Clean House, Clean Planet by Karen Logan is an incredible resource, explaining how to mix up your own eco-friendly household cleaners from everyday ingredients you likely already have at home. It’s the Smock Eco Read pick of our office manager, Carrie, who shares with us a bit more about one of her favorite eco reads…

I love this book! Karen’s recipes for cleaners are effective, fun to make, and  a pleasure to use. I cleaned houses for a while after my son was born and used only these products, and everyone for whom I cleaned begged me to make some for them to have. This book really breaks down the benefit versus harm of cleaning agents used in the home, with an eye to the long-term effect these different chemicals have beyond our home environments into the environment we all share. Making your own cleaning solutions is greener in every way, and an easy habit to adapt as part of the journey toward living sustainably in today’s world. I read that book three years ago and continue to this day to use the cleaning solutions found here!

The first of two honorable mentions in our Smock Design Contest brought to us by Judy Paulen Designs at Bloomingdale’s in New York, we’re completely in love with this chic customization of our Engadine letterpress wedding invitation design. It’s printed in elegant wisteria and pewter inks and features our playful Etienne and Shaw fonts for a finished design that is the perfect blend of traditional elegance and modern sophistication. The set also includes a really lovely letterpress reception card that makes the most of a play between the script Etienne font and the clean look of the sans serif Shaw font. It’s minimal and simple, but still fresh and completely chic.

Thanks so much to our friends at Judy Paulen for sending us this beautiful customization!

Here at Smock we’re not only in love with printing beautiful letterpress invitations (and letterpress business cards, letterpress thank you notes, letterpress greeting cards…you get the picture), we’re also in love with the earth. Really really in love with the earth. We’re always working on improving our eco practices to do our part to help protect the environment for future generations. The Amazon Conservation Association is just one of the organizations we partner up with in our effort to promote

What is the ACA?
“Our mission is to conserve the biological diversity of the Amazon. Road construction, logging, and land clearing for agriculture are endangering the health of the Amazon rainforest. The Amazon Conservation Association works by forging ties with governments, nonprofits and people who depend on the rainforests for their livelihood, with the goal of saving rare species and habitats and learning from the land.”

Why is the Amazon significant?
The Amazon rainforest is home to 30% of the plant and animal species on Earth and additionally, 20% of all fresh water on the planet flows through the basin’s rivers. Recognizing the importance of the Amazon rainforest to the greater ecological systems of the world as a source of countless foods, fibers and potential new medicines, the ACA works to protect these invaluable forests as they are facing increasing threats from slash and burn agriculture, wildlife poaching, mining, illegal logging, oil prospecting, and large development projects. Rainforests are also a vital force in shaping the world’s weather and climate patterns with the UN citing that 20% of global greenhouse gas emissions are related to tropical deforestation. It is estimated that at current rates, more than half of the Amazon rainforest may be destroyed or severely damaged by 2030. ACA is working together with local communities and partner organizations throughout the region to protect these precious forests.

Want to get involved?

• Consider visiting one of the ACA’s two research centers – they welcome travelers of all types. (Talk about a cool idea for an eco honeymoon!) They have one location in the beautiful cloud forest outside of Cusco, Peru, called Wayqecha. The other location is in the Amazon, in the state of Madre de Dios, Peru, called CICRA. Both stations provide 3 meals, cabins (private or shared) and an endless amount of hiking trails. Wayqecha also houses a world class canopy walkway, which visitors are welcome to explore and enjoy the birds-eye view of the rainforest. Volunteers are also always welcome!

