Many hands make bright work
How Folk’s 2015 Christmas Card took shape

“Err, we could do Hash-tags…. Gift tags, in the shape of a hashtags…?” 

It was October 2015. We were searching for a simple idea, or even the beginnings of one, for our fast approaching Christmas card/gift deadline. Complicated ideas: we’d had loads of them. Complicated, impractical, too expensive, too heavy. Sheesh.

But “hashtags” – inviting the recipient to “share for real” this festive season – great idea Clare. Simple as. Nice one. Clare.

We designed six hashtags. The fronts were the same: a pleasingly chunky hashtag with “from/to” pre-printed. The backs each featured a different festive pattern: bright red, lovingly letter-pressed, onto tactile and toothy white card. “Let’s put a silky red ribbon on them!?” Ooh yes. We did that too. 

We also printed a fair amount of overs for Avenue, a not-for-profit Fair Trade Gifts client of Folk, to sell online and at various markets. “Ding-dong. Why ever not?”

Some weeks later. “Delivery!” 

3000+ hashtags, unsorted. 20 metres of red ribbon, uncut. 

’Tis the season to be jolly…. It turns out “jolly busy” is the end of that sentence. Huge thanks goes to the ever-cheerful team of Folk Elves – and their supervisor, Sandra Claus – for making it all happen. Sorting the tags into 500+ sets of six (the easy bit), and hand-cutting the ribbons to length before tying each perfectly onto every one. Each set of six were then popped into its awaiting, individually signed, greetings card and client addressed envelope.

“Good ideas, well crafted” is design maxim we hold dear here at Folk. “…well grafted” seems equally appropriate on this special occasion. All’s well that ends well. The card and hashtags (ribbons ’n’ all) turned out very nicely and we were delighted to hear they sold like hot cakes for Avenue. Which was jolly good news indeed, and all well worth the effort.

(Well done Clare.)