New Prints

I have been playing around with some new designs over the last few weeks and finally have a new range just delivered from the printer.  Since I am living in the beautiful Queenstown I thought I would embrace some Kiwiana and create some prints more aimed at the vast tourist market that this town caters for.

New Zealanders are very proud of there beautiful country so I decided to design this new range with that in mind.

Maori artwork and symbols have a huge influence in New Zealand so I decided to incorporate this into my designs.

I took inspiration from the symbolism and colours.

My new New Zealand inspired prints are all available to buy from my Felt online shop.  My other prints are still available to purchase from my website mouseillustration.com

Hope you like my new designs.  Let me know what you think :-)

Mouse x

Business Cards have Finally Arrived!

So I have to admit that I was getting a little frustrated waiting on my new Business Cards to arrive, especially since I had run out of my last order and had none left.  I did order them from the UK and since I live in New Zealand I expected to have to wait a couple of weeks......but over three weeks was truly testing my patience.  However, they were most definitely worth the wait!

My friend over at Pink Pig Illustration introduced me to Moo.com and I am very happy she did.  The paper quality and finish are better then I expected and I will definitely be using this company from now on (I just won't leave it till I have run out of cards next time).

Moo.com offers a great service especially for designers looking to showcase their work through their business cards.  You can upload up to 100 images for each print run........so you can order 100 business cards and each one can be different! Amazing huh!  You keep the side with all your details the same for each card and the flip side can have a different design so I chose to have five designs for my batch.

They arrived in a great display box..........

They even give you a separate holder for you to store your cards............

The paper quality is fantastic almost feeling like a thin plastic and the amazing thing is they are guilt free!  The paper used for the cards is sourced from sustainable forests and the black holder is 100% recyclable and the structure is made from recycled pulp.  I feel better ordering from a company when I know the care about things like this.

Thanks Moo I'm a big fan :-)

The C Word........

Yup you guessed it Christmas! (If you were thinking of something else, shame on you)!

Sorry folks I hate to mention it but it will soon be upon us with only just over 8 weeks to go!

I have decided to get organised and get going with my Christmas Range. Last year I sold some Tree Decorations that seemed to sell quite well and I got a really positive response from them. Therefore, this year I have decided to carry on with the range and have added what I have so far to my website.

This set of four decorations can be bought individually so you can mix and match.  I will be adding more decorations to the Mouse Illustration website as I make them.  There will be a few Christmas Bookmarks and maybe even a set of Festive Wine Charms which would make a great Present for that special someone.

I must admit that I really enjoyed making the Christmas page of my website and I really need to get some Christmas Illustrations done as well!

I will keep you updated when I put more Christmas goodies up on the site but in the mean time start thinking about decorating your tree :-)

Packaging

It has been a busy week here at Mouse Illustration and I just wanted to share my packaging ideas with you today.  Since my product is handmade I like to make sure that the whole Mouse Illustration experience has that handmade feel.

I am still working on my packaging design and I have some new business cards on the way from www.moo.com which I will share with you when they arrive. (I heard about moo.com from my friend Mabel @ www.pinkpigillustration.com who recommended them)  Once my business cards arrive I will make some labels to match but in the mean time this is what I am sending out to my customers who order online.

I wrap the jewellery in tissue paper then put them in these cute little bags that I found on a trip to Brasil.  I like to make them look like a bag of sweets.

Lastly I always like to write a note by hand as I feel that I would appreciate this extra touch when buying handmade.  Each customer appreciates that you have handcrafted the jewellery and I like to respond to their purchase on a more personal note.

I am always looking for new ideas regarding packaging but I hope this gives you a little insight into how I like to interact with my customers.

Maybe you could share your thoughts on what you would expect when buying handmade?

I hope you all have a fantastic weekend!

Business Card

I just wanted to share my new business card design with you.   Any thoughts or opinions are welcome :-)

Front

Back

And just a little reminder about my Giveaway! Entries will be drawn on the 16th October so Good Luck to all who enter x

Website Relaunch

I have been a busy little bee over the past week redesigning my website.  I treated myself to upgrading to Illustrator CS5 (which in case you wanted to know is Amazing!) but that is a whole other feature.  I redesigned my banner using my new BFF Illustrator CS5 (well at least until they upgrade again) and also have designed an easier to navigate Jewellery Shop which will hopefully attract more customers.

My New Banner Designed in Illustrator

Old Layout and Banner using Photoshop

My New Home Page designed in Illustrator

I have also made my jewellery shop easier to navigate with each product now having their own order page and giving more detail about each item.

Page from the New Jewellery Shop

It has been a lot of work creating the new jewellery shop but it has been worth the effort.  When I designed it before I have to say I was a bit lazy with attention to detail.  Well lazy isn't maybe the correct word to use..........maybe inexperienced is a better one.  To begin with I looked at it from a customers point of view and realized I needed more detail and explanation about each individual piece, and that's exactly what I did.  I am still learning with web design as I go but I definitely feel that I have improved and learned a little bit more during this project, and have hopefully made a more attractive and user-friendly site along the way. 

You can have a look here at the new Mouse Illustration website and as always I would love to hear what you think. 

www.mouseillustration.com