Create a letterhead in Microsoft Word

Give your letters the personal touch and make writing them easier

Microsoft Word is great for giving a professional look to letters.

But it can do more than simply adding dates and addresses neatly and printing in an attractive font.

Professionally printed letterhead paper was something of a status symbol when letters were written with a pen or typewriter because of the time and money it cost to create.

Today, Word can be used to add a professional-looking letterhead to every letter you create, at no extra cost.

Better yet, as Word prints the letterhead along with the message itself, there’s no need to keep a stockpile of letterhead paper in a cupboard, and it’s possible to have a choice of several headings: one for personal letters, maybe, and one for professional ones.

In this feature we’ll explain how to create a unique personal letterhead that’ll add some character to your correspondence. We’ve used Word 2003, but similar functions are available in both older and newer versions.

Preparing your view
Before making a start designing the letterhead, it is important to use the best document onscreen view. Word has several different ways of viewing documents and selecting the right one makes preparing a letterhead much easier. Some views may not show any of the letterhead text and graphics at all.

The easiest way to change the views is to use the five small icons in the bottom left-hand corner of the window, next to the horizontal scroll bar. From left to right they are: normal view, web layout view, print layout view, outline view and reading layout.

Left-click on the middle icon to select the print layout view. This shows the document as it will be printed, including the margins. This is important because most printers cannot print right to the edges of a page.

To prevent text being cut off, check the rulers at the top and left of the document. The white part of the ruler shows the inside of the document and the darker parts on either side show the area that text will not enter.

If the margins are too large it’s possible to change them. Click on the File menu, then on Page Setup. The four margins can be adjusted by either entering a new figure in the top text boxes or by clicking on the up and down buttons.

Making the adjustments from this window is safer, as Word will attempt to check them against the printer’s own margins so that nothing will be cut off when the letterhead is printed. Click on OK to save the changes. If you’ve moved the margins too far a warning message will appear – click on Fix to automatically move them back a bit.

Control your creation
Most people are familiar with Word’s alignment buttons, which can shift text to the left, right or centre.

To get more control, though, it’s best to use text boxes that can be moved around with the mouse.

To add one, click on the Insert menu and select Text Box. The cursor will change into a crosshairs shape.

Click where the top left of the box should be, then move the mouse to where you want the bottom right corner before releasing the mouse button. The box will appear with a thin black line around it.

Click inside the box and start typing to enter text – your address, for example. The text inside the box will be formatted as if it is in a separate page, so the alignment tools will now place it on the left, right or centre of that box.

To change the position of the box, click on it once so that the text box is surrounded by diagonal lines. Move the cursor over the lines so that it changes into an arrow with four smaller arrows. Press and hold the left mouse button and move the text box to its new location. Release the left mouse button when it is in the right place.

The size of the box can be changed in a similar fashion but by clicking and dragging one of its corners.

Once you’ve got the hang of adding and moving boxes, it’s easy to get all the elements of your letterhead, such as addresses, dates and other information, exactly where you want them.

In the picture
As well as text, it’s easy to insert a photo, picture or clipart as part of a letterhead.

To add a picture, click on the Insert menu and then on Picture. Click on From File... if you have an image such as a photo or family crest, to insert – simply use the dialogue box that appears to locate it then click on Insert. Alternatively, choose Clip Art to open the Task Pane and search for clipart that was installed with Word.

Sometimes even a simple graphic can make a letter look more appealing. Click on the Insert menu, then on Pictures and then Autoshapes. Click on the third icon from the left on the Autoshapes toolbar that appears (hover your mouse pointer over it and the label ‘Basic Shapes’ will appear) and select a shape from the menu.

Draw on the screen to insert the shape. Don’t worry if it’s not quite right at first, as it can be adjusted by clicking and dragging the corners.

To maintain the proportions of figures precisely, hold down the Shift key when dragging with the mouse. To add some colour, right click on the shape and select Format Autoshape from the menu – a dialogue box will appear with lots of ways to customise the shape.

Wrapping paper
You should now be able to add text, images and shapes to your letterhead. When arranging text and pictures, though, it is important to understand wrapping.

Wrapping is the term used to refer to what happens when two objects on the page, such as text and a picture, touch one another. You might want to place some text on top of a shape, for example, or wrap text so that it doesn’t run over a photograph.

