Surveys! Livestreams! Other Stuff!
about 4 years ago
– Thu, Sep 10, 2020 at 03:34:22 AM
Hello friends!
Just a quick note this time with some housekeeping and updates as BOTANICA continues to take root. The project is off to print now! Safely in the hands of our trusted publishing partners who are cutting dies, casting stamps, mixing inks and sending proofs as they prepare to get this whole crazy thing onto the presses. We're still pretty much on schedule! When this project exponentially blew up, we were very worried that it would make it hard to hit our originally quoted deadline. Well, if we miss it, it shouldn't be by much. Barring any unforeseen issues, we're still on target to deliver this whole project by the end of the year.
First off -- surveys! We're planning to send them out by this weekend! If you haven't received your survey by this coming weekend, try going to botanica.backerkit.com and entering your email. If that still doesn't work, please email us at [email protected] and we'll help you figure out what's up. NB: PLEASE DON'T EMAIL US NOW ASKING WHY YOU CAN'T ACCESS YOUR SURVEYS -- WE HAVEN'T SENT THEM OUT YET.
Not many sneak peeks to show quite yet -- but here's a glimpse of the Compendium interior!
Kevin and Maëlle have been absolutely pedal-to-the-medal on this project for months now, getting everything ready to go into production. Join them tomorrow at 2PM on their respective Instagram channels @kevinjaystanton and @ouimaelle for a live chat about Botanica, their other projects, and somewhere in the area of fifty to one thousand bizarre tangents and digressions regarding animals, musicals, and the worst movies of all time. They're considering making these a regular weekly thing, and for our money this is most promising development of this utterly awful year.
Finally -- we're into the final 48 hours of our campaign to fund LAAB MAGAZINE, our ongoing annual art newspaper of the radical imagination! The project is fully funded, so please consider this final chance to get on board with this vital collective publication and ongoing adventure. (If we hit $40k, we'll add another 8 broadsheet pages!)
Thank you, dearest Botanists! More soon.
Josh, Maëlle and Kevin
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Name Check (plus proof peeks!)
about 4 years ago
– Sat, Aug 22, 2020 at 01:17:23 AM
Hi friends! Just a quick update for those of you in the Alchemist-and-above tier, who are being thanked in print.
If you are in the Alchemist and above tier, please check this file to see if we've spelled your name correctly. If not, we need any revisions by Sunday at 1:00pm EST. BOTANICA goes to print Monday morning!
https://www.dropbox.com/s/5qhg8ey4c1dd90d/BB_Botanica_Acknowledgements_Booklet%20200821_16h56.pdf?dl=0
Please note that this is NOT an opportunity to change which name you would like to be credited by. The deadline for giving us a different name besides your Kickstarter handle was back in July. If you didn't answer our initial query, we won't be able to change how you're credited. This is only to double check that we haven't made errors, left anyone out, or misspelled names.
One small change. Our initial Kickstarter pitch said that you would be thanked in the informational booklet accompanying the deck. Well, this project BLEW THE HECK UP, so we quickly realized that ramming a few thousand names into a booklet that intended to get a lot of regular use would make things impossibly unwieldy. So we've decided to include a second acknowledgements booklet to thank the relevant folks. That's the file linked here. Internally, we've dubbed it: The Book of Friends. So find yourselves in the book and let us know if we've got you right.
PLEASE NOTE: Only people in the $100 and above tiers are thanked in print! If you're an Herbalist backer, you don't appear in the booklet. But you do appear in our hearts.
Thanks everyone! We love you, we're grateful to you, and we're proud to have you inscribed directly into the material manifestation of this magical project.
FINALLY -- some sample snaps of our proofs! We're grinding like mad this weekend to get everything off to print. Hope you're all having fun in the sun for us, while we sit in our darkened studios staring at computer screens.
Happy Friday everyone! And don't forget to check out LAAB MAGAZINE! We're almost at our funding goal!
XOXO,
Josh, Maëlle and Kevin
A Cease-fire in the War of the Bookmarks. Plus Sneak Peeks and a New Adventure!
over 4 years ago
– Tue, Aug 18, 2020 at 03:43:27 PM
Afternoon, alchemists and augurers! Just wanted to send a note from storm-wracked Philadelphia, where we're stirring the cauldron constantly, swirling BOTANICA together faster and faster every day. Kevin is sending in new designs and paintings at a furious pace, and every new card is more gorgeous than the last. We're receiving proofs of cards, boxes, terrariums, tins, pins, patches, charms, journals, books, scarves, stickers, postcards and more (I literally can't list everything, my fingers get too tired), and we're nitpicking and perfecting the hell out of them.
I'll share some more sneak peeks below, but I also wanted to clue you all in to a new project we just launched on Kickstarter yesterday. LAAB MAGAZINE is one of our flagship publications -- an annual collective art newspaper full of deep-dive writing and scholarship, gorgeous experimental art and comics, interviews with folks like John Carpenter and Saul Williams, and more. This thing is a glorious tangle of text and image, all approaching some new understanding of aesthetics, culture and the radical imagination. It was created by Ronald Wimberly, and features a diverse cast of authors including Ben Passmore, Emily Carroll, Rosemary Valero-O'Connell, Ezra Claytan Daniels, Paul Pope and dozens more. I hope a few of you (so many of whom are new to this strange world-within-a-world we call Beehive Books!) will hop on board this ongoing adventure.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/beehivebooks/laab-an-art-newspaper-powered-by-the-radical-imagination?ref=1zbdmd
OK -- now back to the flowers!
