Blue Birds Journal Set (Brighton Birds + Dusky Rose Herons)

This gift set contains:

Brighton Birds A5 fully lay flat notebook with 250gsm cover and 100gsm off-white numbered pages (Printed in England on FSC paper)

Flight of Heron, Dusky Rose Slimline Case - fully lined eco-cotton case with zip and thread from recycled plastics (handmade in Scotland) 

Bringing together two popular items that just happen to go perfectly together (and no, that wasn’t originally planned!).  This set is a great, practical yet thoughtful, gift for anyone who spends a lot of time putting things down in analogue.  Whether they’re a big journaller, meeting notetaker, student or sketcher, this set means they can carry around paper and some carefully selected pens/pencils. 

Although they’re both bird patterns, the origins of both are very different.  The Brighton Birds Notebook pattern is inspired by a pink and blue stairway in Brighton Pavilion - somewhere I visited whilst at school that captured my imagination and started a love of pattern and historic interiors.  The Flight of Herons pattern on the pencil case has slightly more humble origins having been originally inspired by some research I was doing into migrating birds.  I was looking for an answer to a question my daughter had asked when I saw images of flocks flying in formations.  Both patterns are, however, based on my own original hand-drawn artwork and watercolour paintings, which I then refined, digitised and then turned into repeat patterns for printing. 

The Notebook has a fully lay-flat thread-sewn binding, so the most can be made of each page (and they’re numbered for those that are really organised).  The first page has a monochrome version of the cover - so no first page fear - but otherwise the pages are clear with just the light grey dot grid.  And yes, not everyone likes a dot grid but it’s a personal favourite as I can use them to help keep my writing straight as well as drawing on them when I need to, so for me it’s the best of both worlds! 

The cover is a sturdy but not heavy 250gsm card, printed lilac on the inside, and the interior pages are an off-white 100gsm FSC approved paper. So they’ll hold up really well against your fountain pens and highlighters without bleeding or show-through.  Lastly, these are printed in the UK by a family-run printer that specialises in the lay-flat binding technique used (infact it was mastered for orchestra scores, but now they apply it on this smaller scale too), and they are also a carbon balanced printers who ensure sustainability within their processes.

The Slimline Pencil Case may be small but it’s also pretty mighty.  In fact at its fullest I’ve got 12 pens/pencils in there along with a small rubber, although I wouldn’t quite fill it that full all the time. Most of the time I carry 3 pens, a pencil, a small ruler and my pod headphones in there, and sometimes a phone charger cable too, which keeps all of them away from the bottom of my handbag making them easy to find (and hard to get caught round everything else).  The case is made from eco-cotton, is fully lined (also in cotton), and the sturdy zip and threads are all from recycled plastics.  The fabric has been printed in Scotland, before being cut and handmade into cases by a team just down the road in Stirling, who also specialise in small batch manufacturing and are championing a net zero approach. 

Both these items will be individually wrapped with minimal packaging - the notebook with a belly band and slimline case with a tag, both of which are recycled and recyclable.  They will then be bound together with paper string, ready to give as-is.  Or, if you would like them wrapped in Holchester Designs wrap so they’re ready to give, just add it on as part of the checkout process. 

Love the patterns but want to create your own set? You’ll find various items from the range in these patterns, and can search by pattern from the top menu.  But I’ve also got a whole section of pre-made gift sets also available, in lots of different patterns.