In addition to finding the published greeting cards, I also found the things that led up to them: the stack that we chose not to print, my mock ups, the ink drawings (had to use special ink) the camera-ready acetate overlays, on and on.

I remember standing in a print shop waiting for a xeroxing job. There was a girl behind the counter grinning, high, over-dramatically singing “That’s What Friends Are For.” It was 1986. There I was on the other side of the counter, thinking that I was creating a line of greeting cards. Was I nuts?

When I set up the mocked-up cards I did not have a computer, it was waaaay before people had them in their homes, but I did have an incredible Brother electric typewriter that had memory capability, a computer pre-cursor,  and it could hold onto about three lines of copy that could be viewed in a tiny screen, I found a font that was closest to what I eventually used.

I had to hire a compu-typist, see him in person, and on his then-primitive computer, he would print my lines of copy which I would then have to cut-up into strips and glue onto the mock-up. Nothing was quick and nothing was easy, I learned from my teacher as I went along. When the mock-ups were done Alan, the instructor, would take them to a bar and pass them around for feedback. People said that they were the best written cards they had ever seen.

We went to press.

These are the first twenty-four of the brain-storming originals that were not used. It’s all about the sale, and the ones that were printed were thought to be the most viable on the racks. If you see a stray line here and there it is a shadow of the type was glued on in strips.

The card that started it all was the little string bean; everything evolved from there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It all began with this little bean …

 

The first part of this series is here.
The second part is here.

But wait, there’s more, coming right here!