The Wren Bird Key Ring is bubble wrapped inside a small brown paper bag and closed with a Wren sticker.
Simple, practical and perfect.
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Finally I have found a use for my swallow silhouettes…
The Small Town Bags are still packaged in the classic brown paper bags but now they are decorated with cut-out map swallows.
Using my pile of mis-printed maps I cut miniature versions of my wall-art swallows and spray-glued them to the paper bags. To close the bags I use an old stamp (torn off from sent letters).
My five favourite things about this new wrapping are:
1) The look and effect I think is really great.
2) I am taking a boring brown paper bag and making it special.
3) I am recycling, reusing and upcycling.
4) All Wren packaging now has a common theme: maps.
5) The irony of this packaging: maps, swallows, bag traveling to you…..
I value the wrapping of gifts and I carry this through to Wren bag packaging.
Each Wren bag is packaged in a brown paper bag sealed with a safety pin decorated with brightly coloured beads. The safety pin is a traditional South African clothing item used instead of a button to hold clothes together and in my context, it serves as a sticker closing the classic and simple brown paper bag. The safety pin can be used later for whatever reason you can dream up.
This weekend I was playing with a new and ‘bigger’ bag design that I am hoping to introduce soon. For this bag I realized I needed bigger packaging. Brown paper bags come in standard sizes and the one I use is the biggest one available. I gave this ‘problem’ some thought and this is was what I came up with:
I have used the maps that I had under my bed. These maps of Cape Town and the Cederberg were being thrown away due to printing errors, name changes or because they were out of date and I ’saved’ them thinking I would find a purpose for them someday. Until now the only purpose I have found for them were my wall-art swallows but now I can finally say - they were worth keeping. I have taken something that was waste to somebody and have given it ‘new’ life. I copied the pattern from the brown paper bag and adjusted the size proportions. I have never been good at origami, maths or patience so this was a true challenge (and I was doing it on a Sunday afternoon!). After many frustrating samples I finally got it right and I am so excited with the result.
To seal the ‘map’ bag I came up with the idea to use old stamps. This relates to the map itself, distance and ties back to the theme of ‘no waste’. To get the old and already used stamp to stick I use double-sided tape.
So now you know - if you buy a Wren bag it comes beautifully wrapped. The current size bag is wrapped with the brown paper bag and beaded safety pin, if you buy more than one Wren bag you will get the recycled map bag and South African stamp and if you buy one of the bigger Wren bags that will soon be launched you will also get the recycled map bag and SA stamp.
