The Card Designer Spotlight is a series featuring independent makers whose greeting cards you can find in Paper Source stores. Meet and be inspired by a new designer every month on our blog!
This month we want to introduce our featured card designer, Ashleigh Verrier of Verrier Handcrafted. Ashleigh’s inspiring story is one that is filled with a creative pivot to a dream, hard work and a lot of glitter.
How did you begin your card-making career?
Upon graduating from NYC Parsons School of Design in 2004, I was awarded “Designer of the Year” for my fashion thesis clothing collection. Saks 5th Avenue NYC Flagship store put in a modest purchase order for all of the wardrobe garments that I had created. At that time, I thought I was on my way to be a fashion designer with the blessing of my garments being placed next to Marc Jacobs. Without getting too gloom-ridden, there was the sting of the financial crisis in 2008 that hit the fashion world hard. That presented a dilemma, as a young fashion designer, to get creative with reinventing myself. Curiously enough, this challenge found me revisiting the part of fashion design that I enjoyed the most – drawing fashion. I remember when I was a student at Parsons, I would actually get called out because my assignments focused a bit too much on the rendering of what the fabric texture looked like in my sketches, as well as rendering what the face of the person wearing my created garment looked like. This approach was not needed for the concept of quickly sketching out silhouettes. I refashioned some of these paper fashion gals into cards I would send to my grandmother. She actually told me to consider a greeting card business. A few years later I became engaged and ended up creating my own wedding invitations, along with fashion icon prints for the table number. Much enthusiasm was expressed for my artwork at my wedding with request to place orders for this paper fashion.
Where do you draw inspiration from?
As a young teenager, if asked what I wanted as a gift, I would always request fashion books and magazines (even when on any family trip for a souvenir). I would use my bedroom window as a light box taping up torn out editorial pages from these magazines to teach myself how to draw facial features and hair coiffures for my traced croquis wearing all types of styles. These fashion magazines introduced me to a global world of fashion inspiration. The majority of my original artwork card collections are my interpretations of whimsical feminine fashionable characters. As I grew older, I continued to be captured by the lives of Hollywood fashionable icons which led to my ‘What Would (insert icon
name) Do’ card collection.
My mom laughs looking back at my 6 year old self only wanting to wear a heavy hand of sparkle. She expresses my love of fashion, art with glam and glitter, in hindsight was always part of my DNA. There is a very long story on how I led her through a must have mission to secure a pair of glitter sneakers before glitter sneakers were in vogue. In kindergarten, I even had the idea to change my name to Sparkle. Fortunately, my teacher was all in on indulging me. So I guess being well beyond the age 6 currently, my attraction to glitter and the brightness of neon has become my personal evolved motif. The signature on all of my cards, prints and canvases has that continued heavy hand of sparkle with detail using glitter and neon paint accents.
What does your day look like as a card maker and designer?
Raising two young children without a nanny (a daughter 9 years old and a son 2 years old) finds each day overbooked for managing to accomplish all that is needed for my Verrier Handcrafted career and familial attention. Unfortunately, a child’s demands are not always a matter of upholding a predictable schedule. Fortunately, my original artwork has a more gentle nature of being inspired and created anywhere at any time, when a moment allows. These fashion creations have become my escape to life after motherhood. My company does have a production studio in NYC with invaluable dedicated employees who have been with me, even throughout the pandemic. My executive production manager, was actually my first intern and she is like family to me! In addition, we use some USA companies for outsourcing certain elements of our business production.
What is your preferred medium?
The first year at Parsons, had me experiencing all forms of medium for creating art, inclusive of a cardboard chair that needed to hold my weight to pass the exam! I used an array of art mediums: styrofoam, metal, plexiglass, charcoal, pens and all types of paint. I find myself pretty much attracted to the idea of using paint as a favored medium. More specifically, the Verrier Handcrafted art designs are embellished with neon acrylic paints, accented with fine grains of glitter.
What does your creative process look like?
The first step of each design is an original art concept that I personally create. I follow with positioning the art into a file that can be printed out in a variety of sizes on a variety of surfaces, including card and print stock, plus gator board and canvas. There is a range of production protocol from all details applied by hand for limited retail and limited wholesale numbers ordered to the use of automated detail to keep all affordable for orders running into the thousands for wholesale. It goes without saying, pricing is influenced by the process used. All hands are on deck for quality control before each product is meticulously packaged.
What are you most proud of as a creator and card maker?
Aside from receiving continued orders in worldwide luxe department stores, including Harrods, Isetan, Bergdorf Goodman, etc., the personal feedback of how my designs have brought joy to individuals has made it so heartwarming. I will share one of these stories of a daughter telling us she bought a framed card with a design translating the front view architecture of the Bergdorf Goodman building with shoppers rushing in view. This daughter gave it to her 96 year old mother who was bedridden. Each time she went to visit, her mom would ask for this framed card on her side table and would ask if Bergdorf Goodman still looked this beautiful. Apparently, Bergdorf Goodman was a favorite shopping experience for this classy lady and she was able to revisit that joy by looking at the card. How can that not be a proud moment for me as an artist.
Any personal tidbits?
Well, I will relate a personal experience that was very humbling. When I had decided to apply to Parsons, part of the application was an art portfolio. There were a number of designated aspects that needed to be covered in this given direction for the portfolio. I had not been formally trained in art and so I decided it would be a good idea to take an art class that was offered during the summer at Parsons in NYC. I had spent one less than happy year prior at the University of Santa Barbara in California and that led me to check the “college student” box on the Parsons summer art program application. What I didn’t realize was by checking this college box, it was interpreted that I was at a college level for art. I was placed with very advanced individuals who were already teaching art. The classes were booked, so there was no room to switch to a lower level. This was before google was ever a thing, so runs to Barnes & Noble had me burning midnight oil on most nights to teach myself things like “how to prep a canvas for an oil painting”. Let’s just say, I had no background for the involved projects and assignments that were assigned that summer. Parsons had a system of critiquing art on the wall to have class members give feedback on one another’s work. Fortunately, I had a very kind teacher who looked at mine and decided to save me from the class review (embarrassment) and dealt with teaching me one on one outside of class. She gave me an incredible foundation to imagine I could do the art portfolio. I took the fall semester off from UCSB to create my Parsons application at home and was accepted during the winter semester to the graduating class of 2004. This humbling experience made me realize that I really wanted to gain a chance to be educated for design at Parsons and would do what I had to do with sleeves rolled up to reach for that opportunity.
Find Verrier Handcrafted cards such as Glitter Tablescape Thanksgiving Card and Christmas Glitter Ice Skating Card at your local store or online at papersource.com. For more inspiration and behind-the-scenes action, follow @verrier_handcrafted_ on IG.