Tuesday 29 November 2011

Upcoming New Collection Launch & More

Next week Sawyer's Place will be launching the second line of SP Exclusive tapes - the Titus Collection. As a mother to a 2 year old boy the new collection has been heavily influenced by my desire to have something 'for the guys', something fun and something manly - and of course something blue! As a one-woman design team I find it difficult to step out of my own mindset of what I want and step into the shoes of our customer - which is why if you're a fan of our facebook page (Sawyer's Place FB) you'll notice me regularly attempting to pick the brains of you all. 

All suggestions are taken on board and I think in the upcoming collections some of you may see your own suggestions come to fruition, I've had many an 'ah-ha' moment when reading the suggestions, pleads and begging sof our customers for this design or that. So if there is anything you'd love to see in a tape please drop me a line or stop by the facebook page with your requests.

Titus will be joined on his flight with a restock of many of our core line (the red and green spots for example) as well as some new limited edition releases and will also feature our new labelling!

If you're a blogger or store owner and would like to test-run the new design collection please email me at : enquiries@sawyersplace.com I'll be selecting 3 new blogs to test run the Titus collection in the coming weeks.

This new label and the vacuum sealed packaging brings our product in line with the industry standard across Asia and I am so excited to be launching it, our new collection and great new core lines all in the next week....so stay tuned! 

Monday 14 November 2011

The Industry of Man

In the next few weeks Sawyer's Place will release the second exclusive collection of washi tapes.  Finding a name for this collection has proven difficult, but after tossing and turning I have constantly been drawn to the title character of Titus Andronicus, the most bloody and foul, vengeful of Shakespeare's heroes. The collection is "all man" and industrial in nature, the Roman Empire is certainly indicative of that and Titus is such a strong and evocative name. So Titus it is.

The set is to be made up of two designer patterns and one coordinating stripe. It is my intention in the coming months to develop our range to coordinate with the spots, stripes and plains that everyone has come to love already. Allowing you to easily mix and match your tapes in any given project.

So all of those with boys in your life of any age that have been crying out for something "manly" I think you're going to really love Titus - I know I already do and they're not even here yet.

Sunday 6 November 2011

Delving into the world of washi!

Today I received the first proofs of our new collection, it's such an exciting step and I'm really enjoying working with the manufacturer to bring my designs to fruition.  At the moment we're neck deep in design, while at the same time promoting and fulfilling orders from the previous line and working on designs for the next, it's  certainly hard to switch from one mode to the other at times and it often means Iam up all night with a head full of washi but it's exciting nonetheless.  So what are all the steps?

Firstly I develop my design idea, creating a jpeg of my design plan and identifying the colours from a pantone chart for the factory designers to develop a proof. With the Ophelia collection the first designs had a simple text file for Insanity Script and one damask shape drawing for the Regal Damask.

The designers at the factory then create 'proofs', both a digital file and photographs of the printed tapes (on strips of paper). A little bit of back and forth to refine the designs where necessary and then we're onto manufacture!

After the printing of the design onto large sheets of washi (or rice paper) adhesive is applied to the rolls.  A stripping agent is applied to the printed side to enable the tape to be pulled cleanly from the roll.


15 meters of rice paper tapes with glue on their backsides, and stripping agent on their front sides, are wrapped up into a core.


Tapes are gathered in large rolls in the factory before being cut to size manually.






The rolls are then packaged for delivery and head their way to Sawyer's Place on the South Coast of Western Australia.  A long way from where they start in Japan! From conception to delivery and release the entire process takes about 8-12 weeks depending on how complicated the design is and how many times we make changes to the proofs.  And all of this is accomplished between us and the factory staff - and we don't speak the same language!

Wednesday 2 November 2011

Busy busy busy!

Well it's been a week since I launched the Ophelia Collection of tapes and the response has been wonderful. To date 104 rolls of these two gorgeous designs have winged their way across the country (and a couple have even gone overseas) and while I am busily packaging envelopes each day I'm also deep in the planning and design phase for the next collection, but more about THAT soon as today I wanted to share with you some of the projects that have been created using these two new classic designs.


Rhonda Yates created this truly elegant card above using the Regal Damask print.


Thanks to Jessica Theodore, one of our blogging triallers for submitting this gorgeous offering.

And Chloe Hill had a lot of spooky Halloween fun creating this layout of herself using the Insanity Script tape.