collaboration with letterpress 77

We had a fun collaboration event at our Tokyo store last Monday.
The guest speaker was Mr.Kiyo Matsumoto, an owner of
letterpress 77, and he owns his studio in Dusseldorf, Germany.



Kiyo(right) and our boss, Masaki(left)

As you can imagine from the company name, Kiyo is an expert of letterpress,
at the same time, he is also a designer of his letterpressed items
such as calling cards, greeting cards and wedding invitations.



About 20 participants who are working as designers, printers, and retailers enjoyed his talk, and exchanged the design trends between Japan and Germany.

This is our collaboration card with letterpress 77.
Kiyo designed these adorable designs for us,
and we made the cards. Which is your favorite card?
For me, since they are all cute, it's hard to choose one! :)



You can check his lovely studio and designs here.

Have a lovely weekend!

Rumi

The 50 Best Stationery!!

The famous British newspaper, The Independent introduced our products(series 342) as "the 50 best stationery"! Yay!

Although we have not read the real article yet, we were thrilled to see our items on their website!



We look forward to seeing it by newspaper :)

Now, we have many orders from the UK.
(Dear customers, Thank you so much for ordering our cards & envelopes!)

Please read the article here.

Also, if you are interested in the series 342, you can check here.

Have a nice weekend!

Rumi & Maki

Cheers! Happy New Year, 2010☆

May this year be filled with peace, prosperity and good fortune!

One of the most traditional New Year's events in Japan is the custom of making visits to shrines or temples - this is known as "Hatsumoude."

Of course, I visited a shrine near to my home for praying my wish of 2010.
I really love the architecture, especially its bright red color.



Kanda Myojin is well known as "God of business" here in Tokyo, and it was pretty crowded!

I like the new year holidays in Tokyo since the period is the most quiet time.

Our stores in Tokyo and Osaka have already opened.
Staff members are looking forward to meeting many customers at the stores!

Rumi

2010, the year of the Tiger!

In Japan, we have a custom to send new year cards to friends and acquaintances.
We call the cards, "Nengajyo."
The card is more popular than winter's greeting cards here in Japan.

Since it is a tiger's year in Chinese astrology,
we made some lovely tiger cards.
These were our best selling cards in December.


The design is letterpressed. It looks a real tiger?


They look a little bit weak...! But adorable!


Best wishes for the coming new year for you all!!

Rumi & Maki

Il Buon Tempo

2009 is coming to a close, and 2010 is just around the corner!

One of our big events in 2009 was the collaboration with an Italian publishing company,
"Il Buon Tempo."



Il Buon Tempo is a small publisher which are owned by an Italian artist,
Mr. Lucio Passerini.
He uses traditional letter press machines and publishes simple and beautiful books.

Winged Wheel exhibited his 10 art books at our stores from October 30th to November 31st.
Also, we had a talk session event with Mr.Passerini at the opening reception on Oct. 30th.
I was thrilled to hear his art works and his philosophy.





I LOVE his book, which is called, "Alcuni aforismi."
There are very unique sayings/poems on the book.



It's hard to explain these in English, but my favorite saying is like this:
"I always loose my way, but always can find my way."

mi perdo continuamente e mi trovo dovunque.

Maki, from Osaka

Osaka! 2

I would like to add 2 more photos from Osaka trip in last month.
During the business trip, of course I went to our store in Osaka.
Its store name is Winged Wheel Shinsaibashi.
Sinsaibashi is very modern and chic area in Osaka ;)

Inside the store, there are more than 1000 kinds of products specialized in cards, lettersheets, and envelopes. Customers can touch the texture of each product.

I was thrilled to watch the window display of the month because our colleagues are very creative. And they always make me surprize!
The theme is "autum night." How lovely!




Inside the store, my colleagues Maki and Yoko were chatting something.

Ah, maybe a small meeting? :)



They are in the product development division, and produce our lovely products.
Many thanks, girls!!

If you have a chance to visit Osaka, please stop by our store.
Here is our Osaka store information.
Winged Wheel Shinsaibashi (you can check our Tokyo store, too.)

Rumi, from Tokyo

Osaka!

I had an opportunity to visit Osaka as a business trip.
It takes around 2.5 hours from Tokyo by Shinkansen. (do you know? It's a super fast train.)

Then, I took a train to Matsubara city where has our plant.
(It's located on the southern part of Osaka.)
There are more than 20 kinds of envelope making machines and printing machines.

This is a very old letter press machine!


Some of our expert staff can oparate the machine.



When I visited there, he was printing some luxurious invitaions for our collaboration event with an Italian publisher.
For the event, we chose hand made cotton paper by Fabriano, which is very famous paper making company in Italy.

Although itwas just one day trip, I was so glad that I could meet with many colleagues there.
(Many thanks, Maki!)

But, the only thing I forgot was to enjoy Osaka food...!!
I forgot to eat Okonomiyaki... Too bad!

Rumi, from Tokyo