From now until Valentine’s Day (whilst stocks last) we’re includ­ing one of these gor­geous hand­made cards with every pur­chase of one of Coulson Macleod’s love-related typo­graphic prints. The hand­made card has been designed exclus­ively for Coulson Macleod by Ruby Wren.

Each heart has been indi­vidu­ally cut by hand from wild­flower seed paper. A true labour of love.

So when you’ve fin­ished with your card you can plant it and wait for the flowers to grow. Lit­er­ally watch your love blossom.

And this is what you could be growing…

• Pretty yel­low Birds­foot Tre­foil, Black Medick, and Meadow Buttercup.
• Red Cam­pion.
• White Cam­pion.
• Purple thistle-like Black Knap­weed and purple Self­heal, a mem­ber of the mint family.
• Feath­ery foliaged Yarrow.
• Watch the leaves of your Com­mon Vetch fold at night and attract bees and but­ter­flies with your ice-pink Musk Mallow.
• It was con­sidered lucky to step on an Ox-eye Daisy, the first flower of the year.

And these lush grasses will sprout too…

• Rib­wort Plantain.
• Brown­top Bent.
• Red Fes­cue.
• Cres­ted Dogstail.
• Meadow Fes­cue.
• Smooth Stalk Meadow Grass.

And the C5-sized envel­ope is made from ele­phant poo (and no it doesn’t smell). Oh, and just in case you think we’d slipped up with the cel­lo­phane outer wrap­per, it’s made from corn starch.

Related art­icles:

• Hand­made Greet­ing Cards by Ruby Wren
• Love Unlim­ited

We love it when we find out that there are other cre­at­ive busi­nesses in our area. Today, whilst on Twit­ter, we found out that the won­der­ful Warbeck & Cox is also based in Northamptonshire.

Warbeck & Cox cre­ates some gor­geous product ranges. In par­tic­u­lar we love their bug prints, which you can find on cush­ions, tea tow­els, nap­kins, mugs, aprons, and laun­dry bags.

But the product that we’ve fallen for are their simple graphic lug­gage tags; very Coulson Macleod…

All their products are cre­ated in-house by Car­oline Cox in her coun­tryside barn-come-studio where she draws on her sur­round­ings for  inspir­a­tion.  She feels very strongly about sup­port­ing local busi­nesses and the envir­on­ment and so insists that every effort is made to use the local com­munity as well as eco-friendly and sus­tain­able sup­plies for all her cre­ations. This sounds just like Coulson Macleod!

Caroline’s interest in tex­tiles began many moons ago when she played with her Granny’s but­ton col­lec­tion beside the fire.  From there she has knit­ted, stitched, gathered ideas, and hey presto, Warbeck & Cox was born.

Warbeck & Cox aims to bring styl­ish, good qual­ity, and fun products to your home. Think they’ve suc­ceeded, don’t you?

Other local busi­nesses include hand­made greet­ing card com­pany Ruby Wren (who we col­lab­or­ated with — see related art­icles to find out more) and Wall Envy Art (a fel­low typo­graphic art business).

Related art­icles:

• Coulson Macleod Loves Ruby Wren
• Hand­made Greet­ing Cards by Ruby Wren

Coulson Macleod can proudly announce its first col­lab­or­a­tion with…

Ruby Wren.

With every Valentine’s pur­chase of one of our typo­graphic prints, we are includ­ing a hand­made Ruby Wren love card. Each heart has been indi­vidu­ally cut by hand. A true labour of love.

And best of all, this card is exclus­ive to Coulson Macleod.

The card is lov­ingly hand cut from wild­flower seed paper. No, not just any old paper for us. You can actu­ally plant your card in your garden or win­dow box and wait for the flowers to grow in the sum­mer. Lit­er­ally watch your love blos­som each year. How lovely is that?

