New Thank You/Business Cards

I've been making my own business cards for my shop ever since I opened it, writing a personalized note to each customer thanking them for their purchase. I'm a hobby photographer anyway and with a little photoshop magic you can easily print words on the pictures. I get them printed at the same professional online photo lab where I have everything printed. They always have a matte finish and a vintage-esque white border. The first photograph I used was the one above (with Curious Knopf Vintage printed on it of course.) It is of a vintage cowgirl and was taken in the bathroom on the fabulous Plains Hotel in downtown Cheyenne, Wyoming.

I have relatives in Cheyenne so we stopped there for a night when we went to visit my grandma in Nebraska a little over a year ago. Cheyenne is a sort of rundown (so many empty store fronts, what a shame) but still charming old West town and the Plains is great if you're passing through (it was my second time staying there.) My second thank you/business card was also taken in the hallway of the Plains. The woman in the photograph is my sister. I ordered 30 copies, so I've been using it for a while, but I'm actually not all that crazy about the layout.

On a side note, I loved the problem-with-cowboys stories my 18 year old cousin who grew up in Cheyenne told us when we visited. Most Cheyenne teenagers grow up in suburban sprawl like the rest of the U.S., but there is a small percentage of real cowboys growing up on ranches. He said they tend to smell and spit tobacco during class which is annoying. There is also a very old law on the books that if they ride their horses to school, the school is required to give the horse shelter and brush it and feed it during lunch time, so some of them do this. What a hoot!

Anyway, my most current thank you/business card is the one pictured above. The photograph is the detail of a 1920s photograph of the German actress Lotte Lenya, most famous for her work in Kurt Weill pieces (she was also his lover for many years.) I wanted to maybe offer it as a print in my new photography shop Augenblick Photo, but it's a bit too out of focus for my taste (not that all photographs should be in focus, but if they aren't, there should be a reason...) It turned out fabulous, especially with the white border. I ordered 20 copies and the first one is going out in a package tomorrow, so if you order soon you'll have a lovely one all of your own. ;)