Because we care deeply about you, our beloved Botanists, we've decided not to slice the pages of your compendiums and the flesh of your first-borns with diamond-sharp bookmark charms. We didn't expect the humble poll we introduced last week to embroil us in the biggest controversy ever to rock the BOTANICA community, but these things rarely proceed as planned. Bookmarkgate has divided backer against backer in a war over how sharp the spikes of this lovely little treasure should be.
After a lot of internal dialog and some experiments in the lab, we've got a solution that we think will work for everybody. We've managed to round off the sharpest edges without losing any of the crispness of the aesthetic look of the things. Without further ado, we present: the Dandelion of Safety.
Kevin, meanwhile, is absolutely on fire, churning out some of the most beautiful cards in this transcendent deck. We don't want to give away too much of the game, but we do want to share some glimpses, details and sneak peeks at what he's working on.
Here's a handful of snaps of his pencil layouts. (He paints these cards on wooden boards!)
And here are some looks at the paintings in progress:
Kevin has also been live-streaming some BOTANICA painting on Instagram, which is really a sight to see. It’s a privilege to watch him work. Most magicians won’t tell you how their tricks are done.
His next live stream is at 10AM EST this Sunday, @kevinjaystanton on Instagram. I can’t think of a better way to spend a Sunday morning. Watching Kevin work is the only thing I’ve ever seen that’s both 100% thrilling and 100% soothing. And don't forget to follow @beehivebooks where we'll be posting some peeks and hints in our stories.
As far as the schedule goes -- we're really up against the deadline now, but we're moving fast. We're planning to have everything off by the end of the month, which should have them back to us around the end of November, in time to get them off to you all before Christmas and the end of the year. It's tight, and this doesn't leave us much room for error -- it's a bit of a high-wire act, but we are doing our absolute damndest to make it happen.
Thank you for your patience and passion, and thank you for talking us down from mailing 10,000 potentially deadly weapons across the far reaches of the Earth. Love you madly!
Josh, Maëlle and Kevin
Bookmarks with Sharp Edges! Altar Cloths with Styling Options!
over 4 years ago
– Thu, Jul 30, 2020 at 12:48:42 AM
Here in our West Philadelphia churchtower we're having an internal design debate, so we figured we'd bring you, our ten-thousand-strong Botanica braintrust, into the conversation.
We got some gorgeous proofs for the die-cut metal charm/bookmark that comes with every deck set. These things are delicate and gleaming and glorious -- and, as we discovered upon poking them eagerly into our tender, editorial-lifestyle-softened flesh, quite sharp. They're not dangerous or deadly or anything, but they do possess a Wildean pointed wit. You wouldn't want to hand them to a child. Here: have a look for yourself.
We could soften up these edges a little bit before we go to finals -- but really, we think the sharp points are nice aesthetically. So we ask you, friends: is a sharp bookmark troubling to you? Are you planning to sleep with your Botanica charm nestled against your cheek? Should we round off the corners? If there's a rough consensus among our backers, we'll do whatever you all say. Sound off in the comments!
In other news, we got the first samples of our silk altar cloth! They really look incredible. Unlike the bookmark charms, these are perfect for facial nestling.
Kevin and Maëlle had no choice but to immediately accessorize them in our Zoom call. Contrary to popular belief, wearing things as jaunty scarves only increases their sacredness.
That's all for now! Don't forget that if you're being thanked by name in the booklet, Friday is the deadline to adjust your name. Please do so by sending us a direct message. Otherwise we'll credit you by your Kickstarter handle, and some of you have really ridiculous handles that you'll henceforth forever known by. (I'm looking at you, TooHighToThinkOfAKickstarterName. Speak now or forever hold your peace.)
Josh, Maëlle and Kevin
Pin and Charm Proofs, Pencil Sketches and Schedule Update
over 4 years ago
– Sat, Jul 25, 2020 at 03:01:05 AM
Hi friends! Just a short update from your favorite mystical botanists.
Things are proceeding quickly through the production stages on this thrill-ride of a publishing project.
We're only a few weeks away from our deadline to have all the files off to the printer. Kevin's been deep in the lab, finishing the portfolio of paintings and working with Maëlle to design the MANY MANY bonus items and add-ons we're producing.
Meanwhile, we're sending things off to the printer and getting proofs and dummies back already. There's lots of stuff I could show you, but I'll save some of it for later updates. In the meantime, here's a quick-and-dirty poorly lit snap of some from our printer of the bonuses we're testing, hot off the presses. These things are SHINY AS HELL.
And here are a couple of little peeks at Kevin's pencil designs, as he works out the design of the final remaining cards.
We're currently still on target to hit our promised fulfillment date of November. This is far more work than we were expecting to need to do in this time frame, but that's only because all of you have invested so much of your faith and love into this project -- all we're doing is trying to match your passion and trust with our own hard work, and the secret sauce of Kevin's inimitable sorcery.
We're having a ball swirling this crazy thing together, and we couldn't be more excited to get it into your hands. Thank you for making it possible.
Josh, Maëlle and Kevin
