When you think of the word “rustic” do images of the great outdoors and peaceful natural settings come to mind? How about images of century-old barns, meadows of wildflowers, and meandering creeks? Minted’s rustic Christmas cards aim to capture this same “outdoorsy” feel and artistically blend it together with traditional holiday card greetings for a uniquely festive presentation.
While others may be sending more traditional holiday cards this year, you have the opportunity to break the mold! Browse through our collection of rustic Christmas card ideas and designs submitted to Minted in 2019 by our collection of independent artists. That’s right, each card you see on our site was hand-designed by individual artists from around the world. Minted hosts design competitions throughout the year on our website and allows any artist to submit their concepts. We let a public vote decide what designs are then sold on our site. Contributing artists are then rewarded with a commission on every design that is sold on our site. It pays to go rustic!
RUGGED, NATURAL BEAUTY
As you shop through our collection of designs, you may begin to see some predominant trends in colors used, imagery chosen, and stylistic techniques practiced to give your Christmas card a countryside look. Below we have highlighted some of these rustic Christmas images prevalent in our designs.
Imagery: The images and pictures in our designs aim for a woodsy, natural look. Animals highlighted on our themed cards mimic ones you may see on a trail hike through a national park. Think birds, squirrels, foxes, rabbits, and even a lone deer. Holiday flora such as pine trees and winter berries are also prevalent design features. Other popular rustic Christmas images focus on the idea of a remote winter wonderland blanketed with a fresh layer of snow and ponds that have frozen over. Take notice of how our independent artists play with plaid patterns or wood-grain markings to create eye-catching borders that can frame your family photo.
Colors: Imagine being helicoptered into a remote region of a thick pine forest. What colors would surround you? Mostly earth tones of brown, green, and maybe a muddied yellow. Our rustic Christmas card selections feature a similar color palette, which mimics the beautiful palette of mother nature.
Messaging: The holiday greeting on rustic-designed cards usually takes a backseat to the imagery. Large bold words would drown out the peaceful scenes and tones of the card. Look for short greetings like “Joy”, or “Peace on Earth”, which fall in line with the idea that beauty can be found by simply observing the peaceful ambiance of nature.
HOW TO PERSONALIZE YOUR HOLIDAY GREETING
After you explore our collection of rustic Christmas card ideas, you will hopefully find a design that speaks to you. Order as few as 25 cards or as many as 5000, in case you are ordering for your business. Minted provides a toolbelt of options to further personalize each card. Change color arrangements. Edit holiday greetings. Upload your own family pictures. Keep reading to understand all the additional design elements available to you.
Custom Text: All our Christmas card designs include text that can be personalized to highlight your family name seamlessly into the card’s look. For additional customization, choose to add a more detailed greeting with paragraphs of text that can be printed on the back of a flat card or the inside of a folded-over card. We even provide some styled templates featuring snow falling or a giant Christmas tree that your personalized greeting can be printed over. Carry the rustic theme onto the back of your Christmas card too!
Add an Image, Or Don’t: About half of our rustic-themed cards feature an area where you can upload your own Christmas photo to appear on the front of the card. Use our simple customizer tool to upload your image, size it, and even apply a filter such as black and white or sepia. A brown sepia image may pair nicely with the natural earth-tone colors prevalent in many of our designs. If you would rather go with a more art-forward card, you can always choose to have a personal image added to the back of the card.
Change the Shape: How often are 90-degree right angles prevalent in the natural world? In sticking with the “outdoorsy” and “all-natural” theme, you may want to select a Christmas card shape that has rounded edges, scalloped edges, or even bubbled edges. If you have your eye on a card that features falling snow, the bubbled-edge look can make the card itself resemble a snowflake!
Depending on the card you select, you may be presented with the option to order the card in our classic 5” x 7” size, smaller 4.25” x 6” petite size, or even a 4.25” x 6” postcard styling. With the postcard designs, you simply just attach a stamp and put it in the mail. No envelope needed!
Adjust the Format: Ask yourself how much real estate you want to compose your holiday greeting and message. If you want to write a year-in-review summary or have plenty of space for everyone in the family to hand-write a personal message, you may want to order a fold-over card. If less room is required, simply opt for a flat card. As we mentioned earlier, we provide plenty of personalization features to add text or images to the back of your flat card.
Recipient Address labeling: This is where Minted really separates ourselves from the competition. Simply upload your recipient addresses and Minted will artistically print them on the envelope for free! Have your rustic Christmas imagery playout on the envelope too. The postal service worker will smile when they see images of reindeer, winter berries, or snowflakes dancing across the envelope. Just imagine what the people receiving your card with think?
Make it Shine: Want to add an elevated design feature to your card? Add custom foil-pressed text to any design and see it sparkle in the light as the card is moved.
MINTED QUALITY
When you shop for a Christmas card on Minted, you are browsing through designs you will not find anywhere else online. Our design competitions hosted on our site throughout the year help promote the most unique and independent designs to reach the masses. When you partner creative independent designs with our user-friendly personalization tools, superior printing techniques, and top-of-the-line cardstock and supplies, the end result is a stunning holiday greeting like no other!