Letter Writing

Envelopes, paper, addressing and the slow post.

Letter writing is mostly solved problems that nobody writes down. Where the address sits so a machine can read it. Which paper takes ink without feathering and still survives being folded. What to put on the page when you have been staring at it for ten minutes.

None of it is about handwriting. The letters people keep are rarely the beautiful ones — they are the specific ones, and specificity is a decision rather than a skill.

Everything here starts from what actually happens: the sorting machine, the fold, the blank first line.

• How to Officiate a Friend's Wedding, From Yes to the Signed Licence

  A friend has asked you to marry them. Here is the order of work: the questions to ask the licensing office, the conversation with the couple, the parts of a ceremony, how long each takes, and the licence afterwards.

• What to Write in a Letter

  The blank page is not a shortage of things to say. It is the wrong question — and there is a better one that takes about four seconds to answer.

• What Makes a Letter Worth Keeping

  Five things the letters people actually keep have in common, and why none of them is good handwriting.

• Fold an Envelope From One Square Sheet

  The four-fold square envelope, the sizing rule that stops you wasting paper, and the paper weights that actually survive the post.

• How to Address an Envelope So It Actually Arrives

  Where the sorting machine looks, which decorative choices cost you a delivery, and how to write an address that survives automation.