#2. cards, books, and cannibalism
Hi! Thanks for reading the second issue of THE BEST HALLOWEEN EVER.
Work has been nonstop so let’s cut straight to the Halloween chase.
Starting Small
This week, I flipped through all my crafting books and magazines and flagged a bunch of cute ideas. But I still hadn’t decided on an overall concept for the celebration (pumpkin-centric, slasher film, dark fantasy vs. creepy sci-fi?????), so I needed a project independent of a theme.
Luckily—and not to brag, but—I know a goth who turned twenty yesterday. So I made her a Halloween-y birthday card.
Once the card was made, I used it as a template for the envelope. The area of the envelope should be as long as the open card plus a couple of inches for the seal flap. Cut the envelope wider than the height of the card, too—as you can see below, I made my envelope a bit narrow. You need to accommodate two tabs (for gluing the sides together) and a few extra millimeters to make the card easier to remove from the envelope.
You can line the seal flap with a complementary patterned paper, draw something cute/creepy on the inside, or leave it blank (follow your heart).
Crease paper tabs along their edges, apply glue, and fold envelope shut. I put mine in a book while the glue dried, but be careful the envelope doesn’t get stuck to the pages.
If your envelope is patterned or textured, you can address it with a metallic felt-tip pen or alphabet stickers. Or write the recipient’s name on some cute nonpatterned paper, cut out nicely, and glue to the front.
Seal with a sticker, because if your envelope is made out of 80-lb card stock like mine, it’s probably too delicate to glue shut. If you don’t keep around a big metal tin o’ stickers, I cannot help you.
By the way, one of the things I’m most excited for this Halloween is mailing out cards! That includes mailing one to you. Please keep your eyes peeled for an address form in the coming weeks, and I’ll send you one :)
To Serve Man
Though I had flagged recipes and taken notes, I still did not have a cohesive concept for my extravagant, socially isolated Halloween blowout. But on Thursday I finished watching the odd, gory, fun television show Hannibal and felt *very* *inspired*. So this Halloween, I’m going to throw myself and my roommates a sort of Hannibal-themed, under-the-indoor-stars, haunted-woods vegan dinner party. I’m going to make breadsticks shaped like fingers with almond fingernails and like, ice cubes with fake eyeballs in them. The menu is TBD, but once finalized, I’ll mock it up in InDesign.
Anyway, I got started on the dinner party with a Twilight Zone–/Simpsons-inspired cookbook.
First, I turned the dust jacket of a hardcover inside-out and let it sit overnight so the paper would crease in the opposite direction. Then I painted the blank side of the dust jacket with black acrylic. This is not a technique I would necessarily recommend; dust jackets are generally made of coated paper that will resist whatever paint you apply to it. At the same time, it’s convenient and environmental to use what you’ve already got, so…pros/cons.
I took a hair dryer to the paint while watching Doctor Sleep, the sequel to The Shining. One simply must get in the spirit.
I decorated the jacket with gold cellophane stickers and metallic washi tape. I sort of free-handed the crossbones with an X-Acto knife…which made me laugh just now, because it’s literally called an “exact”-o knife. The cover’s not very precise, but as someone who spends workdays scanning Merriam-Webster for hyphens (and doing shit like italicizing Merriam-Webster), I have to let loose somehow.
Haunted Miscellany
Hannibal Lecter aside, I would be lucky to channel even a tenth of Christine McConnell this Halloween. She’s This Old House for goths; she is EVERYTHING
My other dinner party inspo is M. F. K. Fisher’s An Alphabet for Gourmets. Based on the 1949 review in Kirkus, Fisher did not intend to write a creepy book. But her descriptions of glossy chicken aspic and great, steaming joints of meat are DELIGHTFULLY GROSS!
I mean, just look at The Gourmet Club by Jun’ichiro Tanizaki—the whole concept of the gourmet is grotesque in the most literal sense (excessive; decorative)
Raquel informed me that Janelle Monáe is also going all out for Halloween, although they have the advantage of 👻ghosts👻
Have a Halloween memory, tip, or link you’d like to share? Reply to this e-mail and I’ll include it in the next letter!
🎃 HALLOWEEN COUNTDOWN: 85 DAYS 🎃