For the feed, and for anywhere that crops.
SEALED WITH
A KISS!
A landing page in wax and airmail, a poem for the feed, a break-up reel, an email that even Outlook gets, GIF cards and a little printed card for every bunch. A flower stall's Valentine's week, and one card just for you.
The Valentine poem post template in Animate, zoomed on the post. Space plays it: a writing desk with an airmail envelope, a stamp, a letter and a postmark.
SWOON!
THE STALL
Petal & Post has one week to make February
Petal & Post is an example business, made up for this page: a flower stall outside a train station, run by Jules, plus a small delivery round on a cargo bike. They sell more roses in the week before 14 February than in the three months before it. That week decides whether January was a good idea.
Jules has a plan: a Valentine page to take orders for delivery, a post a day on Instagram, an email to last year's customers, a card tied to every bunch, and, if there is time after all that, something for their own partner, who has been very patient about the cargo bike. Jules has one afternoon. Here is the afternoon.
8
Valentine GIF cards, in eight looks
5
pieces in the oxblood set
15s
the break-up reel, with piano
600×300
the animated email header
TWO LETTERS
What Jules wrote this week
Valentine's week, in two letters. One went to the customers. The other is the break-up reel, more or less.
14 FEB
Dear customers,
This week we made you a landing page sealed in wax, a poem for the feed, a GIF you can send to anyone, and a little card that comes tied to every bunch. All of it in one afternoon, all of it in our colours. We hope you like roses.
Love, Petal & Post
RETURN
Dear four design apps,
It’s not me. It’s you. You never matched each other’s colours. You made me export, import and re-export. You put the video in one place and the email in another. I’ve met someone who does all of it on one canvas. Please return my fonts.
No longer yours, Petal & Post
1 PM
The page: an order form sealed in wax
The Valentine landing page is the centrepiece of a set: an offer bar, a hero where a valentine is laid on an airmail envelope, postmarked and sealed in wax, three customer letters, a break-up letter to the old way of doing things as a ruled column of grievances, and the offer under an airmail edge. It fits a desktop, a laptop, a tablet and a phone, and the phone is where people buy flowers at 6 pm on the 13th.
It is written for a shared inbox app called Pigeon, so Jules rewrites every line: the letters become notes from last year's customers (real ones, with permission), and the offer becomes free delivery before noon. The Order button links to their existing shop, because PopCraft publishes pages but does not take payments. The publishing page covers the address, versions and taking it down on the 15th.
The Valentine landing page template. ⋯ › Web preview opens it as a site beside the canvas at desktop width, then the width is switched to a phone’s and the page reflows into one column.
1:40 PM
Want a callback form instead of a checkout?
Some customers want to talk before they spend £60 on peonies. Jules adds a little form to the page: name, phone, “what are they like?”. In PopCraft a form is a frame marked as a form, and every field is sent under its name. Publish the page, attach a database from your own Neon account in the Publish dialog, and every request becomes a row, read under Submissions.
2:15 PM
The feed: a poem a day
The Valentine poem post is an eight-second loop: a letterpress card lands on an airmail envelope, four lines of “roses are red” are set one by one, the 14 February postmark is struck, the wax seal goes on and petals fall. It comes square, with 4:5 and 9:16 cuts for the feed and stories.
The shipped poem is about an inbox. Jules's is about delivery before noon, which does not rhyme with anything, so the poem gets worse and funnier. The motion studio page explains how the lines are timed.
The Valentine poem post template in Animate, zoomed on the post. Space plays it: a writing desk with an airmail envelope, a stamp, a letter and a postmark.
2:45 PM
The reel: break up with the supermarket
The Valentine break-up letter reel is fifteen seconds of pure drama: a break-up letter is up in the first half second (“It’s not me. It’s you.”), a rubber stamp is struck across it, the reasons arrive as captions, a postscript slides in (“I’ve met someone”), the wax seal goes on and the offer lands. It is cut to a slow piano piece made by PopCraft and released CC0, 9:16 with 1:1 and 4:5 cuts.
In the template, the letter dumps an old tool. In Jules's version it dumps petrol-station roses. It is the post of the week.
PORTRAIT
4:5!The tallest a feed post goes, so it fills the phone.
STORY
9:16!Full screen, with room at the top and bottom for the app.
3:30 PM
The email, and a link that looks right
Last year's customers get an email. The Valentine email header is a 600 × 300 animated GIF: an airmail envelope with two pigeon stamps, a postmark and a wax seal, petals rocking. The offer, the code and the button are all on the first frame, because Outlook only shows the first frame, and Outlook is where Jules's best corporate customers live.
When the link goes out, the Valentine link preview is the 1200 × 630 card that shows up beside it: a writing desk in oxblood and cream, a letterpress valentine and a 14 February postmark. The email page covers exporting email HTML.