And this is what you could be growing…

• Pretty yel­low Birds­foot Tre­foil, Black Medick, and Meadow Buttercup.
• Red Cam­pion.
• White Cam­pion.
• Purple thistle-like Black Knap­weed and purple Self­heal, a mem­ber of the mint family.
• Feath­ery foliaged Yarrow.
• Watch the leaves of your Com­mon Vetch fold at night and attract bees and but­ter­flies with your ice-pink Musk Mallow.
• It was con­sidered lucky to step on an Ox-eye Daisy, the first flower of the year.

And these lush grasses will sprout too…

• Rib­wort Plantain.
• Brown­top Bent.
• Red Fes­cue.
• Cres­ted Dogstail.
• Meadow Fes­cue.
• Smooth Stalk Meadow Grass.

And guess what the C5-sized envel­ope is made from?

Ele­phant poo!

Ruby Wren buys this exotic stuff from a small Somerset-based com­pany that make 100% recycled paper in the UK in a tra­di­tional paper mill. They are approved by the National Asso­ci­ation of Paper Mer­chants and are mem­bers of the Brit­ish Asso­ci­ation of Fair Trade Shops.

And just in case you won­der­ing, which I’m guess­ing you are, the envel­opes don’t smell. Ele­phants are herb­i­vores, which means their waste is very clean. So don’t try this at home using poo from say, your dog. And as ele­phant poo is obvi­ously a waste product it will rot very eas­ily. And if that wasn’t enough won­der­ful eco-friendly news, the com­pany who make the ele­phant poo paper sup­port The Mil­len­nium Found­a­tion in Sri Lanka who home and look after old ele­phants. So, by using ele­phant poo paper we’re actu­ally help­ing elephants.

Oh, and just in case you think we’d slipped up with the cel­lo­phane outer wrap­per. It’s made from corn starch.

So, not only are our Valentine’s Day cards free. They are also exclus­ive. They sup­port small local busi­ness. They are envir­on­ment­ally friendly. They save ele­phants. And they are a garden­ing gift. Phew! And of course you’ll get massive Brownie points for being so ori­ginal and thoughtful.

Ruby Wren has been fea­tured in numer­ous magazines includ­ing House Beau­ti­ful and You&Your Wed­ding and you can find their cards sold in the Insti­tute of Con­tem­por­ary Arts in London.

So for good­ness sake, don’t go and buy a shop-bought Valentine’s Day card this year.

Simply type “LOVECARD” into the com­ments box on the check­out page for your free Valentine’s Day card.

Related art­icles:

• Coulson Macleod’s Little Love Notes
• Coulson Macleod Cre­ates Far More Than Words

“What is love?

To solve that riddle with just one answer is bey­ond me, for love is many dif­fer­ent and con­tra­dict­ory things.

In the early stages love is excite­ment and breath­less­ness, it is the ache of sep­ar­a­tion and the com­fort of togeth­er­ness, and it builds inex­or­ably to that moment when ‘I’ becomes ‘we’.

Later, if blessed, love becomes a stronger, less trans­it­ory thing, a found­a­tion for two lives lived as one.

It is all around us, there for the tak­ing, yet to seek it out is futile.

It can­not be bought or stolen or given.  It can­not be avoided or denied.

Love is the beau­ti­ful, won­der­ful, mys­ter­i­ous mor­tar that binds two souls together and I first heard its voice on the day I met you.

It has been with me every moment since.

This is what love is.”

Love Birds card cour­tesy of Ruby Wren

Writ­ten by Coulson Macleod.

I’ve been want­ing to show­case the amaz­ing hand­made cards by Ruby Wren for awhile now. All of the designs are simple, mod­ern, and totally lovely. Ruby Wren’s cards and envel­opes are 100% recycled and bleach free and are made using ele­phant and rhino poo!  

This small busi­ness, run by Hay­ley Mitchell, also hap­pens to be pretty local to Coulson Macleod — which makes me think that this is rather a cre­at­ive pocket of England.