The question has been popped, the engagement ring is on, and the champagne is bubbling. You’re at an exciting stage in your life, but there’s more to come. Before you get married, you have to plan the whole wedding celebration. This means you’ve got loads of different things to consider as you put all the little pieces together. If you’re looking for a guide that helps you plan your entire wedding, this isn’t it. Instead, this guide looks at one of the key areas that will need attention right away – your wedding invitations.
Yes, the invites are one of the first things you have to get sorted. You’ll need to send them out ASAP and get responses. Without the invites, you won’t know how many people are attending your wedding. You’d think that choosing them would be easy, but you’re wrong. There’s much to consider, so follow this guide to help you make the best decision!
Step 1: Choose the style
Wedding invitations are available in many styles. You’ve got classic ones that open up like a card, which tends to be most people’s choice. However, as you can see with these MagnetStreet pocket wedding invitations, many variations are available. Your first choice is deciding what type of invitation style you’re looking for. Do you want it to be quite classic, or would you rather be innovative? Have a look around to create a shortlist of the best styles, then pick your favorite. Now, you can move onto the next steps.
Step 2: Set your budget
It’s a boring step, yet arguably the most important one. Setting your budget is vital as you need to know how much to spend on your invitations. You can’t blow through half of your wedding budget right away! I won’t lie, this is probably the trickiest decision in this guide. It’s very hard to know how much to spend. The best approach is to look at your entire wedding budget and consider the bigger costs. Then, look at the invitations on the market and see what the cheapest and most expensive options are.
From here, you should be able to see where your budget fits on the scale. Are you closer to the cheaper end, or can you afford to spend a little extra? It doesn’t matter how much you spend – cheap options are often just as good as expensive ones. What matters is that you spend what you can afford.
Step 3: Choose the overall design
The style of your wedding invitations refers to the way they look. It’s more to do with how they fold and the actual design of the invitation itself. This step focuses on the artwork design, not the shape of the invitation, etc.
Here, you need to discuss what the invitations will look like when people open them. What type of bordering do you want? What colors are you going to use? Are there any patterns you wish to include? Do you want any photos? Ask yourself questions like these to figure out the perfect design blueprint for your wedding invitations. It helps to draw some rough design ideas yourself. Don’t worry if they’re awful, it’s just to let you know what to look for.
An underrated design aspect is the typography used on the invitation. The font choice and writing style play a huge role in determining the invites’ overall look and feel. Make sure you don’t forget about this during this step!
Step 4: Bespoke or templates?
Let’s recap where you are at this stage. You’ve chosen the style and design of your invitations, and you have a budget. Now, we have a huge step: choosing how you buy your invitations.
Realistically, you’ve got two main options. You could buy completely bespoke wedding invitations, or you could purchase templates. A bespoke invitation means it has been designed from scratch. Someone has seen your ideas, listened to your requirements, then produced a totally unique piece. In essence, it’s fully customized to suit your specific needs.
The benefit of the bespoke option is that you end up with a finished product that matches your dreams. Someone can take your rough sketches and turn them into a work of art. If you have very specific ideas for your wedding invitations, this might be the best route to go down. The downside is that this tends to be the more expensive option.
Alternatively, you could opt for some templates. Here, you find a website or a vendor that sells wedding invitations. They will have a large stock of options for you to look through. Each option is a blank template featuring a style/design. You choose the one that matches your vision, then fill it in with your details.
The advantage of this is that it is much cheaper. Plus, you get the invitations a lot faster. With custom invites, you have to wait for the designer to create the design, then approve it yourself, then they’re finally printed. Here, you can order your templates, and they arrive within days. Obviously, the downside is that it’s nowhere near as customized. So, you might have to settle for a template that’s not perfect but matches your dreams the closest.
Step 5: Get some samples
Step 5 is basically merged with step 4, as they closely relate to one another. Before you order anything, it helps to see what you’re getting. With the templates, most websites will offer free samples to order. This lets you see the invitations in the flesh for the first time. Providers of bespoke wedding invites should also offer samples. Usually, they show you examples of previous work, but they should also provide a sample of your requested design.
The purpose of samples is two-fold. Firstly, they help you distinguish between either option and decide which route to go down. You may love the template samples and choose to buy them over the custom-made ones. Secondly, they help you realize if your design is way off. Sometimes, you don’t realize how bad something is until you see it in the flesh. Looking at a sample can make you change your mind and opt for a much better design. Thankfully, you realized this before buying anything!
Step 6: Figure out what to write in them
After step 5, you will know where you’re getting the invitations from. Now, you have to figure out what to write in them. There’s a big decision here that relates to the writing. Typography was mentioned earlier, but are you going to type up the invites? Some people prefer to add a more personal touch by writing them by hand. It’s up to you, though there’s more chance of making errors if you do it like that. When the invitations are typed, any errors can be deleted before they’re printed.
Anyway, what should you put inside the invitation? Generally, you should keep it short and sweet. Don’t put a huge paragraph or make it too corny. Just say that you’re excited to invite each person to your wedding and hope they can attend. Clearly, you need to put the dates in as well – and this should be in bold. Make the date stand out so people can check their diaries and make a note of it.
That’s all you need to include, though you could add some personal messages for specific guests. For example, close friends may get a personalized invite that relates to them in some way. Maybe you include a private joke that nobody else will get. Of course, every invitation should be addressed to each person/couple/family. Don’t be cheap and leave their names out so you can print the exact same invite a hundred times!
Step 7: Include an RSVP card
What is the purpose of a wedding invitation? Essentially, it’s to formally notify people of your wedding and get an idea of who can come. With that in mind, you must give your guests a way to respond! Your wedding invites should be sent out with an RSVP card included. This is a small card that basically says ‘yes I can attend’ or ‘no I can’t attend.’ It’s very straightforward, but a crucial aspect of your wedding invitations.
Therefore, you also need to consider what this RSVP card will look like! Ironically, you need to go back through some of the previous steps to come to this conclusion. Mainly think about style, design, budget, and typography. The good news is that you have the style and design sorted already. These are an accompaniment to your invitations, so they should replicate the style. It would look strange if the invites are one style, and the RSVP card is the complete opposite.
When all seven steps have been followed, you’re in a position to order and send out the invitations. All that’s left to do is sit back and wait for the responses! Oh, and the million and one other things that require your attention when planning a wedding. Once the responses are in, you can start focusing on your next task – making and sending out the dinner menus!
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