4 PM
The paper: a card on every bunch
Every bunch leaves with a card. Jules uses the Postcard, 4×6 with a front and a back, the front in the oxblood look and the back left blank for a handwritten message. For tiny bunches, Invitation (A7) makes a small centred card. ⌘P prints them at home, and Preflight checks for text near the trim first. The print and PDF page explains bleed and crop marks.
5:55 PM
And one for the person who matters
Five minutes left. Jules opens Be my Valentine?, the cute buddy card: a pink ghost-ish creature and two hearts, looping every four seconds. There are eight Valentine cards, from XOXO in kinetic type to Love you to the moon and back in sparkle.
Jules changes the words to “Sorry about the bike”, exports a GIF and sends it. It goes down well. The GIF cards page has the rest.
The “Be my Valentine?” card in its Cute buddy theme, open in Animate and zoomed on the 480 by 480 card. Space plays its four-second loop, and it runs on into a second pass without a jump.
HOW IT GOES
Valentine's week in seven moves
- 1
Pick the oxblood set
The Valentine landing page, link preview, email header, poem post and break-up reel share one look: airmail, wax seals and letterpress. - 2
Rewrite the words
They are written for a software product. Swap the inbox jokes for flowers. The postmark, the stamps and the seal stay. - 3
Publish the page
The landing page goes online at its own address and fits a phone. The Order button links to the shop you already have. - 4
Post all week
The poem post on Monday, the break-up reel on Wednesday, a GIF card on Friday. The post and the reel come square, 4:5 and 9:16. - 5
Email the list
The 600 × 300 animated header keeps the offer, the code and the button on its first frame, so even Outlook gets the message. - 6
Tie on a card
A 4×6 postcard or a small A7 card, printed and tied to every bunch. - 7
Send one for yourself
A GIF card for the person who matters. Change the words. Mean them.
THE OLD WAY
Four apps and a lot of red
| THE OLD WAY | IN POPCRAFT |
|---|---|
| A website builder for the page | The landing page publishes from the same file |
| A video app for the reel, with stock music | The reel ships cut to a CC0 piano piece, in three sizes |
| An email app with a static banner | A 600 × 300 animated header that still works in Outlook |
| Cards from the cash-and-carry | Your own 4×6 card, printed at home |
| A different red in every app | One oxblood across all of it |
CLIPS
More from the week
The Love you more card in its Doodle theme, in Animate. The export button in the transport bar opens Export animation; GIF is picked as the format, showing its shared palette, dither and loop forever settings and the summary of the size, frame count and estimated file size.
The website template in the editor, signed in. The Publish button in the top bar opens the Publish dialog. An address is typed, Publish is clicked, the files upload, and the dialog shows the site's link with Version 1 marked Live. The published site is then opened on its own: the landing page shows, and clicking Pricing in its navigation goes to the pricing page.
The coming-soon page, published, with its email sign-up marked as a form and a Neon account connected. In the Publish dialog, under Database, New Neon database is clicked: a project named after the site is made in the Neon account and its database attached, and it is listed. Three visitors then sign up on the site (sent by the recording, as the site sends them). Submissions is clicked and a table shows the three, newest first, with when each was sent and its email.
An event poster. Command-P opens Print: what to print (every page), how the pages sit on the paper (single pages), and Full bleed, already on for a print page. Crop marks is turned on; the dialog says what each sheet will be.
BEFORE THE 14TH
Write the first letter today
Click New file, search for valentine, and start with the card. Then the page. Getting married instead? Weddings is the long version. Running a bigger sale? Sales and promotions.
ASKED & ANSWERED
Questions, answered
What Valentine templates are there?
Eight Valentine GIF cards (balloons, cute buddy, confetti, doodle, elegant, kinetic type, sparkle and watercolour), a landing page, a link preview, an animated email header, a poem post and a break-up reel. They share one oxblood-and-cream look.
Is the Valentine landing page for a shop?
It is written for a software product (a shared inbox for small teams), and we would rather say so. The airmail envelope, the wax seal, the postmark and the layout suit any Valentine offer; the words you rewrite.
Can I take orders on the landing page?
PopCraft publishes the page as a website and can save what a form is sent into a database of yours, so a “call me back” or pre-order request form works. It does not take payments. Link the buttons to your shop’s checkout for that.
Can I print gift cards to go with flowers?
Yes. The 4×6 postcard has a front and a back, and Invitation (A7) is a small centred card. Print at home with ⌘P or send a PDF with bleed and crop marks to a print shop.
Do the reels have music?
The break-up reel is cut to a slow piano piece made by PopCraft and released CC0. Export it as an MP4 with the sound, or swap in your own track on the timeline.
Will a GIF card play in iMessage or WhatsApp?
The cards are 480 × 480, four-second loops, made small enough for messaging apps, and the GIF export loops forever.
THE MANUAL, FOR THE DETAILS
KEEP EXPLORING
Goes great with
SWOON! YOUR TURN.
Cards, a landing page and posts with a little extra heart. Free to start, in your browser or on your Mac.