Photo by: Larsen Photo Co.
— Cara Jo’s Story —
For our invitation, we wanted to send our guests something elegant, legible, and completely custom to us! As a designer, watercolorist, and calligrapher, it was really easy for me to design my own custom suite for the wedding. We both love historic buildings and picked a beautiful one to have our wedding at. I did a watercolor painting of it and used it on the back of the invitation. We both love gardening and flowers, so I also did some loose floral illustrations to use throughout the suite and day-of pieces.
Photo by: Larsen Photo Co.
My husband helped with feedback throughout the whole process. I ordered a few proofs from C&P and we settled on a final layout. Once we got all the pieces ordered I enlisted some close family members to help with assembly. I didn’t want to ruin the surprise for them, so they only assembled bits and pieces of it, but never saw the whole thing together.
The invitation cards were printed at C&P and wrapped in a vellum jacket I designed and printed at home. Holding all of it together was a custom wax seal I designed specifically for the wedding (and beyond!). Envelopes were also from C&P and were calligraphed by me!
- Print Your Own Design, 5×7″ Flat Card – Printed on Crystal
- Print Your Own Design, 3.5 x 5″ Flat Card – Printed on Crystal
- A7 Euro Flap Envelopes in Lagoon
- RSVP Euro Flap Envelopes in Gold
- Inkjet Vellum Paper
Photo by Larsen Photo Co.
I used the basics like a paper cutter, exacto knife, wax seal, etc. A sponge for sealing the envelopes is key!
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The invitation suite included two 5×7″ cards. One was the invitation and another included A LOT of details. We had a fair amount of people traveling to Colorado for the first time and wanted to make sure they were prepared.
Photos by: Larsen Photo Co.
Finally, we included an RSVP card and envelope. On the RSVP card, we noted how many seats we had reserved for them so they knew if they had a +1 or not. We filled in the seats with a simple rubber stamp. On the back of each RSVP card was a number that referenced their cell in our spreadsheet, just in case people didn’t put a return address down!
Photo by: Larsen Photo Co.
Everything was wrapped in a vellum jacket secured with a wax seal. The outer envelope had an envelope liner that was a 1933 aerial photograph of our wedding venue, with a little heart stamped near it!
The envelopes were hand calligraphed by myself in a dark teal ink.
Plan ahead! DIYing things take a lot longer than you’d think. We planned ours way in advance and started working on them in March to be printed, assembled, and sent out in July.
While we had a website, we didn’t rely on that being the only way to communicate with our guests. We opted to include a lot more information than most people do in our printed invitation. Knowing your guests, and if they are computer savvy is important too. Our guests appreciated the details card and kept it with them while they traveled to the wedding.
Photo by: Larsen Photo Co.
Photo by: Larsen Photo Co.
Congratulations, Cara Jo & Keith!
Thank you for sharing your DIY Story with us!
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