A New Calligrapher in Town!

Posted on July 7, 2016 by Holly

Two weeks ago, I had the privilege of an interview with reporter Cliff Newell of the Lake Oswego Review, in my Oregon calligraphy studio. I am grateful for the thorough job he did, covering creative project highlights, a little history and some of my soulful thinking! A huge thank you to Sharlyn Stare, Ryan Thelen and Ronna Schneider for taking the time with Cliff to add their kind-hearted insights about my work. Trusty photographer Vern Uyetake came, as well, and snapped an interesting array of photos in my studio. Below find the digital article and the paper article. Content is the same, but the photos in the articles are slightly different.

First the digital Article: (you can read the content here a little easier).

“An Artist With Grand Intentions”

Secondly, the real deal in the newspaper: July 7, 2016

SpeedBall Textbook 24th Edition, Celebrating 100 Years

Posted on March 28, 2016 by Holly

It’s Easter, and I’m late with this news, but last November 2015, just after I moved from Ohio to Oregon, the Centennial Edition of the Speedball Textbook, A Comprehensive Guide to Pen & Brush Lettering, 24th Edition, finally hit the market! Yah! My father Cliff Mansley, Sr. and I are both honored and grateful to be included among so many accomplished and inspiring lettering artists. I snapped a photo of our pages below and offer you a brief description, plus links to purchase the book.

Speedball Textbook, 24th Edition in which Holly Monroe and Cliff Mansley are both featured.

Holly Monroe and Cliff Mansley, Sr. showing off the cover of the 2015 Speedball Textbook, 24th Edition in which they are both featured.

For a little $15. book the Speedball Textbook, 24th Edition packs a big punch. Students of the written word can see a wide variety of lettering styles as well as fabulous finished examples from contemporary calligraphers of today. The added bonus in this edition, edited by Angela Vandalis and Randal Hasson, is that it salutes lettering throughout the last 100 years.

Speedball Textbook 24th Ed, Cliff Mansley calligraphy of I Corinthians 13

Love bears all things from I Cor 13. Cliff Mansley’s calligraphy in the Speedball Textbook, 24th Ed.

In the front you’ll find a fold out page featuring the covers of 24 past editions of the Speedball Textbook. It moves on to Tools, Tips and Techniques, lettering styles through the ages (pointed pen, broad-edged, brush, hand drawn, etc.), commercial lettering and so much more. If you’re a lover of letters you’ll want a copy! Order from www.JohnNealBooks.com or www.PaperInkArts.com two small businesses that cater to the Lettering and Book Arts community.

Speedball Textbook 24th Ed with Cliff Mansley flourished title

Bottom right: Flourished title of a poem about Scout Leader’s Wives. Lettering/Flourishing by Cliff Mansley, Sr.

Speedball Textbook 24th Edition featuring Holly Monroe's flourishing instructions.

Holly Monroe’s mini-course in flourishing appearing in the Speedball Textbook, 24th Edition, 2015, page 55. For a more comprehensive weekend workshop, FANTASTIC FLOURISHES, contact Letters@HollyMonroe.com.

Calligraphy for the Ballerina Wedding

Posted on January 7, 2015 by Holly

Last year, I was sitting at the drawing board, when Sue Corral called from www.DesignCorral.com She had been at a speaking engagement in NYC, when the Martha Stewart Weddings people asked her to design the stationary for “The Ballerina Wedding.” Tiler Peck and Robbie Fairchild, the two principal dancers in the New York City Ballet, were getting married! Willingly, she submitted samples from several calligraphers to the ballerinas, and unbeknownst to me, mine had been selected! Tiler and Robbie wanted lettering that was traditional, tailored and elegant. I was honored. So Sue and I put our heads together to come up with something special. Sue, had the design reigns and sent multiple mockups, but the ballerinas had simple, elegant taste. They landed on one, that incorporated the motif from the Cathedral floor in the picture below. Enjoy the professional pictures taken by Photographer Charlotte Jenks Lewis, www.charlottejenkslewis.com

Both the lettering and the tri-floral ends of the design were letterpressed in gold foil. Originally, the calligraphy was created in black…

