This is the first time I do this!

For so many years I wanted to create greetings cards without finding or taking the time. This year will be different.

Hello friends,

First, I want to apologise because I did not send my newsletter last Friday as planned. I actually had an online workshop with my partner Pyramyd and I could not find the time to write the post between each session. So here it is :)

Back to the workshop I did, it was a Fontself one. During 2 days I helped people to create their own font using that Illustrator plugin. I really like teaching that kind of workshop. I already did it during Covid period and that was pretty successful. So I thought maybe I could some new ones, what do you think?

Here are a quick poll I would like you to answer to see if there would be a potential in this kind of training. It could be around lettering, type design or even other subjects like mental health, creativity or passive income. Also the workshops could be simple 2hrs webinar up to a 2 full days workshop. So please, help me by answering these few questions :)

Thanks for your answers. If you want to go further, don’t hesitate to comment below.

Greeting cards for Christmas and 2024!

Let’s come back to the title of that newsletter. Yes, this year I will do something I always wanted to do but never found the time to do: greeting cards. And I must say this is a really exciting project for me. I did design 8 different cards, with different designs and I will print them all from home. They will be available Friday online, so please don’t miss Friday’s issue of that newsletter :)

Here are some visuals I did:

As you can see, these are full powerful coloured lettering and illustration. I even did some French ones for my compatriotes here around. I will actually do a local Artists Market in December so I want to offer people something in French.

But let’s stop 2 minutes on why I could do these this year and not the years before.

I think part of it is because I don’t do client projects anymore. So I can focus on my own work. But sometimes it can be overwhelming too because I do everything myself, from design to shipping. And outside the process of creating and printing, there is also communication and promotion. And that’s the part where I always struggle the most. Creating communication visuals and promoting my work is not my favorite part. So sometimes I tend to procrastinate on that ^^

And yesterday I realised that since I don’t work from home anymore, I tend to be more relaxed and less overwhelmed. Which leads to more space to deal with these things. And I think it helped me to not feel overwhelmed by this project. To be honest, I tend to be more efficient working from the city than home. At home I tend to procrastinate a lot more. When I am at the office or atelier, I know why I am there. I am there to focus, focus on work. It is more difficult for me from home. There are too many things around I should do outside of work.

Maybe you relate to that, so if it is your case, I can only give you the advice to go out and find a nice place to work. You don’t need an office. A cosy coffee shop can make it :) And it can only be one of two days of just a few hours but I do believe it helps focus.

Inspiration of the week

1. Brinca Variable Font

This fantastic font was shared to me by my friend Guillaume from Marmite DeFontes and I love it! This is a variable font that goes from something zigzag to totally round and organic. This is a brilliant idea which gives you different fonts in the same file. Check out these visuals:

2. Britney Variable Font

We get a bit on the font side of things this week but this other example is also really great and experimental. Check out this animation of the font (click on the image below):

salade.tomate.cornichon

A post shared by @salade.tomate.cornichon

OK, this is maybe really weird and experimental but so fun!

This is it for today :) Friday will focused on the sale of my greeting cards and I will also explain details about their process. So see you on Friday, don’t forget to answer the polls above and I hope you have a nice week.

Take care,

Francis