Decorated envelopes make for an amazing surprise gift! Think about it: usually, a person’s mailbox is a pretty boring place, home to many a credit card offer and grocery store flyer. When something extraordinary graces the humble mailbox, it’s hard not to get excited! Accordingly, today’s tutorial offers a quick and effective way to make an artistic piece of envelope art that will stand out in anyone’s mail pile! To create it, you’ll need a black (or very dark) envelope; mine is a cheapie that came in a black card/envelope set from the North American craft store chain Michael’s. Use a soapstone pencil and a ruler to make a centered vertical guideline as well as a centered horizontal guideline.
Next, draw marks on the horizontal line that are 1.25″ (31.75 mm) from the edge both sides of the envelope. Then, draw marks on the vertical line that are 0.75″ (19 mm) from the top and bottom of the envelope.
Use curved lines to connect the marks you just drew. Don’t worry about the curves being perfect; part of the charm of this piece is that it’s not perfect!
Next, dip a size 1 paintbrush — the size is engraved in the handle — into white calligraphy ink (I am using Ziller), white acrylic paint, or white gouache. (If none of these three inks are handy or you are not comfortable using them, you can substitute in a white Gellyroll pen for this step.) Use your brush to paint a wavy line over the oval you drew in the previous step.
Once you finish painting the wavy line, start painting another wavy oval line. This wavy line should have waves that appear at opposite parts of the first wavy line; you’ll feel like you’re making “8”s all the way around the oval! Again, don’t worry about perfection here:Â if your waves aren’t perfect, it’s no big deal.
When you’re finished, the oval will look something like the photo below.
While you’re waiting for your oval to dry, you can pull out your colored pencils. I love Prismacolor pencils because they’re soft and high-quality!
Choose two different colors to use on the envelope; I would suggest blue and red, as pictured below.
Take the red pencil and draw a series of short and connected curved lines in the bottom left corner of the envelope; your goal is to emulate a sparse tree branch.
Next, draw leaves connected to the lines. The leaves don’t need to appear in any sort of pattern; wherever you can fit in leaves is perfect!
Before you go any further with the colored pencils, it’s a good idea to erase your soapstone pencil guidelines!
Once the guidelines are erased and your first laurel branch is drawn, you can add another laurel branch. This branch will be blue!
Continue to draw laurel branches around the envelope. The size and the shape of the branches don’t matter; the important thing is just to alternate the colors. Every red branch should be sandwiched between two blue branches, and every blue branch should be sandwiched between two red branches.
The result will look something like this:
The next step is to finish up your envelope art by adding complementary calligraphy! For projects like this, I like to pre-write the recipient’s address in pencil (or, in this case, soapstone pencil) to ensure that everything is centered and evenly spaced. It’s not a necessary step, but if you’ve got the time, it’s not a bad idea! Amy Style calligraphy, the style used to write “Rebecca Thering”, corresponds beautifully with the playful nature of the surrounding laurel wreaths.
I love the look of calligraphy paired with hand-lettering, so the address for this envelope is written in Sans Serif letters.
After you write the address, you can add a white laurel branch above and below it to echo the colored laurel branches. This helps to visually tie the piece together!
You can finish up the envelope with a stamp or two in the upper right corner. Don’t worry about covering up some of your artwork; I find that stamps always enhance — rather than take away from — any piece of mail art!
While today’s tutorial shows how to use this design motif for decorated envelopes, I encourage you to be creative with using it on other projects! From place cards to bookmarks to greeting cards, you could use the technique described above to make any paper good stand out. All you’ll need is some black paper, white ink, and colored pencils. Speaking of which …
Giveaway
If you don’t have any colored pencils to create this tutorial with (or you’d just like to upgrade), then you’ll enjoy this international giveaway! Two winners will receive a set of 24 Prismacolor colored pencils, a $32.00 value plus shipping.
You can enter using the Rafflecopter widget below! Remember, if you’re not on social media, that’s perfectly fine: you can still enter with the “Answer a Question” option.
Both winners will be notified via email upon the giveaway’s completion on the morning of Tuesday, May 3rd.
I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial, and that you will use it to make some delightfully artistic decorated envelopes! I’m wishing the very best of luck to you for the giveaway, and I hope that you have a fantastic weekend!
Warmly,
Can’t wait to try this! Hoping that it will work as well on some navy envelopes I have left over from an order!
As long as the envelopes are dark, the technique will work beautifully! 🙂
The day you posted this, I had a total fan-girl freakout moment! I was just reading the latest post like normal, and then BOOM–I was taken completely by surprise! (And you wouldn’t believe the good timing either—my birthday was on the 24th.)