{Top – CICRA photo by Raechel Running | Bottom – Wayqecha photos via ACA}

• Opt to make a donation to ACA in lieu of traditional wedding favors. Those couples who make a donation to the ACA will receive beautiful letterpress favor cards designed and printed by Smock. We’re also offering free personalizing of the favor cards with a couple’s name for those participants who have worked with Smock for their letterpress wedding invitations. You can read more here.
• Sign up for ACA’s quarterly newsletter to keep up to date on recent events and announcements
  Sponsor a small program; $40 conserves 5 acres of rainforest, $80 conserves 10 acres of rainforest, $400 buys a GPS for a park ranger, $50 sponsors a “Science Saturday” program for local children, $150 provides a uniform for park rangers, $400 buys one pair of binoculars for park rangers
• Sponsor a program; large-scale donors can sponsor a reforestation or micro-enterprise project, starting at $10,000

For more information about the ACA and how you can get involved or to make a donation, contact Gena at info@amazonconservation.org

This next runner up in our Smock Design Contest is a true customization, blending all of the beauty of both our Nevis and Vettore letterpress invitation designs into one incredible invitation suite. Brought to us by our friends at Arabesque in Naples, Florida, this customization was a true pleasure for us to print. With an exciting mixing and matching of colors, patterns and designs, this set is truly unique and exudes an undeniable elegance.

The letterpress invitation itself is our Vettore design, printed in soft lake and midnight inks. The design was shifted to have a vertical orientation and the couple opted for pattern backing in our willoughby pattern in lake. With corner rounding and gold edge painting, every detail was thoughtfully considered. The result? An absolute show-stopping letterpress invitation that we completely love.

Switching it up, the letterpress reception card is in our Nevis design in the same midnight and lake inks, with pattern backing in our seneca pattern. The same corner rounding and gold edge painting make this card just as classically chic as the invitation itself.

The letterpress reply card is once again in our Vettore design, paired with an envelope liner in our seneca pattern printed in lake to match the pattern backing of the letterpress reception card. The careful pairing of colors and patterns helps this invitation set shine, a truly beautiful and unique reflection of the couple and their wedding.

Thank you so very much to the folks at Arabesque for the privilege to print such an incredible customization. Congratulations on being one of our Smock Design Contest winners!

Have we mentioned already how much fun was had at Monday Morning Mimosas? Not only did we get to hang out with good friends, but we also got to spend the day in the incredible loft space of Hatch Creative Studio, with amazing event details pulled together by Erika of Delphine. Pretty paper streamers, and fun MMM-themed coasters and cocktail napkins, even color-coordinated Paulette macarons kept all of our visitors (and us!) oohing and aahing as they walked in all day.

Bobbi and Erika of Delphine chatting with friends Jennifer from Orange and Pear and Chloe from Toots & Magoo.

Joan and Vanessa of Green Paper Company

Erika of Delphine [left] and me, hanging out at lunch after Monday Morning Mimosas.

Stay tuned for more from Monday Morning Mimosas!
[Previously…Smock at Monday Morning Mimosas]

Thank you to everyone who came out for Monday Morning Mimosas this week and to all of the excited Smock fans who showed up for our sample sale that evening! It was wonderful to meet so many new people who share our love for great letterpress, stationery, lovely candles and chic office supplies. We had a fabulous time with our friends from Delphine, Linnea’s Lights, russell+hazel and Green Paper Company. For those who couldn’t make it, here’s a sneak peek at the event….there are many more photos to come!

And, of course, an obligatory group photo…

Good is an eco magazine, one of my favorite eco reads. Subscribe to this magazine and 100% of your subscription is donated to nonprofits doing good. And if that isn’t convincing enough, this magazine has amazing photography and really cool graphs (“the most used subways in the United States and the world, showed in graphic form”), as well as inspiring profiles of people who are helping change the world for the better. Though I wish they trusted their readers to have a longer attention span (lots of short 1/2 page or 1 page articles), it’s a thought provoking read that nudges you to live your life better – not in the self-development sense (10 ways to look better, etc.), but living your life in a way that helps others and the world. One of the most recent issues was devoted to transportation, and by the end of it, it was hard not to say “okay, okay, I’ll ride my bike more, I’ll look at bus routes differently, okay, I’ll do it!” This issue included drawings from grade school students on transportation of the future (including “traveling legs’), a neat article on “casual carpooling” in the Bay Area, and the cool buses of Bogota. Good is just that, good, and one you should definitely check out.

[Good]

As promised, we are so excited to share with you all of the beautiful customizations we crowned as our favorites in our recent Smock Design Contest. This incredible customization of our Kurai letterpress wedding invitation is so beautiful and unique, it’s probably pretty easy to see why we love it oh so much. Printed in rich eggplant and raspberry inks, it’s delightfully pretty and wonderfully charming.

