Experimenting

Home Made Christmas Cards
Home Made Christmas Cards

As many of you know, we have been experimenting with cards a lot lately. For me this experiment started way back in the mid 1990s, when I was employed by BT. Back then some of us were encouraged to have our business cards made to double up as prepaid payphone calling cards. The stock images we could choose to go on the card were typically corporate and boring. So I decided to design my own. I took a photo of a cloudy sky and retouched the photo with BT blue and red. The card manufacturer happily took my design and made a run of 200 cards from it. I received a mild rebuke from my boss for going it alone, an early sign of “Proceed Until Apprehended”, and the card became quite collectable due to its limited nature.

Doug Shaw's BT Business Card
Doug Shaw’s BT Business Card

Fast forward to 2010 and Vandy Massey helped to reignite the experiment fantastically with her beautiful hand painted water colours. We encouraged folk to design their own cards for a workshop and the response was excellent.

Last week I designed a few more cards with a distinctly festive theme. I gave them to friends, they chose their favourite colour then I added a little note to the card. And as you can see from the picture at the top of this post someone has since taken the design and made their own interpretation of it. Well done to Alison Chisnell’s daughter, the experiment grows.

This morning I heard from Vandy Massey again. One of Vandy’s friends has been inspired by this hand made experiment and she too has designed her own Christmas card. Fantastic!

I was recently asked “how do you find the time to do this – when do you do any work?” Truth is I’m lucky enough to see this experiment as part of my work. I fit it in – sometimes even making cards when I can’t sleep.

I don’t know where this experiment will go in 2011. It’s already been contributed to by more people than I expected and I hope it will adapt and emerge in more places next year too. I’m looking forward to it. Thanks to everyone who has taken part so far.

How do you like to make your mark? I’d be very interested to hear from you if you want to participate in this experiment or if you are already doing something a little different then please share it with us.

Author: Doug Shaw

Artist and Consultant. Embracing uncertainty, sketching myself into existence. Helping people do things differently, through an artistic lens.

6 thoughts on “Experimenting”

  1. What a brilliant idea Doug. I’ve made my own xmas cards in the past – not so much lately. 2011 will be the year to revive my artistic side and maybe even get back to painting again 🙂

    1. Good afternoon Mr Airmiles Sir. Very kind of you to pop by. It would be lovely to see 2011 emerge as a year of artistry – watching with interest.

      Cheers – Doug

    1. Hi Vandy – thanks for inspiring people to get creative. Like you I’m looking forward to more participation and more artistry in 2011. Thanks for all your support in 2010.

      Cheers – Doug

  2. I love this idea and even though the company I work for has decided the Future’s Bright, the Future’s Grey in it’s corporate colours, this is so much more fun and doesn’t have to stop here! Another potential is the nightmare that is voicemail messages. About 12 years ago, I got my (then) 7 year old daughter to record a Christmas voicemail message for me along the lines of “My Daddy is on holiday with me so leave him alone – Happy Christmas etc etc etc” and people still remember it!! So ditch the dull voicemail message or at least personalise it – after all if someone is talking to your voicemail it’s because they want to talk to you and if you can’t answer them so the least you can do is “personally” ask them to leave a message and maybe even make them smile at the same time!

    1. Hi Chris – love the voicemail idea, spot on as usual. I’m on the case right now. Thanks for the idea….the reminder…the sanity restorer 🙂

Leave a Reply to Doug Shaw Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *