Thank You Notes

[Blotbot]

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/04/06/fashion/the-found-art-of-thank-you-notes.html?referrer=

Amen

[joi]

ditto that amen!

[Starlee]

I couldn't agree more!!

[Erica McPhee]

Great article! And kismet - I'm going to Stationer on Sunrise in Palm Beach tomorrow!!! Can't wait! 

[Blotbot]

I wonder if there could be an employment opportunity as a professional thank you note calligrapher?  What a nice why to send a nice thank you.  What would you charge to create a custom card?  I would think it would have to be a spontaneous effort (rather than a extensively planned out format) to keep the cost down.  Maybe $20? 

[YokePenCo]

There have a been a few companies try to offer this service, the one I recall most was lettrs.com who was hiring calligraphers at one point. After just visiting the page it looks like they turned it into a social media/texting service with a small amount of writing involved.

[joi]

i will add that most of my "practicing" involves sending thank you notes.  besides the benefit of for me the calligrapher, the recipient is so super thrilled to receive something pretty and done by hand in the mail.  a friend told me that it makes her day to go thru the mail and pull out a beautiful envelope, she wants to write a thank you for my thank you
the lost art of thank you's and correspondence is an added benefit that i did not anticipate!

[YokePenCo]

I do the same thing Joi, I even hand address bill envelopes just for the practice. The only mail leaving my home not hand addressed is my holders & now wipes because of needing tracking on the package. Someone sorting mail in a utility company bill room somewhere thinks I am completely nuts! lol

[Lori M]

I even hand address bill envelopes just for the practice

I should challenge myself that everything that goes out in the mail is addressed in calligraphy. Almost all our bills are done electronically now, though. 

I love the article, especially this quote at the end:

in the process of opening a note, feeling the paper, seeing the imperfection of the writing, reading the message in another person’s voice, you actually feel like you have a piece of that person in your hand.

I think that's worth putting in my quote file. (Which is also electronic -- I should start a calligraphy notebook instead!)

[Blotbot]

Yes! "the imperfection of the writing"!

[Erica McPhee]

Great quote!

On another note, can I be named the 2015 Queen of Carnival and receive over 600 gifts? Or better yet, I would just take this, "The pearl white cards Ms. Gelderman chose for her thank-you notes are engraved in dove gray ink by Arzberger and bear her name engraved in Roman lettering at the top. The envelopes were lined with gray-and-white patterned paper, and a custom shade of ink slightly darker than the paper was ordered from Iroshizuku to fill her fountain pen."