For this edition of 'Behind the Card', we are featuring our new bridal dress cards. As we stated in our previous post, these cards came from our 'Secret Project', that wasn't so secret. However, even though it ended up not being a secret, having a name made it fun for us (at times) and kept us motivated (at times). And the best is, we can't even remember where the 'secret' idea came from. But with all our projects, they have to have a name in order for us to keep them all straight.We can't make it easy on ourselves and work on one project at a time. That would be too simple, lol!
But getting back on topic, this project had the usual fazes of thinking up the idea, planning, starting with Plan A, moving on to Plan B, taking a break from the project because we lost our motivation to finish, find our motivation again and finally...finish the darn project! You know, normal stuff.
Like we have stated previously, this project came about from creating a couple of bridal dress cards for friends of family in years past. Both cards were a huge hit at each bridal shower with people asking us more about the card and our business. Or in the case of the first card, when were we starting a card business. Basically free and easy advertising and marketing for us. With all the positive feedback we received, we decided we would try our hand at selling them.
To make this project a little different from the other dresses we created, the 'original plan' was to have them look completely different from the original dresses. The original dresses were ball gowns, simply decorated and catered to show the personalities of each bride. Now each bride didn't have a ball gown dress but we learned early on that they were easier to cut out, easier to put a message inside and not so flimsy in general. So construction wise, the best decision to use.
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| Mermaid dress is a mixture of the two dresses on left side. |
We conveniently forgot about those points when we started this project because we wanted to push the limits look-wise and skill set-wise. We just wanted to be different. So we tried...and failed. Badly. At least we can say we tried, right? But we failed so badly that we almost gave up on this project.
Yes, creating cards that work and look great is a physical process, but it is also a mental and emotional one too. When you look at a card and just feel emotionally drained, it is time to step back, do something else for awhile and eventually rethink the original ideas. And that is exactly what we did. By the time we rethought and refocused, it involved putting cards we put our whole selves into, into the trash literally. We honestly could feel a weight coming off our shoulders and our motivation coming back in full force the second those cards hit the bottom of the trash bin. We did end up keeping one mermaid dress that was actually a mixture of two previous dresses. But the ball gowns were back and it was the best decision we made for the project. And as the saying goes, the rest is history.
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| Material used. Part of our hints for the 'Secret Project' |
See our Instagram page for individual stories on each card!
