The holidays have us thinking about ways to remember all those folks — some who traveled FAR — with whom we visited or shared a meal, celebrating and counting blessings. So compiled our collection of traditional and not-so-traditional forms of “guest books”.
Graphic designer Pamela Hovland draws place settings on her Kraft paper covered tablecloth beforehand. Everyone signs them and adds notes and greetings.
She cuts them out and sends them to guests in the days that follow, affixing an address sticker and stamps on them.
Cover your table with a big swath of cotton, muslin or Kraft paper and provide guests with fabric pens to write poems, draw, scribble as they talk and eat.
They just might become heirlooms….
Guest walls are pretty great, IF you’re willing to set aside a scrap of wall for whatever a guest devises, whether written…
…
…covered with notes, polaroids, and ephemera…
…We love these fabric covered “guest sofa and chair” signed with fabric markers
They don’t have to be upholstered. Wrapping them in white muslin or a drop cloth will do…
And then of course there is the very simple, wonderful idea of an actual guest book. One we’ve kept for years is crammed with thank you notes, wine labels, polaroids, notations of dinner, wines, who was there and other memorabilia.
If you know great artists, as the legendary chef Fernand Point did, you just might get a drawing as a thank you, like this one by Jean Cocteau
