We absolutely love hearing about your crafts, projects, and inspirational ideas. But, this time, we’re turning the camera on ourselves. Follow Paper Source Intern, Christina, as she takes you behind the scenes at the Paper Source home office…
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Behind the Scenes at Paper Source
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What a HOOT?!
On Monday, Paper Source Facebook fans got a peak inside the Halloween festivities that took place at our Corporate Office. We were not surprised when comments poured in over the wily owl costumes created by our Custom Print & Invitations team – everything from the colorful paper to the unique details of each winged character left everyone in awe.
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On display now: PS Christmas tree at the Chicago Botanic Garden
The ever-busy gnomes at the Chicago Botanic Garden have just unveiled the 2010 PS Christmas tree at the annual Wonderland Express Walk. Our tree theme this year? Elves!
And not just cookie-cutter elves. My own elfin PS Crafts team and I started with our new Holiday Elf Kit and crafted 100 individual elves. Like snowflakes, every single one is different with his or her own personality. They’re all nestled in a garland made from our Holly A7 Leaf Cards.
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Work at Paper Source for the holidays!
Happy Holidays! Yes, here in the Paper Source Recruitment Department I am focused on getting our stores staffed for the busy holiday season. I love reading blog entries written by our staff that start with “I have the best job ever!” I have to agree, and in my role as Field Recruiter, I get the fun of speaking about this amazing brand to many people each week. My job requires reading lots and lots of resumes, and what keeps this routine task fun and exciting is finding cover letters from our best candidates who often become employees – OUR CUSTOMERS. I can feel the passion when someone writes that they just attended a workshop and quickly got online to apply for a position – they tell me, “I just have to work here! I was so inspired by the creative process and all of the associates look like they have so much fun at work with the customers.” It makes me goosepimply, if that is a word!
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Hometown Pride & Two Grand Openings this Saturday!
This weekend is a biggy for Paper Source, and for us Chicagoan’s – being the home base for the company – it’s a moment to pause and celebrate a bit of hometown pride! When I joined the company eight years ago, we had 9 stores. Today marks the opening of our 39th store in Studio City, California and tomorrow we celebrate the Grand Opening of our 38th and 37th stores, Santa Monica, California and Southport here in the Windy City! Seeing a new store open is really exciting for us old timers, and I know I feel a lot of pride in seeing us open again in Chicago on such a wonderful shopping street as Southport.
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Ask Annie
For my last blog entry as a summer intern at Paper Source, I interviewed someone who embodies creative inspiration – Annie, our Craft and Visual Merchandising Designer.
What do you do on a typical day at work?
Everyday I brainstorm new kits, how-to ideas for the stores and our blog, as well as physically work on numerous craft assignments. I make samples for our stores such as cards, invitations and paper kits. I even make birthday banners for PS employees! -
Behind the glass: a look into PS window displays
It’s nearly impossible to walk past a Paper Source store without stopping to admire the creative and colorful window displays. If you are like me, you may have simply assumed that the items in the windows – whether giant paper dolls or bigger-than-life pastel paper magnolias – are mass-produced by machinery. But I learned on my very first day as a Paper Source intern that every single item in a Paper Source window is made by hand.
One of my first projects this summer was to help make multicolored whirls from envelopes that are now displayed in the windows of our new stores in Corte Madera, California and Houston, Texas. We made these sunburst shapes in our new PS colors: persimmon, peacock, sunshine, and paper bag; using four different envelope sizes. I worked along side Maria and Estela, two of the master crafters here, who work every day to make the beautiful items you see in our windows, as well as the samples in our stores.
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From house pet to holiday card
Inspiration comes from anywhere and anything, and in the case of this Valentine’s Day card it came from Fabra’s adorable Boston Terrier, Archie! As the intern here at Paper Source, I’ve gotten the chance to observe the unexpectedly extensive process that one simple greeting card design goes through, before winding up at our stores ready to be sold.
The first step after an idea is conceived is its design. Elements such as print method, fonts, color, size, imagery, and copy all must be taken into account. For this card, one of our graphic designers, Elaine, used an existing image of a Boston Terrier as inspiration for her hand-drawn computer image. She made sure that the dog had the right angle and facial expression in order to create a strong composition with lots of character. Once the design is created, it goes through an approval process. Often there are color, composition or sentiment tweaks that must be made in order to prefect the card.
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Girl Power – tween crafting party!
Did you know that Paper Source is the perfect place for a private party? Recently, a group of tween girls finished a soccer game in the morning, and then headed straight to our Evanston store for some fun creative time! We loved learning all about what inspires this age group – what are their favorite PS colors?…what new crafts and classes do they want to see us invent? And without a doubt, our favorite part was learning what makes them smile. The answer: hanging out with their friends while doing something creative!
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Paper Source handmade cards
The Paper Source motto is “Do Something Creative Every Day”, and we have some very lucky folks here who get to live this out making handmade greeting cards for a living. If you’ve visited our stores, you’ve seen our greeting card wall full of funny, thoughtful and lovely cards. Among these you’ll find Paper Source greeting cards assembled by our team in Chicago – each one is truly a masterpiece (below are a few holiday cards available in stores now).