Hello all! This past weekend, my Fiance and I finally sent out all of our wedding invitations. It's been almost a year long planning event, and we're proud to say that they turned out better than we imagined.
When we first started our wedding planning process, we knew we wanted to personalize our day as much as we could. We wanted to make sure when our guests looked at our invitations and then on the big day, walk into our venue, they'll automatically think, "Wow...this is SOOOO Cindi and Chris". Our venue is at a place in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle called Pravda Studios. As you can see from the picture below, it's pretty much a blank studio/lofty space. Which is the exact look I was looking for. This leaves room for us to personalize how we want it.
This room divides into two spaces, one side of which will be where our ceremony takes place. The other side will be set up for tables and once the reception starts, the chairs just only needs to be moved to the tables. It was the perfect set up! Pravda also allows people to rent lounge furniture. Our color scheme is going to be red, white, and black so we're going to turn part of this space into a nice little lounge area with sofa couches, coffee table, rug, coffee tables, etc.
Chris and I were determined to make our wedding an intimate one. Our guest list consists of about 100 people, all of whom are family and close friends. People that we truly care about, and in turn care about us. So, it was very suiting for us to make our invitations seem like they are personal letters to our guests. We were inspired by Kathleen of Jeremy and Kathleen. While searching for wedding invite ideas, Chris came upon her blog. Kathleen is a freelance designer and when it was her own wedding time, she chose to design her invites in this correspondance theme as seen here. We fell in love with this idea and decided to design ours like Kathleens. And here's what we came up with:
We used a 29# vellum for the main invite and bought the directions cards and rsvp envelopes at Paper Source. We also found a bunch of the black envelopes online for a very good price. The hang tags we used for the rsvp's were from Etsy of all places! And finally we printed everything on our inkjet printer at home. All in all, I would say we spent about $100! Because our envelopes were black (to go with our color scheme), Chris had to painstakingly write every single address on the envelopes with a silver gel pen. But I loved how they turned out. I especially love our silhouettes and we signed every single invite by hand. Chris did most of the designing (making our silhouettes, drawing out the map, etc.) and might I say he did a great job! I'm so lucky to have such a great Fiance...soon to be Hubby.
Accordingly, because of this correspondance theme, our reception program will have a similar feel. We will be using the same envelopes, each of them addressed to our guests.
Anyhoo, back to clothes! My OOTD isn't anything special today. Comfort was my goal since I was so uncomfy and itchy yesterday. Also, I knew I was going to be in a 6 hour long meeting, I thought I'd better be prepared for it.
I got this blouse at the Anthro sale but couldn't find the name of it online. It doesn't show very well in these pics, but it's a button enclosure with ruffles next to the buttons in the chest area. The color is more of a cobalt blue and the fabric is light and silky. The straps are also cute because rather than being all sewn on, the straps in the back next to the shoulders are actually buttons. Very cute! Love this top and it's SO comfy.
Tank - Anthropologie
Blazer/Jacket - Halogen (Nordstroms)
Slacks - Banana Republic
Shoes - RSVP
Necklace - Oh, Hello Friend
P.S. can you guys see my tan line? I tried hiding them in the tank only shot. Haha...but it still looks horrible. Lets hope it clears up a little more before August. Eeeeek!
OMG, I LOVE your invites! They are so special - and it's totally cool they are personalized, down to the hand addressing. Yay for your fiance!
ReplyDeleteAnd I hear ya on the comfy clothing. Somedays you don't want to work on wearing anything special, you just don't want to tug, scratch or pull all day. It's still adorable, though! Thumbs up!
Cindi - I love that space and those invites! Dave and I are planning on renewing our vows in 5 1/2 years (our 10th anniversary) and I would love if our invites turned out that awesome! Our actual wedding was small and very disorganized becuse we got married after only knowing one another for 3 months. (crazy, I know) So i didn't get a chance to have my "dream wedding". I can't wait to see more of the little details for your. I love weddings!
ReplyDeleteThe tan line isn't so bad -- I could only see it when i clicked on the picture and it enlarged. I'm sure it will be gone by august! You've got 2 1/2 more months :) no need to worry! you look adorable.
Great job on those invites! We also made our own invitations, using a painting my mother-in-law painted for us (she does marvelous Chinese watercolor paintings).
ReplyDeleteLove that top!
Cindi! Your invites are super nice and I love how involved your fiance was! (he's a keeper!) Hmm. Maybe I will post pictures of mine soon (we got married 2 years go, while I was in school, ugh--not the marriage part, the school part ;) ps. I am so jealous you only have a 100 guests, I had 550! (okay, I will stop blabbing now!)
ReplyDeleteps. I love the lounge idea!
I just got my invites in the mail yesterday and we're hoping to send them out tomorrow :) We are SO behind in sending them out, but luckily the wedding is small and mostly family.
ReplyDeleteMichelle Q - Thank you so much! Yep...he is definitely a keeper. He's my partner in crime. Also, I totally hear ya about not wanting to pull and tug all day. I'm totally comfortable again today too. :)
ReplyDeleteAimee - Aww...that's so sweet to renew your vows. By that time your kids are big enough to see and understand the commitment you guys have for one another. How cute! 3 months...wowsers! Well, you know when it's right and although we waited for awhile before we were financially ready, we knew a couple months into our relationship that we were right for one another. We have other touches we'll be posting, including a home made guest sign in book. So stay tuned!
Carol - Oooh...your invitations sound so nice! And how cute to use her painting. We were totally going for something different than the average invites and we're so glad we did it.
Sammie - Yes, I'd LOVE to see your invites. WOW 550 guests? I can't even imagine where they'd all fit. haha. Most of my family is not in the country and Chris' Mom's side is in the Philippines, so if they were all around, we'd probably have around 350 or so. So maybe it's a good thing they're not? :)
Sara - Aww..when are you getting married? Isn't it a huge load off of your shoulders to get those out? Now more little details to worry about right? Aye! I can't wait to hear about your big day. I hope you blog about it. :)
Your invites are amazing! I'm so excited for you and I know that your guests are going to love getting them! I can't wait to see more wedding details:)
ReplyDeleteps-I love the yellow shoes.
I love your reception venue! And that top is adorable with the yellow shoes!
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Hey Cindi I have a quick invitation question for you...where do you put the return address on the outer envelope and do you include names or just the address? Does it go on the back flap? Thanks!
ReplyDeleteSara - Ours were a bit different because we wanted the feel of it to be like a letter to our guests, so the return address was actually on the top left corner like a letter would be. We included our names and just put "Cindi & Chris" then our address. Our invites weren't that formal though.
ReplyDeleteIf you're going for the more formal feel, I've received ones where they've printed out labels and placed the return address on the back flap of the envelope. Or you can handwrite them..but if you handwrite the return address, you should handwrite the guests address too. At least that's what you'd read if you searched the internet about ettiquette. You can read a lot of different things on the internet but really it's about what you guys want. I hope this helps and that I've answered your question. Let me know if I've just blabbered! haha.
I love yellow shoes!
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