Gallery: Forget Hallmark. Vintage Holiday Cards Are Where It’s At

  • The Cooper Union's Herb Lubalin Center has collected more than 100 holiday cards from famous designers including this...
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    The Cooper Union's Herb Lubalin Center has collected more than 100 holiday cards from famous designers, including this one from illustrators Jean and Roy Doty.
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    Herb Lubalin designed this card, which reads '72 either way you flip it.
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    The cards are from the collection of Arnold Roston, who kept and donated them to the Cooper Union.
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    Here, a Christmas tree built out of the factorial sequence.
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    In the late 1960s, Louis Silverstein, then the New York Times' art director, drew a bow from the paper's grid.
  • Milton Glaser's holiday card for Advertising Composition Inc.
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    Milton Glaser's holiday card for Advertising Composition Inc.
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    Although intended to spread holiday cheer, the cards also allowed graphic designers to show off skills usually reserved for clients.
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    Paul Rand designed this for the Advertising Composition Inc.
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    Rand highlighted the company's acronym with red letters.
  • Swiss designer Walter Marti created this new years card in 1960.
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    Swiss designer Walter Marti created this new years card in 1960.
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    Ladislav Sutnar's holiday card.
  • Image may contain Graphics Art Pattern and Floral Design
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    A card from the illustrator Richard Erdoes.
  • Image may contain Word Text Alphabet and Label
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    The card from branding agency Chermayeff & Geismar.
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    The Met's holiday card.
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    The cards were a mode of personal expression for designers who usually dealt with clients.
  • Image may contain Book Text Page and Diary
    Herb Lubalin Center
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    A card from modernist graphic designer Lester Beall.
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