Unofficial homage · Not a client project
Unofficial homage ↗What if Alejandro Jodorowsky designed your baby shower invitation?
A design exploration: the baby shower invitation we imagined Alejandro Jodorowsky making for Kayleigh and Brandon’s party at a chain restaurant in Dayton, Ohio. A tarot card called THE BABY (2.75 × 4.75 in) in the Tarot de Marseille style, letterpressed in vermilion, chrome yellow, ultramarine and flesh with black outlines on thick cream cotton, with mirror gold foil sun rays, gilded edges and rounded corners; a GRANDMOTHER RSVP card; a DIAPER registry card; and an envelope sealed with a vermilion wax eye. An homage, not affiliated with Jodorowsky.
A ideia
Treat the most ordinary party in America as a sacred rite, and make the invitation a tarot card worth keeping.
Four rules
- 01THE BABY: the invitation is a tarot card. The front is pure picture: a swaddled baby on a lotus above a stepped pyramid, under a rising sun, with THE BABY on the banner. Date, time,…
- 02Letterpress, one colour at a time. Each colour fill is drawn a hair larger than its shape, and the black outline prints last, on top, so it covers every join. The fills can w…
- 03Foil sun rays and gilded edges. Mirror gold foil rays, each drawn at least 0.6 mm wide and fanning out from the halo, stamped after the letterpress so they sit on top. The…
- 04THE GRANDMOTHER, THE DIAPER and the seal. Two matching cards at the same size: the RSVP is THE GRANDMOTHER (cloak, yarn, ballpoint pen) and the registry card is THE DIAPER, a folded…
The brief nobody sent us
Kayleigh and Brandon from Dayton, Ohio, are having a baby shower. Sunday at 2, in the party room of their favourite chain restaurant, with a sheet cake and a gender-reveal balloon. In our version of the story, they asked the most cosmic filmmaker alive to design the invitation, and he took it very, very seriously.
Alejandro Jodorowsky has spent decades with the Tarot de Marseille: he reads it, writes about it and, with Philippe Camoin, helped reconstruct the deck in 1997. So the invitation could only be one thing: a tarot card. These are made-up people and a made-up job. It’s a design exploration and an homage, and we’re not affiliated with Jodorowsky. Every technique on these cards can really be made.
THE BABY: the invitation is a tarot card
Wanted: An invitation that feels like a sacred object, not a party flyer. Something the guests keep on the fridge for a year.
Constraint: A tarot card is narrow (2.75 × 4.75 in), so there is no room for a paragraph of party details on the front.
We chose: The front is pure picture: a swaddled baby on a lotus above a stepped pyramid, under a rising sun, with THE BABY on the banner. Date, time, place and the parents’ names go on the back, set small and centred like the fine print on an old deck. Rounded corners, like a real deck.
Letterpress, one colour at a time
Wanted: The flat, chunky colour of 18th-century woodblock tarot: vermilion, chrome yellow, ultramarine and a pale flesh tone, held together by heavy black outlines.
Constraint: Five colours means five passes through a platen press, and perfect registration on soft cotton is hard. Too tight looks digital; too loose looks like a mistake.
We chose: Each colour fill is drawn a hair larger than its shape, and the black outline prints last, on top, so it covers every join. The fills can wander a little, as they did on the old woodblock decks, and the card still looks crisp. The deep bite of the letterpress into thick cream cotton does the rest.
Foil sun rays and gilded edges
Wanted: The light coming off the baby. Every Marseille-style deck glows a little; this one should actually shine.
Constraint: Thin foil lines break up or fill in. Under about 0.6 mm (1/40 in), fine rays stop stamping cleanly.
We chose: Mirror gold foil rays, each drawn at least 0.6 mm wide and fanning out from the halo, stamped after the letterpress so they sit on top. The card edges are gilded in gold, so the stack shines even before anyone turns a card over.
THE GRANDMOTHER, THE DIAPER and the seal
Wanted: A full suite, so the joke keeps going: every card is a new arcana.
Constraint: Extra cards add cost fast, and the suite has to fit one envelope and one stamp.
We chose: Two matching cards at the same size: the RSVP is THE GRANDMOTHER (cloak, yarn, ballpoint pen) and the registry card is THE DIAPER, a folded cloth diaper radiating gold rays like a holy relic. Matching geometric backs, all three in one cream envelope (an A1, 3⅝ × 5⅛ in) closed with a vermilion wax seal pressed with an open eye.
Where the idea came from
The deck. The Tarot de Marseille is centuries old: woodcut figures, a handful of flat colours and thick black lines, printed and hand-coloured by card makers in France. It’s public domain, and it’s the look every card here is built on.
The man. Jodorowsky is a filmmaker, a comic-book writer and a tarot master. In 1997 he and Philippe Camoin, from a family of Marseille card makers, published their reconstruction of the deck, and his book on it has been read by tarot students all over the world.
The joke. Put that level of ritual into the most ordinary party in America and you get a baby shower with robes, a throne of diaper boxes and a balloon that goes off like a revelation. The cards stay serious. Everything around them doesn’t.
Alejandro Jodorowsky on Wikipedia → →
Como fizemos o filme
We shot it like a 1970s art film on a sitcom budget: everything dead centre, saturated primaries, film grain and nobody smiling. The music starts as a slow organ ritual and turns into a party exactly when the balloon pops.
The cards are concept renders and the scenes are made with AI, with ordinary made-up people, not real ones. The techniques aren’t made up: multi-colour letterpress on cotton, gold foil, gilded edges, rounded corners and wax seals are things we make every week.
Make your own
Baby shower, christening, gender reveal, a first birthday: if you want the invitation people keep, tell us the story and we’ll make it a ritual. Tarot optional.
Partir destes materiais
O mesmo papel, folha metálica e acabamento, já definidos. Nada da arte desta peça vem incluído.
Perguntas
- What are some unique baby shower invitation ideas?
- Give the invitation a form, not just a design: a tarot card, a tiny book, a ticket, a seed packet. Then add one or two finishes people can feel, like letterpress, gold foil or gilded edges, and make the RSVP part of the joke.
- Can you letterpress a baby shower invitation in several colours?
- Yes. Each colour is a separate pass on the press. Four colours plus a black outline is five passes; we draw the fills slightly oversized and print the black last so every join stays crisp.
- What size is a tarot card invitation, and what envelope fits it?
- A classic tarot card is about 2.75 × 4.75 in (70 × 120 mm). An A1 envelope (3⅝ × 5⅛ in) holds the invitation plus matching RSVP and registry cards.
- What is edge gilding?
- Gilding coats the edges of a card in metallic gold (or silver, copper and other colours), so a stack of cards shines from the side. It works best on thick stock like 2-ply cotton.
- How thin can gold foil lines be?
- Keep foil lines at least about 0.6 mm (1/40 in) wide and the gaps between them a little under that. Finer than that and the foil starts to break up or fill in.
- Can I add a wax seal to my invitations?
- Yes. We can make a custom seal design (like our open eye) as real wax or as adhesive wax seals that survive the mail.
- Is this an official Alejandro Jodorowsky design?
- No. It’s a design exploration and an homage, and we’re not affiliated with or endorsed by Alejandro Jodorowsky. The couple, the party and the people in the film are made up, and the cards and scenes are AI renders.
- Can I order invitations like these?
- Yes. Every technique here is real. Order a sample pack, start a quote or book a design consultation and we’ll build your suite.
An homage to Alejandro Jodorowsky and the Tarot de Marseille. Not affiliated with or endorsed by Alejandro Jodorowsky. The couple and the party are fictional. Art direction by Peppermint. Cards and scenes are AI renders; every technique shown is real.
