Characters With Love -letterbox gifts by Jane Foster
Characters with love
When the schools closed a few weeks ago and we suddenly went into lockdown with the cornavirus, my thoughts went into overdrive as to what I could do to make a small difference in people’s lives at such as challenging and scary time. I threw myself into lots of illustrating to not only cope with my own anxiety but to also try to offer a little bit of happiness to others in the wider community. I started illustrating little ‘characters with love’ which I drew by hand onto thin card and carefully cut out. Each one was slightly different and the idea behind them was that these could be affordable little ‘letterbox’ gifts that people could send or receive in the post to loved ones who were self isolating. The fact that they were letterbox gifts meant that no-one needed to visit a sorting office to receive them.
Here are some I made below. *One customer requested I make twenty characters to send to all her relatives from her son and daughter - I wrote messages on the back of each one which I found very moving.
The designs progressed into having little windows with secret flowers or hearts behind.
I couldn’t make these fast enough as they were so popular. I then came up with a solution - I could create some ‘Make Your Own’ kits alongside these for children to make and colour in. First In started with the ‘Characters with Love’ enabling children to create 18 characters.
I then created a new set of characters to send in the post for Easter.
My next decision was to get some of my new characters onto fabric so I could create little toy kits. My illustrations were printed onto organic cotton here in the UK and created some ‘Make Your Own’ kits which also become part of the ‘letterbox love’ category in my shop.
I still felt the need to continue to create these little characters so I returned to my love of making miniature books. I’ve been making these on and off for around 30 years and they’re a real labour of love!
