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Spring Seasons Trends 2018
Seasonal Fruits With Father's Day out of the way, next year’s Spring Seasons card designs are now burgeoning onto the market for retailers to consider. PG steps into the past to share some of the origins of Spring Seasons’ card sending traditions and the abundance of design trends that are ‘fruiting’ on cards for 2018.
The birds and the bees
Valentine’s Day - 14 February 2018
Top: Abacus’ Rapture range consists of 12 Valentine’s Day designs with both illustrated and photographic designs. Above: Sweet gold foil bees buzzing around on a Caroline Gardner ‘Jumble’ Valentine’s card. Right: A Valentine’s ‘Talking Buttons’ design from Laura Sherratt.
Almost 20 million Valentine’s cards are sent in the UK each year, a romantic greeting that stems as far back as the Middle Ages, though written Valentine’s didn’t begin to appear until after 1400. The earliest surviving recorded Valentine is now part of the manuscript collection of the British Library in London. It’s a medieval French poem entitled ‘Farewell to Love’ which was written by Charles, Duke of Orléans in 1415 to his wife while he was imprisoned in the Tower of London following his capture at the Battle of Agincourt. Charles was 21 years-old at the time. In the year of 2018, Valentine’s card designs are all about the birds and the bees and the bears, as winged and furry cute messengers buzzing and chirping with affection. Along with the leggy pink flamingoes and honey makers, there are tiny berries and buttons and soft marshmallow sweet sorts, a delicious mixture among the passionate red hearts and spots of gold foiling. The heartfelt messages are sweet and endearing in simple handwritten style fonts, and of course there are always some Valentine’s designs with a naughty invite.
Top: Twinkling gold foiling on a new Valentine’s design from GBCC. Above: Sweet Tooth from Paper Rose features handcrafted sweet characters by talented designer Phillipa Phipps. Left: New from Paperlink, ‘XO’, a range of eight new contemporary Valentine’s designs with fluted gold foil or holographic foil.
Guardian of our galaxy
Mother’s Day - 11 March 2018 Mother’s Day is celebrated in countries all over the world, but in Britain and Ireland Mothering Sunday is the fourth Sunday of Lent, three weeks before Easter. The reason is held that in the 16th century, on Laetare Sunday (the fourth Sunday of Lent) people would visit their mother church (the church they were baptised or main church in the area); this was commonly said to have gone ‘a-mothering’. Later, it became a day off for children in domestic service to visit their mother church, along with their mother and family; often they would pick flowers on the way for their church and mum. These days the religious tradition of Mothering Sunday has evolved into Mother’s Day with the two celebrations being mixed up. Bouquets of flowers still remain a loving gesture on Mother’s Day designs for 2018, which burst with bold blooms and tiny ditsy rosebuds in pretty blush pink and rose hues, with soft touches of aqua and pale green. Lace patterns, tiny cute buttons, watercolour washes and gorgeous coloured and gold foiling enhance illustrations, with adorable captions in sincere and intimate hand-written font thanking mum for her caring and cuddles. Above left: ‘Fiore’ from Pigment has six new beautiful Mother’s Day designs for 2018. Left: The Mother’s Day 2018 Collection from Noel Tatt features foil, flitter and hand-applied details on luxury Silkweave board.
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PROGRESSIVE GREETINGS WORLDWIDE
Right: Amaretto from Paperlink is a cold foiled illustrative range of six Mother’s Day designs brand new for 2018. Far right: Cherry Orchard’s Spring Seasons has over 110 new designs including fantastic fragranced cards ‘Scent With Love’.
Above left: Nigel Quiney’s ‘Pizazz’ and floral ‘Pizazz Gallery’ ranges feature beautiful floral artwork combined with sparkly flitter. Above: Molly Mae has extend its 'Flutter on the breeze’ range for Spring 2018: Embossed and foiled with beautifully fine detail. Above right: Pretty floral, hand-finished Mother’s Day cards from Cinnamon Aitch, featuring the odd cute animal too.