Word treats picture and text boxes as if they are individual objects placed on top of a sheet of paper. This makes it possible to rearrange the order in which they are stacked.

Picture boxes can be sent to the bottom of the pile so text can be placed on top of them. Left-click on the picture to select it, then right-click on it. From the menu that appears hover the mouse over Order then click Send to Back.

Text boxes can be set to have text wrap around them. Click the box to select it, then right-click on the diagonal lines that appear around it and select Format Text Box. The layout tab gives several ways to wrap text, with images to illustrate how they look.

Striking words
The Wordart tool makes it quick and easy to insert striking-looking text, but treat it with caution as the results are often garish. It is best suited to producing a single, colourful title rather than lines of text.

To use it, click on the Insert menu, then Picture and then Wordart. Select a style and then click on OK. Type the text for the title into the text box and select the font and size from the dropdown menus above it. Click on OK to insert the Wordart.

To edit the text, right-click the Wordart and select E – border around the entire page. Click on the Format menu and then on Borders and Shading. Click on the Page border tab to see the different options.

A simple line can be a little boring so click on the dropdown menu labelled Art to see the different graphics. Changing the number in the width box will make the graphics bigger or smaller, and the preview window shows how the results will look.

Saving time
Word can also save time when entering the date and time. Click on the Insert menu and then on Date and Time. Select English (UK) from the dropdown menu on the right and then left-click once on the desired format. Click in the box labelled ‘Update automatically’ and then on OK. This will automatically print the correct date every time the letterhead is used.

It’s important to remember, though, that this date will update every time the document is open, so if writing a letter of complaint that you want to keep on file it should be deleted and replaced by a normal, typed-in date. If you’re stuck for inspiration when designing your letterhead, Microsoft’s Office website has several examples that can be downloaded.

Another good way to add a mark of distinction to a letterhead document is to include a family coat of arms. Having the correct surname does not necessarily give you the right to use the coat of arms associated with it, but it is unlikely that anyone will complain.

There are many websites that provide high-quality images of coats of arms: try the Coat of Arms and Family Crests Store, Family Crests and Ancestor Hunt. Alternatively, the Victoria and Albert Museum has a tool that lets you design your own.

Always recycle
Once you are happy with the letterhead, it’s time to save it – but don’t save the file as a standard Word document. Instead, it’s best to save it as a template.

To do this, open the File menu, click Save As and then select ‘Document Template (.dot)’ from the ‘Save as type’ menu.

In future, to write a letter simply open this template file, type the letter and click Save – rather than overwriting the letterhead file, Word will ask where you would like to store the new letter.

Creating a letterhead template is a great way to give letters a professional look, and even the simplest template that includes an address and signature will save time.

If you want to be creative, there are all kinds of ways to make letters distinctive, whether it is adding colour or even a family crest. So, get creative and never send a boring letter again.

Templates for email
Emails can also be made more attractive using a letterhead.

Rather than clicking on the Create mail button in the Outlook Express toolbar, left-click on the small arrow to the right of it to show a dropdown menu with some templates.

Click on the Select Stationery option. Then left-click once on each template to see a quick preview of how it will look.

Click on the Create New button to start the stationery wizard. Click on Next. Select a picture from the dropdown menu or click on Browse to select a different image.

The colour option sets the background colour. Click on Next and select the font for the text of the email, click next, choose the margin options then click next again. Give the new stationery a name and click on Finish.

Not all email programs will be able to display letterheads, though, so remember to put any important information in the text as well.

The open alternative to Word
For the examples in this article we’ve used Microsoft Word 2003, but if you don’t own a copy of Word it’s possible to create excellent letterheads using Openoffice.

Like Word, Openoffice can create text boxes, but the icon for doing so is in the Drawing toolbar rather than a menu. If the Drawing toolbar is not visible, click on the View menu, Toolbars and then on Drawing. This toolbar should appear at the bottom of the window. Click on the ‘T’ icon and draw the box onto the screen.

Wordart is called Fontwork in Openoffice and has its own toolbar. To show this, click on the View menu, then on Toolbars, then on Fontwork. In the toolbar that appears click on the icon that looks like the letter A in a picture frame.

Another window appears with different formatting options, like those in Wordart. More information on Fontwork can be found here.