Autumn '24 🍂 Portfolio Brief: A range of Greetings Cards

Follow or join this crack at cards

Sep 13, 2024

I’m Libby. I’m trying to find my feet in the world of illustration. I’ve done a load of research and I’m sharing it here, along with my progress on how my illustration journey’s going. I’m so glad you could join me on this bumpy ride!

Hi there!

Today I’m sharing an Autumn portfolio brief that will run from Sep-Nov.

If you want to catch up on my previous portfolio briefs and resources, you can access them here:

I’ve had a good break from setting portfolio briefs during August and I’m looking forward to delving deeper these next three months to produce…

A RANGE OF GREETINGS CARDS

Why Greetings cards?

I had been avoiding greetings cards as a new illustrator because, with lots of experience as a market seller in East London, I didn’t want to go down the route of making and selling my own cards.

The cold winter days, warming my well-wrapped-up feet on a piece of cardboard is etched on my memory.

But I’ve recently come around to the idea of licensing my designs to greetings card companies.

And I can’t do that without some greetings cards within my portfolio.

The brief

This time it’s a ‘real’ brief, set for the purposes of pitching to licensing agencies.

Design a range of cards covering the following:

Birthday - adult
Birthday - children
Christmas
Valentines
Thank You
Blank

Something a licensing agency said in a talk I attended recently was:

When someone is buying a card, they see it as a reflection of themselves or the person they are buying it for.

They said that greetings cards also don’t usually feature realistic human characters as they may not relate to the person buying, so avoid these.

So with those points in mind potential ‘safe’ topics:

Florals
Animals
Party
Type-focused designs
Cute stuff
Pattern

Here are some beautifully illustrated cards I came across at the Studio Boketto stand when I attended Top Drawer retail trade fair in London this week.

The brief runs till November with the idea of having cards ready for Christmas to give to loved ones but have a portfolio ready for the new year for agencies.

Getting started

I’ve already got some ideas sketched (which I’ll share soon) and will be leveraging from work I’ve already created.

I’ve been analysing card displays in greetings card shops and what stands out for me and without a doubt it’s COLOUR 🌈

Things to consider

Format. There seem to be different standard formats and sizes in different countries. Have a search or measure some examples from companies you would want to work for.
Standing out on the shelf - I’ve found visiting greetings card shops helpful for this. Thinking ‘why does this card stand out more than others?’
Consistency across the range. As art directors tend to be looking for a consistent style, bear this in mind when deciding on a design
Broad appeal ‘are people going to want to buy, gift or have your design in their living room?’

Confession Time - As usual I have never designed a greetings card for licensing! So I’m going to be learning as I go. I’m assuming that might be the case for you too. Here are some resources I will be considering using:

Resources

I found this video which seems quite helpful from the well-known illustrator Liz Kohler Brown.

I’ll be researching greetings card retailers online like:

Hallmark
Ohh Deer
Scribbler

I’ve also been following

Jo Scott

who has been writing about her experience in greetings cards design so I’ll be gleaming some tips from her Substack, like this post ‘Anatomy of a Greetings Card.’

Who’s with me?

If anyone wants to join, I’d be happy to share your stuff on Substack and feature it as a post on The New Illustrator Instagram page.

But am also really happy to have you follow along, if you don’t have time to take part at the moment.

I’ll be sharing my sketches in Substack notes as well as the comments of this post as I go instead of the Substack chat this time. And maybe I’ll do an update post each month with how it’s going….

Thanks for reading!

Look out for my progress, I look forward to seeing yours!

Libby