Vendor Spotlight: Gus and Ruby Letterpress

French’s Point Estate is thrilled to continue our series of blog posts spotlighting amazing Maine wedding vendors that help to make weddings at our waterfront wedding venue not only successful but truly the embodiment of the experience our clients strive to craft for their family and friends. This series will showcase some of the best providers from our vibrant, talented, dedicated wedding industry community we are so proud to be a part of here in Maine and New England. This group of professional wedding vendors understands and adheres to our guiding principles for the service we endeavor to provide our clients: Be Responsive, Be Kind, Provide Excellent Customer Service, Provide the Very Best Product/Service. Because of these wonderful people, the celebrations here are French’s Point Estate is the stuff of which dreams are made!

Choosing the ladies at Gus and Ruby Letterpress to design your custom wedding stationery is going to be one of the best decisions you’ve ever made. Not only are they both wonderfully creative, but they’re also fun, smart, and have years of experience. I love that their passion is bringing your ideas into reality. This is how they describe their vision:

“We believe every part of planning a wedding should be a joyous, celebratory experience. we are experts at offering advice regarding timing, explanations of the necessary pieces, tips on etiquette, and creative inspiration used to craft truly personal packages. From the story of a first kiss to the lyrics from a favorite song, we find inspiration in every personal detail and help couples create stationery as special as they are.”

Now, doesn’t that sound like a team you want to work with? Meet the creative duo behind Gus and Ruby Letterpress.

How long have you been operating your business?

We have been open as a custom design studio since 2008. What once began as a small side-business has grown into a full-time design and print shop as well as brick and mortar stationery and home-goods store.

How would you describe our products and services?

We offer a variety of services from true custom design – meaning we start from scratch to create a stationery suite just for you – to modified custom design based on our work or specific input, to customizable designs from albums of work from the country’s top designers.

Describe your range of design style.

We specialize in true custom design, so our style is really more a reflection of our couples’ styles! We pride ourselves on taking a couple’s love story and personal aesthetic and translating it into the perfect paper suite. We have designed suites that have ranged from super crisp and contemporary to lush and romantic florals to clean and bright nautical and everything in between. Our only goal as designers is to take your vision and translate it into something spectacular so the final product is a reflection of YOU and your style.

What makes your work unique?

Our story – with Whitney being a 3^rd generation letterpress printing and us starting out printing on a press from the late 1800s that was owned by her grandfather – makes us unique. Ink and paper are part of our heritage and we are so proud to keep alive a printing technique from our forefathers. We strive to create pieces that truly tell the stories of our treasured clients – each suite is unique in that it is born from a love story and our deep-seated desire to create something stunning for each client.

What is your average cost per suite?

Because each of our clients’ needs and packages are so different and are quoted on a case-by-case basis, it’s very hard to provide an average cost. From our custom design and letterpress and foil stamp printing to digitally printed or thermography options from albums, we do offer a wide variety of options and price points.

Do you recommend hand-addressing invitations? If so, can you provide this service?

We absolutely recommend hand-addressing invitations! It’s such a lovely, personal touch for your guests. We don’t offer calligraphy in-house but do work with a team of incredible calligraphers for our clients’ projects.

What sage advice would you offer our couples?

Our first piece of advice is to trust your vendors! You are working with one of the best of the best teams in New England (French’s Point!) and they’ve likely introduced you to a slew of other talented professionals. Share your vision with your team and then trust them to do their jobs beautifully and execute on your behalf. You’ll be so much happier not feeling like you need to micromanage everything and you’ll be in such great hands with people who only want the very best for you and your big day. You hired them for a reason so sit back and enjoy the process!

The second piece of advice – more stationery related – that we offer is to give yourself plenty of time. The design process is always much smoother and more enjoyable when you (and we!) don’t feel rushed. As soon as you’ve made your big decisions (date, overall tone/vibe), contact us right away so we can begin brainstorming creative ideas for your paper pieces.

What’s your favorite day trip in Maine?

Such a tough question to pick just one trip! We really love heading up to Portland for a day of good eating and shopping! We’d start our morning with Holy Donuts and iced coffees from Bard then we’d head on a quick ferry ride out to Peaks Island for a morning of exploring. Once back on the mainland, we’d lunch on paninis and french fries at Duckfat or lobster rolls from Eventide Oyster Co. Cones in hand from Mt. Desert Island Ice Cream, we’d then spend the afternoon wandering around the old port and visiting all our favorite stores for inspiration and some retail therapy. If we’re feeling adventurous (and to build up an appetite again!), we may rent bikes and coast along the coast for the late afternoon. Cocktails at the Hunt and Alpine Club followed by dinner at one of the myriad amazing restaurants (Fore Street and Central Provisions being two of our classic favorites!) would really round out a dreamy day.

Samantha Finigan and Whitney Swaffield
Gus and Ruby Letterpress
29 Congress Street
Portsmouth, NH 03801
(603) 319-1717
gusandruby.com
hello@gusandruby.com

All photos by Brea McDonald Photography