Ephemera Design

Ephemera was referred to me by a friend, and they blew away all of my expectations for my wedding invites. They understood what I wanted and worked with me to provide options to make it happen! I would highly recommend this business for all printing needs - I will certainly be keeping them in mind for the future!

Selection is very small and what they have is not well. curated. The woman behind the counter was extremely loud.

The BEST place in Iowa to get fun cards, stationary, and gifts. I can spend so much time and money going through all the unique and witty cards. I recommend it to everyone I know!

Great place for a unique gift or card, but their card selection is admittedly very small. No reason to NOT check it out for art supplies, lotions, candles, chocolates, and everything in between.

I absolutely love this shop! It's always been my go-to for cute and quirky cards. They have unique and fun gift items too. I did quite a bit of holiday shopping there for my nieces and nephew the past few years, they have the cutest selection of kids items! I'm also constantly treating myself to their awesome candles and candies. I cannot say enough good things!

As I think back to some of the most meaningful and memorable gatherings in my life, Ephemera was an integral part of so many of them. They've designed invitations for baby showers, milestone birthday parties, and a housewarming party. When my dear friend, January, passed away and I was organizing a celebration of life event in her honor, it was the ladies at Ephemera who suggested the perfect idea of creating a calendar with January's artwork prominently displayed.

During another tough time when I needed to have a ceremony that invited others to mourn with me, Ephemera designed beautiful programs that flawlessly captured the essence of an unusual and heavy event. I count myself lucky to be able to look to a cute little local shop that knows my name and my needs, and can design something for both joyful occasions and sad, somber ones. Ephemera is a gem and it warms my heart to be able to support them throughout all the different seasons of life.

Ephemera is one of the best and cutest shops Des Moines has to offer. The owners are so friendly and always helpful when I'm looking for that perfect card for the occasion. I love their selection of cards, from funny and cute to beautiful and heartwarming. Great spot to find gifts as well. Lots of wonderful smelling candles and fun calendars, notebooks and all kinds of thoughtful gift ideas. They also designed the Thank You cards for my wedding. The turn around time was quick, the cards were perfect and the price was great. Love this spot!

Ephemera is my go-to when I need a special gift for a friend. Walking into their shop just makes me smile- everything is so pretty and you can tell it was carefully and thoughtfully selected. The owners are SO sweet as well. It's a great little local gem.

For more than a decade, I have loved shopping at Ephemera, but I have appreciated the shop and its amazing owners even more during the COVID pandemic. As I found myself lacking the right words to extend care, concern, grief, and joy to my friends and family this year, Ephemera always had the perfect card or the best gift to send. I appreciated being able to shop safely online, and their Happy at Home boxes were absolute delights. I'm so glad this shop exists. It is a treasure!

I liked in that movie 500 Days Of Summer, the character works at a Card Writing company. That stuck with me! Cards can say so much without saying much! This cute store does just that! It says so much in such a small package. Perfect final piece to that perfect gift, or if you just need to send someone a little reminder of how much you love them.

Popped in on a cold winter Saturday to warm up and browse around. Very nice shop and friendly service. We bought our daughter a mermaid necklace, and I got myself a new nib and some ink. The nib is great, and writes beautifully. Thanks! I can't wait to stop by again.

Exceptionally smart and helpful staff Wonderful old architectural touches in the decor Highly recommended

Karen and her team are great! She worked closely with my fiance for our save the dates and allowed time for edits right up to the moment we went to print. The paper Karen suggested was perfect and she helped match the fonts for the addressed envelopes. We've had so many compliments on them. We can't wait to work with them on all the rest of our wedding stationery! High quality stuff and we were so happy to work with a local business.

I come to ephemera every time I need the perfect snarky or sentimental (or sometimes both) card. Visiting with the owners Arin and Karen is like a therapy session. I adore the little slice of sanity and calm they've created.

Ephemera is THE place in Des Moines to go for nice cards, gifts and custom print needs. They are extremely prompt whenever you need a print job done, it is always perfectly done and they are so incredibly kind and friendly. They are willing to offer advice on any project, provide guidance and direction all while making sure your original vision is realized.

Their selection of cards is delightful. From the humorous to the delicate, they have one for every occasion and with the help of Ephemera you will be on top of your game with the perfect card! Their birthday offerings range from the silly to the sweet, they offer wedding cards that will for sure make that scrapbook of the happy couple. They truly have a card for every occasion.

