LBC Paper.
If you’re anything like me, you really love great stationery. In fact, if you’re like me, you’ll look inside your desk drawer and find that you have different types of thank-you cards, blank notes, letterhead, seals, and a ton of envelopes that probably matched something at some point… LBC Paper is today’s feature. The artist: Leah Copplestone. Her specialty: Paper! Leah creates handmade stationery, paper decor, journals, magnets, spools, pushpins, and other colorful paper products. Her colorful paper flower (pictured) is made from different pages of a children’s encyclopedia (intentionally chosen to create a yellow hue). Each individual petal is placed strategically, and the whole thing is glued to a powerful magnet. It is really an explosion of texture and color. These flowers are also available as pushpins and ornaments. She will also take custom orders, in case you’re looking for a specific color. Another fun fact: If you can guess Leah’s middle name, she’ll refund 25% of the order back to you. Visit her Etsy site for the hint.
Meet LBC paper….
Your name? Leah Copplestone
How did you get started? I’ve had Lyme Disease for about ten years but it wasn’t discovered until this past summer. So, needless to say, I’ve been pretty sick for a while but no one was ever able to get to the bottom of it. Athletic overuse injuries were given credit for the majority of my symptoms (chronic, constant, unbearable leg pain). In an effort to distract myself from the continuous pain I started cutting up paper and making stuff with it, which I quite enjoyed. As time (and pain) went on I needed bigger and bigger and bigger distractions, so I started an Etsy shop.
Other than making stuff – what do you do? Currently I’m taking time off from school (blame goes to the Lyme), so when I’m healthy enough to return to academics I’ll be studying architecture at Boston Architectural College. Until then I pretty much just spend my time hanging out with my two-year-old nephew, playing Sudoku, drinking tea, sometimes cooking, not usually cleaning, maybe reading…oh, and Lyme treatment.
Who is the most inspiring person you know? Well, there’s my mom, who together with my dad raised my four sisters and me, and who is currently kicking the butt of one of the most outrageous cancers ever known to man (Leiomyosarcoma). My dad pretty much rocks my world; he’s easily the kindest and most humble person I know, while at the same time being totally selfless, generous, creative, funny and occasionally annoying. Yes, I know it’s cliché to pick your parents as your most inspirational people, but I don’t have much of a choice: they’ve both fought for their lives like nothing you can imagine (my mom patiently waited for my dad to kick his Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma’s butt before letting her own cancer begin its invasion) and from both of them I’ve learned lessons I could never even hope to be able to teach to others or to relearn myself.
What makes ‘handmade’ important to you? Simply the fact that actual human thought goes into every second of the production process. Anything using too much help from a computer gets on my nerves, especially when it’s a paper product. Printed off paper goods really don’t do it for me, especially when exact replicas can be infinitely reproduced. My favorite items to make are the ones where my only tools are my two hands, scissors and a bottle of glue.
Leave us with 3 little/fun/trivial facts about you!
- One of the things that will automatically get you on my bad side is to mispronounce my name as “Lee” instead of the correct pronunciation of “Lee-ah” (but lots of people make that mistake so don’t worry, you’ll have plenty of company if you end up on my bad side)
- I think cottage cheese is the nastiest thing I have ever seen.
- I really loved Geometry class in high school.
Check out some more of Leah’s work below:
Click Here to visit LBC Paper’s Etsy store, or copy&paste this URL: http://www.etsy.com/shop/LBCpaper?ref=top_trail
Once again, a big thank you to Leah – Can’t really do this blog without all of these amazing contributions! And now, time to crank up the heat, bundle, and stay warm. I suggest everyone do the same 
MK
