Monday, January 20, 2014
SAN FRANCISCO VICTORIANS

My favorite time of year has come and gone, but during those few weeks of holiday cheer, I was crafting away on DIY Christmas presents for family, friends, and coworkers. Nate and I are for sure homebodies--we are perfectly content spending evenings and weekends at home without leaving the house and eating home-cooked meals three times a day. 

Yet, on the first weekend of December, we decided to go out on a limb and take a day trip out to San Francisco. At Fort Mason, we stumbled upon a holiday craft fair full of local vendors selling their artisan products. One vendor was selling kraft notebooks embossed with custom travel stamps. I looked up at Nate and said, "Hey, I could totally do this too." And from that trip, a sketch of a San Francisco Victorian house was born into a stamp, and in turn, became fifteen-some custom kraft notebooks. I guess it's good to get out once in a while and feel inspired, right? 


The kraft notebooks were very affordable and bought on Amazon. Although not shown here, each notebook was personalized with a name stamped below the row of houses.


My light tracer has become one of my favorite tools. I use it to outline, sketch, and reiterate. First I drew the first draft in pencil, then ink and then transferred it onto Photoshop to clean up and enhance the drawing. 


I have to give another plug to my go-to stamp store, Berkeley Stamp. It's a very small local stamp store in Downtown Berkeley. I have ordered numerous custom stamps there (as have my 'clients') and they have really nice people working there.


From powder to raised ink!

Stamping the kraft notebooks took a lot of trial and error (and frustration... Nate can account for the stamping tantrum I had one night). I had to figure out a working methodology of how to align the stamp so that it was straight and center on the cover, how to get the right amount of ink onto a notebook without it bleeding all over the place and achieving thin crisp lines, and how to emboss the stamp without the notebook cover curling.


I'm thinking next time I will tackle the Boston brownstone.

  JANET posted at 11:26 AM | 7 comments




{ABOUT}

JANET CHANG



I'm obsessed with the customization of anything and everything because I believe a one-of-a-kind item reveals the self and transforms ownership into something special. For now, graphic design is only a hobby of mine that I picked up from architecture school, but some days I tickle the thought of making it into a part-time career.



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