged. Nichole wanted her florals to be voluptuous, dramatic and modern, with lots of sparkle. I loved how Nichole was willing to take risks with her florals and color palette.
Special thanks to Kerrie and her sweet assistants. Setting up all the intricate details for this wedding was not an easy task, and the Platinum Weddings gals were so eager to help us out along the way. You rock!
Extra special thanks to my amazing TPetal helpers (Shana, Deb, and my lovely sis) who, with superhuman strength, hoisted 70 pound arrangements onto the tables, snapped the heads off of over 1000 roses, poured enough blue water to fill a swimming pool, and came back at midnight to clean it all up. I adore you guys!
I am so excited to share Nichole and Mike’s wedding with you. When I saw Amy Squire’s blog post this morning, my jaw dropped. They captured this wedding so fabulously. Check out their blog post for the full scoop!
Meet the beautiful couple! I love how Amy Squires found so many cool backdrops at the Huntington Beach Hyatt.
YAY!!
I’m so excited to have finally started my year. Whew! And there was no better amazing couple to celebrate and kick off my sophomore year in wedding photography high school!
Lesley and Jason, are a lovely, warm, funny, amazing couple. It’s so obvious that they complete each other, and everyone who raised a glass, did to that notion. And so freaking stylish!! Lesley wore one the most beautiful Jenny Packham dresses I’ve EVER seen, and Jason made a light fixture out of spoons for the reception! Plus, it was at one of my favorite venues in New York City, The Foundry. In my very own home town of Long Island City. And the delightful Susan (from Susan and David) was wonderful company and was kind enough to carry my stuff around while I make pictures!
Off to Africa, we are, and soon!
My friends Kristen and Josh got married in beautiful Athens, Georgia last summer in a fantastic brick house with a lovely garden. The house was so amazing! It looked like it came out of a page from the magazine “World of Interiors.” I had been there before to do a photo shoot while working at hable and wanted to move in right away. When Kristen told me her wedding was going to take place there and mentioned all the wonderful decorations she and her friends where making for the occasion, I just knew it was going to be the prettiest celebration, Southern style!
When I got her invitation, I fell over -it was the cutest thing, and she designed it all herself! I’m all about handmade goods with lots of personality. It came in a handmade craft-paper envelope stitched with color thread along the edges. Party flags, birds and a tree-of-life were some of the details on the 10 1/2 x 16 1/2 folded poster. The colors where light and dark blue, golden yellow, brown, watermelon, olive, and avocado to name a few -very festive. I made the bird and party flags idea the main focus on the pillow and put the bird close to the center so it looks like its beak is holding the rings. I added a few beads on the bird’s tale for some sparkle and stitched some stars here and there with gold metallic thread. It turned out lovely.
Pillow in action (photo by rinne allen)
How could I resist posting this map for a wedding in Islesboro Maine? It was a destination wedding for my lovely client Gina and her fiance Christopher, that took place on this small island off the coast of mainland Maine. It’s a land of lobsters and fishermen, and the map displays it all. The gals got beautified at the Cutting Edge Salon while the men sailed around Penobscot Bay on the Schooner Olan, depicted in Camden Harbor.
Since the wedding took place over 4th of July weekend, how could the map be complete without a display of fireworks? This couture designer map is the perfect addition to an invitation set or a welcome basket!
I have to start this post by saying thank you thank you thank you to Emily at Once Wed….not only is Once Wed my new blog obsession, but it also led me to my favorite wedding of all time from MS Weddings. We have been scouring our back issues of Martha Stewart Weddings trying to locate that wedding again and we have never been able to find it. I had forgotten all about it until I stumbled across the Big Sur wedding featured over at Once Wed, which took it’s inspirations from the infamous MS Wedding (Lena and Joshua).
We’ve known Cindy and David separately for many years. During their engagement shoot, Dave reminded me of one time in college, when I messaged him a picture of an alarming piece of doo-doo that I had run into online. I still don’t remember why I did that, but that (among other things) has earned me the nickname “i-poop.” Jerry met David about 9 years ago when he was still in high school! Now we have all graduated, and Dave is on his way to becoming a pastor and marrying the most loving person I know!
While shooting one of our first weddings, Cindy broke the news to us that they had begun dating. Our eyeballs almost flew out! I remember that she was so happy, she was visibly glowing. For some reason it had never occurred to us before that they would get together. Now that we know them as a couple, they complement each other so well that I can’t imagine them apart.
-Ingrid
They are constantly making each other laugh. We wandered around San Francisco for a little while looking for cool places to shoot.
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