Letterpressed type and “Dinner and Dancing” calligraphy was charcoal grey.I am sharing a close up with you….one might think that the gold lettering is typeset, the letterpress makes it look soooo perfect. But no, this was all done by hand at the drawing board, retouched in Photoshop and digitally transported to Sue. The calligraphy was much more delicate than it shows here. If you are not familiar with letterpress, the process always thickens the intended fine lines.Menu’s were letterpressed via Sue, as well. In an effort to elegantly use the Menu as a Place Card, I was asked to personalize each one with gold gouache. I used FineTec gold, but have to say that the marriage between the paper and the gold was a delicate one. I painstakingly went over each name a second time, so that the hairlines would 1). show up better 2.) while not losing their delicacy…so had to keep a light tough. I achieved the look that I wanted. (Perhaps soon I will post a closeup of a few of those.) Here is their extraordinarily romantic table setting. I was pleasantly surprised to see the calligraphy initials that I created for their names, foiled into the cover of Tiler and Robbie’s Guest Book.

The initials also appeared on their peekabo wedding programs. Again, the symbol from the Cathedral floor the cut-out on the cover.

Another surprise was to see the calligraphy delicately carved into the lid of the wedding ring box below. How sweet is this!?

The table numbers came towards the end of our project. Tiler and Robbie had the originals. I scanned them, so that both Sue and I could reproduce the table numbers, in case others wanted to use them. My Epson printer prints on two sided digital Entrada fine art paper, so it is easy enough to do.

The wedding favors, were two special little cookies in a box, that the Martha Stewart Weddings people hired out. My lettering did include a flourish, which I thought for sure would be perfect for a ballerina wedding. I had envisioned them reducing the design so it would fit on the box. Instead, it was removed. Nevertheless, I’ll show you! It’s below the last picture in this blog.

To see all of the wedding credits and pictures, go to www.MarthaStewartWeddings.com 20th Anniversary Edition > Tiler and Robbie wedding > Slide show > page 44, to see all of the fabulous people who helped to make their wedding a day to remember.

May these two beautiful ballet dancers, live happily ever after. What a fabulous couple they are…with a bright future! Again, check us out: Calligraphy: Holly V. Monroe, Stationary Design: Sue Corral, and Photography: Charlotte Jenks Lewis

Thanksgiving Place Cards with quick Brush Lettering

Posted on December 26, 2014 by Holly

Each year my friends, Tim and Teresa Cleary invite two families to join them for Thanksgiving at their Elk Lake cabin, Chateau Relaxo. It’s a fun several days full of puzzles, games, occasional polar bear leap into the lake, hot tubbing, paint ball, movies & reading, an annual pumpkin toss and just catching up with each other. The Thanksgiving dinner is cooked by all of us, so it’s delicious. We share the cooking load. Teresa reminds me to ‘bring your calligraphy pens’. She provides the colored paper and each year, we try to do something different with the placecards. Here is a sample from this year…I used gold gouache applied with a Kolinsky brush #4 round. Freehand!

And here is one of my favorite pictures from a past pumpkin toss!

Emily and Josh Monroe, Heidi and Phil Lofton, Mike and Kari Rogers, David Strife, Emily Cleary

The Patrigraphica Project – Recreating the Founding Docs of the USA

Posted on July 11, 2014 by Holly

Five years ago, I began working with client Ryan Thelen, a Cincinnati school teacher fromDater High School, who values the Founding Docs of this great country of ours. He wanted his students to see a life sized copy on parchment, so that it had more impact on them, but after a thorough internet search, he found nothing! Unbelievable! All that’s left of them are faded copies in a dimly lit room at National Archives.

Ryan and I put our heads together, experimenting with techniques to get the most accurate reproductions of the Bill of Rights, the Constitution and finally, the Declaration of Independence. He explains some of this on his website www.Patrigraphica.com (when I have a little more time, I will add to this post more detail as to how we did it.) Now, citizens can purchase life-sized copies of our Founding Docs on genuine parchment (calfskin) from his website. Monticello also sells the Declaration.

In the meantime, after all of our efforts, we were interviewed in NYC on Fox & Friends, July 3, 2014. Originally, all three of us were to be interviewed about our part….Holly the calligrapher, Jesse Meyer (www.Pergamena.com) the tanner or parchment maker and Ryan. In the end, we appeared at the end of the program, with Ryan as our wonderful spokesman.

Above is a picture on the Curvy Couch at Fox & Friends, Fox News studio, NYC.

Below is a link to our interview…..http://video.foxnews.com/v/3656931244001/teacher-brings-historic-us-documents-to-life/?playlist_id=930909787001#sp=show-clips