Are you that mom? That mom who loves to take pictures, printing, and hanging up your treasured moments? Or perhaps you just love to take pictures but couldn’t be bothered with the printing yet, because #momlife. A couple of us at SFBAM recently tried out SimplePrints and fell head over heels in love with it – especially the “click-and-done” convenience of getting your pictures printed and hanging at home! Here are their personal accounts about their experience:
I’m that mom. I am obsessed with picture taking, printing, and hanging art.
Walking into a room filled with pictures of loved ones makes me smile. Having friends and family visit and getting to see their faces while they notice our bisabuela (great-grandmother) prominently displayed makes me happy. My mother’s image covering an oil on canvas painted by visual artist Maceo Montoya, while wearing a traditional Charo outfit, reminds me of my family legacy. Maybe that’s a lot when I’m just going into the kitchen for a snack, but it’s a reminder nonetheless. Seeing family displayed and honored is more significant than mere decoration; it’s the ambiance of our home.
It’s true, and that’s not just because bare walls make me nervous. It’s because my equilibrium or Zen exists somewhere between having a home that looks like it’s being staged and throwing up a family wall mounted by thumbtacks. It’s also an expensive habit unless you know a thing or two.
Specialty stores that make photo prints and canvases do so at a significant markup, and it may take about four to six weeks before you would receive your order. Recently I did something out of the box; I tried an online photo printing app called SimplePrints. I looked into them for two reasons; first, I’m redecorating. Second, when trying to reframe some of my favorite pieces and family moments, I realized that the pricing for prints in the traditional ways has significantly increased. I had to find another solution.
SimplePrints was just that. Simple. All I did was log on, pick my style, size, add a picture and click it into my cart. There was no need to wrap a canvas, get it into the car, and trust a stranger over the counter. Within two weeks of my order at SimplePrints, I had the beautiful canvas of my five year’s first day of school. In it, his brother is lovingly squeezing him in a final goodbye. The boys, on a large stretched canvas measuring “24x”36, are show-stoppers.
The biggest surprise from my experience with SimplePrints was that the stretch canvas style I chose was comparable to the boutique-style canvases I have invested in in the past. The delivery of my canvas was half of the traditional time, the quality was the same if not better than a boutique, and I know that the style will last.
SimplePrints is simple, fast, and affordable. Try them!
– Olga
SFBAM Readers get
Even though I had been living overseas for the last decade-plus, I had never gone a year without seeing my parents. Not long after moving back to the same continent as my parents and making plans to regularly visit them, the pandemic hit. It has been nearly two years since my parents have seen me – their only child, as well as my preschooler son – their only grandchild, in person. Needless to say, this forced separation has been super tough on everyone, and it hurts my heart to think of how much of my son’s toddlerhood his maternal grandparents have already missed. Besides regular video chats, a small way I’ve thought of to help my parents feel more involved with my son’s rapid growth is to make memorabilia, namely, a photo book that chronologizes the last year and a half.
As a hobby photographer, I have tried out many services that put my photos onto canvases and photo books. As a marketing professional, I am well-versed in scrutinizing printing quality. As a WFH mom, the SimplePrints app strikes a perfect balance of convenience and quality. The app is super easy to use and you can even pick images from your cloud backups or social media. The printing quality of other apps I’ve tried has been subpar at best, but SimplePrints has managed to churn out a high-quality photo book and got delivered to us in under two weeks! I also opted to make a thematic collage of some landscape photos on a glossy metal print. It arrived even faster than the photo book, well-packaged and ready to hang.
If you’re looking to print a showstopping photo book (or ten) to send to loved ones, or simply as a family keepsake (e.g. my baby’s first year) – look no further and download the SimplePrints app!
– Pauline