They select cards from the best vendors and even have some made in house! Don't forget to grab some of their wrapping paper and ribbon while you're in, they have a wonderful selection of adorable papers!

One of my favorite stores in the East Village. They have a very unique and vast selection of notecards, greeting cards, & stationary. Also, the staff is very helpful. Definitely a must for any paper product needs!

Got the most beautiful wedding invitations, thank you notes, coasters and menus from Ephemera. The staff was helpful and fun to work with, and their shop is adorable! They have lots of pretty cards and little gifts -- I couldn't help but buy something every time I went in to talk about my wedding paper products! At one point, we had a miscommunication about the color of the something, and the studio offered to reprint that day and even drop them off!

Also -- we had to add a last minute note to our gift boxes, and the staff was able to print something adorable within a few hours. Highly recommend! Can't wait to go back when I'm in town.

Oh my, so much temptaion in one place for a paper junkie. I loved all of the gorgeous art papers, along with the other beautiful baubles scattered throughout this fun little shop. The selection is quirky and will tickle the creative within you. Have fun! I know I will be back again to feed my addiction.

It is always great to support a locally-owned business, particularly instead of using cookie-cutter online stationary options. Working with the girls at Ephemera was great initially, because you get to actually see and touch the samples and make custom choices to get exactly what you want. Plus, their shop is cute and they have fun personalities. Ephemera delivers a very high quality product. but of course you get what you pay for - they're not cheap! (We paid almost $1,000 for our wedding invites/RSVPs.) The cost was worth it though when people actually called or emailed specifically to tell us how awesome our invitations were.

With that said, we would highly recommend you bypass the option of having Ephemera address your envelopes. Unfortunately there were several mistakes, which were not adequately fixed. We had a few people who never received the invites due to these errors! Very embarrassing and awkward when they had to come to us and ask if they were still invited. For these errors, I believe Ephemera refunded us approx. $5.00.

We would also recommend that you proofread all estimates and invoices, as there are likely to be mistakes there too. This was one of the more frustrating parts of our wedding-planning experience, so regretfully we won't be using this shop again. :( I hate to write a critical review, but I found Yelp to be very helpful in planning our wedding.

We just want to make sure to help future brides and grooms know where to closely review and consider things. But if you do want cute, quality stationary products in general, shop away!

This is a great little shop that sells homemade stationery as well as a small assortment of handmade jewelry, accessories, home items, and other shiny objects that I have no real use for but want to purchase anyway. They do custom stationery, invitations, etc. and though I haven't looked through their selection extensively, what I've seen looked very creative and exciting.

The greatest thing about Ephemera is that there's a whole "crafting" room toward the back where they hold different classes each month - knitting, printmaking, sessions with local artists, etc. The classes are reasonably priced and although I haven't had a chance to sign up for one yet, there's always something that looks fun!

I'm bringing postage back. Remember the excitement of there being a "real" letter when you were in college? Well, it never went away. It's still boss to get a letter with actual handwriting on the front. Far too often people forget, or neglect the simple pleasure of opening a post box and not seeing a impersonal form letter, the gas bill, or yet another post card from that optometrist that you went to three years ago when you needed more contacts - quickly.

When I stumbled upon Ephemera Stationary Studio a few months ago, I was looking for one, maybe two quickie birthday cards to two of the four people that are on my holiday card list. What I found in the shop was inspiration and beauty surrounding me. Passing through the birthday cards, thank you notes, I noticed fine collections of charming and original hand-made cards. Blank for "Just Because." While browsing, I met and had a nice chat with the gal behind the counter of the benefits and pitfalls of giving a gift of paint-by-number pictures painted or unpainted. (My sister sure enjoyed her UN-painted pictures at Christmas.) Ephemera provides the cards, notes, and design-intuitiveness for one-of-a-kind cards - the kind of cards that end up on a fridge, or in a cubicle, just because. Just because they're pretty, and just because you forked over the $.42 to make someone's day. Find it at Ephemera.

I am a sucker for good stationary and cards and this shop has them! Locally owned and locally created, so if you are looking for something specific, these ladies can make it for you. Everything in the store is very creative and handmade, but if you are looking for a wide variety of choices, you might want to go to Hallmark or make a custom order. It also helps that they always have coffee/cocoa and cupcakes available for you while browsing.