JADA CANNIZZO
By JADA CANNIZZO*
MIRBOO North graphic designer, Jess Greaves, recently won the Australian Wedding Award in the category of ‘Wedding Stationary’, to go with her Gippsland and Phillip Island Wedding Industry Awards last year. Ms Greaves branched out in 2018, starting her own graphic design business. She then created the wedding stationary business: Letters with Love. “This is kind of my fun thing to do (outside of regular graphic design work),” she said. “It’s a hobby but it’s my full-time job, so I’m very lucky.” Taking out the Gippsland and Phillip Island Wedding Industry Award late last year, Ms Greaves said she was surprised to just be nominated for the award, with no idea she would go on to win the overall Australian award. “I was shocked to win the Australian one. I just went up with my husband to the awards in Sydney for the experience and I was lucky enough to win the award,” she said. The Wedding Industry Awards are first broken up into regional categories, and the winners of the regional awards are then nominated for the Australian Wedding Industry Awards. Ms Greaves won both awards in her category ‘Wedding Stationary’. Growing up in Traralgon, Ms Greaves studied Visual Communications and Studio Art at school, then went on to complete a degree in Visual Communication, at Monash University, finding a passion in designing wedding stationary. Her favourite thing about creating wedding stationary is being a part of a couples most special day. “(It’s) such a happy occasion that people are excited about, and I get to do a really nice print. A lot of the stuff to do with graphic design now is all online and digital, whereas with [Letters with Love] I get to work with a physical paper and print, which is nice,” she said. With more than 10 years’ experience in the industry, Ms Greaves said she gets her inspiration from what’s current. “Certain fonts, colours, different papers and how I feel the layout would be best,” she said. Ms Greaves utilises Gippsland PromoPrint, a local company in Mirboo North to print all of her wedding signage. She also works for other local businesses in the Latrobe Valley such as Momentum Physio, Broadening Horizons and many more for all of their graphic design needs. Ms Greaves talked about the different trends that come and go in the industry. “Wave dire cuts are quite popular at the moment. Signage is really popular, things like seating plans, physical table numbers and that kind of thing,” she explained. Busier than ever before, Ms Greaves hopes to one day expand Letters with Love to an online shop. She is happy sticking to weddings and expo’s for now, but wants to eventually branch out to events. A great win for a local Gippsland business. Gippslanders must have a knack for the wedding industry, as Ms Greaves tells The Express other Gippsland businesses did “really well,” at the awards. Four other businesses from Gippsland were nominated, one was a runner-up, another in the top five and another two in the top 10 for their respective categories. For any enquiries about Ms Greaves’ work, visit www.jessicagreaves.com.au or www.letterswithlove.com.au *Jada Cannizzo is an intern with the Latrobe Valley Express