Thank you so much Lindsey—I’m anxiously awaiting for this to arrive (my friends are forwarding it to me, as I’m back in France now.) 🙂
Since I know you really care about keeping addresses private, I’ll share with you (which I recently learned from these London-dwelling friends) that in the UK, each post code covers an average of just 15 houses. So for example, there are actually just four houses which have my friends’ postal code. So to disguise UK addresses, it especially helps to change the post code too. Fun fact of the day!
As always, thanks for sharing your creations and inspiring all of us!
I am so glad that you will receive it! I did a quick re-read-through of your letter before sealing the envelope, and I noticed that you said you were leaving the UK in the middle of April … oops! I still put it in the mail, though, figuring that Hannah would be able to send it in the right direction. 🙂
That is so interesting about postal codes in the UK! I know you totally get where I was coming from there … I think there are hundreds, if not thousands, of houses in Boulder that share our postal code. I will definitely censor the postal codes on UK envelopes in the future; thanks so much! Does that apply to France as well?
Yeah, I totally knew where you were coming from based on U.S. zip codes!
Nope, it’s not like that in France—but I think the same applies to Canada, where their postal codes are the same (or maybe just similar) format as in the UK. This page says there are an average of 19 households per postal code in Canada.
Never thought coloured pencils look so awesome on dark paper! Thanks for yet another pretty idea!
They are super opaque, right!? I’m always amazed at how great the coverage is. 🙂
Your tutorials are so wonderful and I thank you for sharing your wealth of talent with your readers.
Thanks, Helen! I love writing about this sort of thing, so I’m really happy that you enjoy the blog!
Through my recent endeavors with bullet journalling (that led me to want to improve my hand lettering skills) I ended up on your blog. You have such a lovely website! Love this tutorial too 🙂
Thank you!! I’m really happy that you are enjoying the website, and that you’re journaling. That’s a great way, as you know, to flex your creative muscle. 🙂
This is beautiful! I haven’t tried yet, but I actually feel like I can do this one. I don’t draw, so sometimes feel tutorials are out of my reach. This one I feel is reachable! Thank you!
I have a feeling you’ll be able to do this one, too. 🙂 It’s a nice little project to work on when you want to take a few minutes to relax!
As always, your work is always so inspiring! I want to someday be able to work so beautifully 🙂 Thanks for sharing your creativity for others to learn through practice!
You will absolutely get there, probably a lot sooner than you think. 🙂 Thanks so much for the kind words, Missy!
I didn’t know they were so opaque on black paper. Love it!
I know — that opacity is so cool!
Methinks your tremendous talent makes these lovely artworks appear deceptively simple. Still, the inspiration they provide is undeniable!
I beg to differ with your first sentence! 🙂 Nevertheless, you are too kind!
I make cards to give with my crocheted prayer shawls, and I think I could use this technique on them. Thanks for the chance to win!
That would be a wonderful utilization for this technique! 🙂
I love this! Thanks for the tut!
It’s my pleasure! Thanks, Crystal!
This is such a great idea and so beautiful. I love how the colored pencils pop on that black envelope. This came in with perfect timing. I just ordered 2 different white inks to try, and now I really can’t wait to get them. Also, I will be trying out the nibs and nib holder that I recently won through your previous give a way. Thank you so much for the give a way gifts and to Paper and Ink Arts. You are both very kind and generous. Also thank you for your tutorials. I always, always enjoy them. Good luck to those who signed up for this give a way. I love the Prismacolor pencils. Have a great weekend………Linda E.
Thanks, Linda! I’m really glad to hear that your giveaway spoils will be put to good use (not that I had any doubt)! I love white ink, too — you’ll get a lot of mileage out of your purchase. 🙂
I think you forgot to block out/cover the address details in one of the photos…
Actually, the photos that show the address details have been Photoshopped to keep the address private. 🙂 I really appreciate you keeping me on my toes, though! If I had inadvertently posted the recipient’s true address, I of course would want to know!
The envelope is gorgeous, the artwork and lettering stand out beautifully against the dark background! I do have some black envelopes and I’ll give the project a try, just applying the techniques you teach is great fun. Thank you!
I’m sooo happy that you enjoy trying out the techniques! I know you’ll enjoy this one; it’s a nice project to take on if you have a couple of minutes to relax. 🙂
Wow I never would have thought to use calligraphy ink like that, and it looks amazing! What a striking yet accessible design. And those coloured pencils show up so well on the dark paper! I never would have thought!
It’s amazing how well colored pencils interact with dark paper, right?! 🙂
Perfect. I worked on something for my sister yesterday, and this morning was just getting down to the: ‘Now, for the envelope!’ part. This matches so well. Thanks Lindsey, your tutorials always make me happy.
It’s serendipity! 🙂 Thanks Bron — you always have such nice things to say!