Erica Heinz

Erica Heinz

Here we have a case study in resourcefulness, as Erica Heinz, designer [and yoga teacher], uses engraved artwork of yesteryear for her present day business card. Old engravings and artwork from previous centuries are in the public domain, so are therefore free for folks to use. While a designer may be pressured to do all his/her own artwork, I don’t mind the recycling of key art like this.

This card is letterpressed, which is impressive that they could achieve such fine detail with letterpress. No idea on printing credits or paper stocks.

Erica Heinz

Erica Heinz


Staples Copy & Print Shop

Staples Copy & Print Shop

You’d think that the staff at the Staples Copy & Print Shop would have better cards! I mean, they are in the biz, are they not?

Staples Copy & Print Shop

Both cards pictured are plagued with bad typography, colour inconsistency, bizarre thermography patterns, and pathetically thin card stock that feels entirely wimpy in hand. Also, two people from the same store don’t even have the same card. What’s going on here? Total fail.


Craig Ward / Words Are Pictures

Craig Ward

Craig Ward, the highly-decorated and highly talented typographer/designer, has worked in multiple countries, for numerous clients, for many years … without a business card. Finally taking the effort to design one, and have it printed, I am pleased to present his card.

Craig Ward

A single-colour, letterpressed card, printed by Dave at Print Icon in New York City on 110# Mohawk paper. A first run of 500, which I imagine he’ll take some time to get rid of.

Craig works under the moniker Words Are Pictures.


Vintry

Vintry

Vintry is a little bar down in New York’s Financial District. They have a nice card.

Vintry

Craft paper with red foil stamp and rounded die-cut corners. Very sharp. Type could be improved a bit, but the production is quite lusty.


Penny Shooter Card

What better way to promote your fabrication business than with a small machine disguised as a business card. In this case, it’s probably not the most practical device, but we have to admire the novelty of it. Right?

Cardnetics is the company behind this craziness, and apparently this is what they do.


Big Names

Mark

Recently, I popped into Jack Rabbit and spotted the card of the store manager. It reminded me of the ongoing trend in making the name on your card really, really, friggin big. What do we think, is having a giant name a useful tactic on cards? I admit, it’s easy to see, but after the card goes into my desk drawer, or whatever, the size of your name doesn’t really matter, does it.

Here’s a few more in a similar mode.

Read more »


Fox Engineering, 1945

Murray Fox

The above is my grandfather’s first business card from the year 1945. In itself, it is remarkable that he kept a single business card for so long, but what’s more amazing is that he’s kept every business card for the past 65 years! At least, his own, that is, I’m sure a few have fallen through the cracks over the years.

I’ve begun to upload the cards to a Flickr set and will update this as I find the time to retouch and upload the cards. Also, I’ll have to listen back to a video I filmed where my grandpa time-stamps each one and tells a bit about the backstory.

But yo, a card from 1945! Check out that phone number. Brilliant.


Jacob Pierce

Jacob Pierce

Spotted this gorgeous example of a letterpressed card on the Dolce Press blog. While there is no shortage of excellent letterpressed business cards out there, this particular post is not only photos, but a bit of an explanation/tutorial on how to design for letterpress when you’re working with large fields of colour.

Jacob Pierce
Close-up example of the text

Jacob Pierce
edge-staining is a nice touch

More photos are available on Dolce’s Flickr feed »


Steve Worthington

Steve

A very homegrown operation from Steve Worthington, featuring the handwriting, photography, and sculpture all his own.

Steve

I dig the handwriting, which is uniform enough to be readable, but has the rawness that is evident when a font is not used.


The Perfect Billboard

The Perfect Billboard

Ok, this isn’t a business card, per se, but it is a pretty cool reference to perhaps the most popular mention of business cards in pop culture — that scene from American Psycho.

Check out the full-sized image »

I’m ashamed to admit I’ve never seen this movie the whole way through. But here, dear readers, is the scene in question:

links via @adaminspired and @behoff


Mini Business Card Filing Cabinet

File Cabinet

The geniuses at ThinkGeek have created a mini filing cabinet for your business cards! How awesome! It’s pretty self-explanatory: you put cards in it rather than a rolodex or notebook. Here’s a look in action.

File Cabinet

Someone please buy this for me now!


Paul Rand

Paul Rand

I am indeed surprised that Paul Rand, of the most famous and prolific graphic designers ever, has such a starkly spartan business card. Surely, this was intentional. Right?

Links via amassblog »


Kallemeyn Press

Kallemeyn

If you’re a letterpress shop, you’d better have a sharp card. The above image is so very lightly pressed onto the card that you can barely feel it. The lines are extremely fine, some maybe as fine as 1/8″ pt. And the image doesn’t leave an impression the reverse side.

Kallemeyn

The reverse side isn’t much for layout — 5 typefaces? Really? — but the same technique applies. I’m definitely going to ask these folks to bid on my next letterpress job.


Market Publique

Market Publique

Normally, I’m not a fan of Avant Garde, and still insist that it was only created to spell out the words “Avant Garde”, but it seem to work here for Market Publique. The M and A make an odd kerning pair, no?

Very sharp letterpress at work here. A close-up:

Market Publique


Christopher Soprano

The card of illustrator Christopher Soprano isn’t so much a card, but a sort of paper puppet/miniature POP display. It’s pretty cool.

At first, it looks like a regular card. The typography is whimsical but with a sense of sophistication. There are elements of hand-crafted goodness, and a bit of stampy action.

Soprano

And then they stand up and become something else entirely.

Soprano

Here’s a close-up of the mechanism, so to speak.

Soprano

This isn’t the first pop-up card featured on the site. Older ones are here and here, to start.

What do we think, are pop-up cards a pleasant surprise in the day-to-day of card design, or an eye-rolling act of creative half-rebellion?



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