Meet 20th and Ives ++ Win!

If you know me at all you'll know there's nothing I love more than neon. and when you squish it together with a little bit of gold, letterpress & stationery. Well I may just faint..

Enter 20th and Ives - 20th and Ives (originally Brenster Occasions) is a husband and wife team founded March 5, 2013 by Bren and Sterling Larsen.  "Brenster" is the celebrity mash-up name our friends gave us when we got married (y'know, like "Brangelina), but we think renaming the company after the streets we lived on when we met (20th Street and Ives Street) sounds much lovelier.  We just love cooking, throwing parties, and writing letters.  In our philosophy, all these fluffy things should be more about connecting people than showing off.  We do what we do to help people develop their talents, build relationships, and serve others.

Where can you find us? Website // Etsy Store // Pinterest // Facebook // Twitter

++ don't forget to follow us on instagram - @20thandives

Where did it all begin for you? For us it all began during a huge blizzard in Washington D.C (Snowmagedon 2010)!  That's the week we started dating and conveniently had two weeks of time off work and classes in which to fall in love.  Bren lived on 20th street and I lived on Ives (hence the coming name change) and we have such good memories of walking the two blocks between our houses in three-foot drifts of snow at all hours of the day and night. Now we have two adorable little girls and love going on walks to the park.  The paper thing started for me much earlier, nearly a decade ago while I was living in Taiwan.  I liked working with designers and visiting the printing factories there, so this company is the realization of an old, long-anticipated dream.

Daily rituals.. We are a bit neurotic.  It takes us about an hour to get ready for bed.  We floss, brush, swish, shower, journal, read scriptures, and pray all before we check on the girls and make sure (for the third time) that the doors are all locked and the oven is off.  We've kept a joint journal every day since we got married and have started jotting down little memories of our girls, too.  It's a bit involved, but it's worth it.

What makes your heart happy? My girls -- the way they sleep, talk, laugh, play.  Long runs on the national mall past all the monuments on a sunny day. Warm chocolate chips cookies.  Singing around the piano with friends.

Note to self... I've learned how important it is to be kind to myself and use the same analytic rigor in assessing my good qualities.

In a past life I... was definitely a potter or a gardener.  For me, bliss is spending the day with clay or dirt on my hands.  

What's next for 20th and Ives? Other than our name change, we want to keep expanding our line and have a booth at the National Stationery Show in  New York in a few years!  We'll be there this May as spectators to see first-hand what it's all about!

&& now some super lovely news - you can win a set of these 4 neon + gold letterpress cards. & then you can try and send them to friends & family.. but it'll be hard, oh so hard. these babies scream to be framed on the wall.

How to Win: make sure you're following @paperedthoughts ++ @20thandives on instagram & repost the giveaway image below with the hashtag #PTfavouritethings (note the Australian spelling of favourite!) This giveaway is open Internationally!