Brought to us by Wordshop in Denver, Colorado, this customization makes the most of a unique layout where the branch design is shifted up and the text is rearranged to create a striking visual effect. It’s decidedly modern, but when paired with the richness of the tradition of letterpress, this is a look we can see becoming a new classic.

Featuring corner rounding on all of the pieces, a beautiful letterpress reply card, and a unique petite-sized letterpress website card, this suite is completely personalized with rich details and saturated colors. Thank you so much to the folks at Wordshop for bringing us this beautiful customization!

Here at Smock, we absolutely love working with our fabulous Smock dealers. We are continually and endlessly inspired by the customizations they dream up and love printing fabulous letterpress invitations, save the dates, escort cards, programs, social notes, business cards and so much more for their clients. In order to recognize the incredible adaptations of our Smock designs that we have been printing in collaboration with our stores, we recently honored ten breathtaking customizations that captured our imaginations and made us smile with glee as we printed them, packaged them up and sent them off to happy clients around the globe.

Over the next several weeks, we’ll be sharing each of the winning customizations, but we wanted to share a sneak peek of the many lovely letterpress creations that have had us oohing and ahhing for months…

A big congratulations and a heartfelt thank you to the stores we worked with to create these incredible designs…
Real Card Company in Seattle
Alphagraphics in Chicago
The Write Image in Salt Lake City
Wordshop in Denver
Arabesque in Naples, Florida
Kate’s Paperie in Manhattan
RSVP Studio in Toronto
Judy Paulen Designs at Bloomingdale’s in Manhattan
Paper Love in Brooklyn

Taking our commitment to the environment and green living seriously, Smock happily subsidizes CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) memberships for all employees through a local organic farm, Grindstone Farm. We receive weekly deliveries of fresh, organic veggies and herbs that are typically picked within just hours of reaching us – and they’re incredibly delicious, too! Because the old warehouse we call home, the Delavan Center, is the Downtown Syracuse drop-off location, our CSA deliveries literally come right to our door. We love seeing what awaits us as we fill up our bags and head home to cook. Tuesday becomes our favorite day of the week during CSA season!

Usually we can count on receiving an assortment of great lettuces, kale, fresh herbs like cilantro and dill, broccoli so delicious you’ll never want to eat anything other than organic broccoli again, garlic scapes, cool daikon radishes that resemble white carrots, and lots and lots of beautiful red radishes. As the season is progressing, so are the crops, but radishes have continued to greet us every week, which led a few of us to start looking into recipes that use radishes and ideally the radish greens too. After a while, we’ve found ourselves at a bit of a loss as to what to do with them other than slice them up for salads. After some hunting around, one of our letterpress printers, Carrie, who is one of the finest artisans we know to ever run an Original Heidelberg windmill, found and tweaked the following recipe that was so good, we just had to share it in the event any of you are at a loss as to what to do with radishes. If you like food with an Asian flair, you will love this recipe.

Asian Hamburger Skillet

• 1lb lean hamburger (although many of us are vegetarians so we substituted the Morning Star ground “meat” instead)
• 1 medium red onion, sliced about 1/4? thick then cut into 2? lengths
• 1 bunch of radishes, cut in matchsticks
• 1 bunch of radish tops, cut roughly into 1? pieces
• 4 carrots, julienned or cut into 1/4? slices
• 1-1/2 tsp ginger paste
• 2 tbsp fish sauce (although we’ve also tried General Tso’s sauce and it was delicious!)
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1 lime (optional)
• Freshly ground pepper, to taste

In a large sauté pan, cook hamburger (or meat substitute) over medium high heat, until just beginning to brown, breaking into small bits with spatula. Stir in onion and radishes and cook another 2-3 minutes. Stir in carrots, radish tops, ginger paste and fish sauce and cook 5-10 minutes until onions are softened and hamburger is cooked through. Sprinkle with lime juice (if using) and pepper, to taste. Serve immediately…and feel free to share your CSA-inspired recipes with us and we’ll post them here on the Smock blog!