HISTORY OF SCRAPBOOKING

After World War I, people collected and saved photos, letters, cards and other memorabilia, but stored them in boxes. From the early 1920’s to 1970, scrapbooking slowly evolved. Over time, preserving family photos, newspaper clippings and drawings were kept in albums with paper pages, held in place with glue or photo corners and with written captions written below photos to document dates and contextual information.

The beginning of modern scrapbooking occurred in 1980 at a genealogy event called “The Conference on Records”.

Marielen Christensen, was invited to the Church of Latter-Day Saints event in Salt Lake City to display her 50 decorated 3ring binder albums of her family history. She used archival safe materials in her clear page protector albums, a first in scrapbooking. The unique photo and record keeping system resonated with the Mormon church members genealogy research. In 1981, she opened the first scrapbook store, Keeping Memories Alive, in Utah. Within a decade, scrapbooking became the fastest growing hobby in the United States of America.

What was initially considered an individual hobby, became a social hobby with parties getting together to share their love and interest in the hobby.

By the late 1990’s the standard scrapbook page size of 8½” x 11” shifted to a larger 12” x 12” page, accommodating 4” x 6” photos. Several local scrapbook stores opened, providing a selection of albums, papers and products.

Jill Davis, an artist and calligrapher, was another pioneer in modern scrapbooking. Inspired by Marielen Christensen, she started creating her own scrapbooks and ideas. In 2000, she and her husband Charlie launched Scrapbook.com, a place where Jill, and others, would teach how to scrapbook.

Scrapbooking transformed with the advent of digital photography, but when cameras were added to smartphones, it caused a second change with scrapbookers being flooded with photos, having more than enough photos to scrapbook.

In 2008, pocket-page scrapbooking was introduced by Becky Higgins, featuring a “photo a day” album featuring page protectors with individual pockets to insert photos and decorative cards.

MEMOIRS – Lynette Jacobs

Modern planners, journals and recordkeeping is the newest form of scrapbooking. Industry has reinventing traditional planners as embellished journals and planners with a collection of notes, information and photos from daily life, adding stamps, stickers and other embellishments.

Bible journaling has also gained popularity in recent years with scrapbookers, recording thoughts in Bible margins, resulting in inspiring faith journals as keepsakes for future generations.

While technology and techniques have changed over time, the human urge to record history and to tell our stories, has remained. One thing is certain, scrapbooking leaves a legacy for future generations through creative, unique, meaningful handmade self-expression.

South Africa has a vibrant and very active scrapbook community. TroCraft, which is part of the Trodat group carries a large variety of products including the popular Ranger Ink range, Prima and Simple Stories. Penelope Dee is a local range, designed by Glenda Viljoen, that includes paper, collection packs and embellishments. The range is affordable and released monthly which ensures a steady stream of product into the craft and stationery stores in South Africa. �

YOU-NIQUE – Glenda Viljoen

Although there was a lot of laughter, emotions were running high when the Board and staff of SHOP-SA officially said goodbye to Hans Servas at the end of June. Hans ended his term as chairperson of the Board for the Association after a term of 10 years.

Hans’ immediate plans included an extended visit to family in Europe – and also celebrating his 75th birthday with family.

As a chairperson, Hans made an impact through his governance and administrative contributions to the operations of the Association. As a person, he has touched the lives many people in the industry and will be remembered as one of the legends of the local stationery industry.