Wedding invitation suite: 10 years on

For some reason designing for yourself is always the hardest, and that probably explains why I’ve never shared my own wedding’s designs in the 10 years I’ve been married! Looking back, it’s interesting to observe what elements are a snapshot of who I was in specific time and place, and who I still am today. Let me set the scene: it was before hand-lettering was popular, DIY was beginning to trend but a definite essential given our small budget and huge guest list, and people were just starting to venture away from a single main color or identical bridesmaid dresses—eons ago! Hahaha!

Left half: All-in-one invitation, directions, + RSVP. Shown open at the top, inside (L) and outside (R), and folded closed with address areas at the bottom.
Top right: Program fan.
Bottom right: Save the date.

All-in-one invitations

One of my (enduring and shared) values is eco-friendly practices, and with a small budget to boot the all-in-one format made a ton of sense. It features:

• Enough room for all invitation details + an information and/or directions area

• A tear-off RSVP at postcard size

• When folded, it’s deliverable without the need for any envelopes

• For the recipient it keeps everything together easily

• For the budget-conscious you can mail these with a forever stamp + a cheaper postcard-rate stamp (cheaper!), and you don’t have to worry about matching envelopes and inserts at various sizes

• The printers I’ve worked with also tend to have digital printing (cheaper), PMS matching (for those with very specific color desires), and recycled paper options

making this a win on so many levels! Would I do this again? Absolutely, and in fact I did recommend and design another for eco-conscious couple, Josh + Felix, years later!

Save the Dates*

We got engaged a year and a half before our wedding date, so I was still figuring out our overall aesthetic when these were going out. You can see some elements that weren’t as present or further refined later on, but it’s clear from the start I was:

• Looking for something a bit more simple, light, and cozy/casual to represent us as a couple and the type of celebration we wanted to have with our loved ones

• Interested in a typewriter font (I later reconditioned my actual vintage typewriter to address some of the invitations)

• Liked a bit of contrast for balance, using my own handwriting (did I mention this was before hand-lettering and modern calligraphy became “a thing”? It’s a bit embarrassing to look at 10 years on!) and some hand-drawn elements for that human touch

• Sold on the airy, beachy color palette since we nailed down our venue at the seaside. The proportions of its use just shifted slightly later on.

*I still refuse to use the abbreviation for this piece

Programs

I used the programs to bring some of the Save the Date elements back in and tie things together better—I maintained the simplicity of the invitations and reused our silhouettes and frames to anchor the front. Fussier elements evolved into the curving shapes of the hole punches we used at the top and bottom to transform the standard letter-size prints into something that felt more special.

Top left: wedding site home page
Top right: placeholder image
Bottom row: About Us page (L), The Proposal (Middle), and the Wedding Party page (R)

Wedding Website

Planning a (heavily DIY) wedding was simply an overwhelming experience for me. With intense pressure to get “something” up for guests to go to, I responded with a tongue-in-cheek placeholder image that read, “We’re joining together in marriage. You should join us too!” for any eager visitors to see, reiterating the desire for invited guests to join us and asking them to revisit when we were ready with more details.

This was later replaced by an actual site with details:

• The About Us was designed in a vertical timeline format with small chronological images.

• The Proposal page told the story of how we got engaged, with our silhouettes taking turns telling the story from each of our perspectives, much as we would have if we were asked in person.

• The Wedding Party page gave props to the people in our lives standing with us at the altar—a short bio/relationship history was revealed when hovering over their pictures.

Left: J and I, only younger.
Top right: table number and menu combo with settings.
Bottom right: our cake.

Throwing in a couple extra photos so you can imagine these designed pieces altogether with the other things from our special day. I also designed alternating table numbers/menus that included our colors, hole punches, and (free!) vintage Audubon bird imagery that matched our DIY feathers with seating labels.

Til death do us part…

A decade later I see some design elements that make my eye twitch, but I take it as a good sign that I’ve continued to grow in my skills and sensibilities! The perfectionist in me does occasionally ask J to marry me again so we can redo it the way we really wanted, but he keeps saying no. I guess even though the DIY trauma has passed (there was so much more than I shared here!), you’ve just got to keep moving forward in life and satisfy that urge with creating better things in the present.

Thanks for taking a walk down the aisle of memory lane with me today! : )