At long last, I’m sitting down to answer all of your wonderful questions about our DIY wedding invitations! The video I shared earlier in the year (also on Insta over here) brought on a whole slew of curious comments about everything from paper sourcing, how to stamp on vellum, how to make faux deckled edges, etc. So I thought I’d quickly lay out our basic process along with links to some of the tools that helped us out along the way.
All in all, these invites took us about six months to make (“us” being me and my ultra-creative, endlessly inspiring mama), working only on weekends. I realize that sounds like a ton of time, but the alternative—cramming all of the work into just one or two months—would have been much more stressful, actually. This way, we were able to stretch things out over a much longer period of time, skip some weeks of work, and actually enjoy what we were doing. And frankly, there really was no alternative. Sourcing supplies was an ongoing logistical headache that required weeks and weeks of advance notice—I’ll talk a bit more about that more ahead.
Without further ado, our process is ahead! I hope it inspires you to create something similar or serves as a jumping-off point for a totally different but equally joy-inducing set of paper goods.
Step 1: Sizing, Sourcing, and Ordering the Base Paper
If you’re embarking on your own DIY invitation journey, the first thing I’d recommend doing is outlining all of the various paper components you’re hoping to include, using scrap paper to create one full mock-up invitation suite. From there, you can determine exactly how many pieces of paper—and, most importantly, in which sizes—you’ll need in order to duplicate that suite. Quantity, size, type/thickness/brand of paper, and color are the main components to consider. Here are two other things to think about:
- If you’ve got a lot of different paper components, remember that you’ll eventually need to stuff all of them into your selected envelope sizes. That’s an easy-to-overlook aspect, but it’s really important to take into account when selecting thicknesses and types of paper.
- If you’re planning on following our lead and creating a faux deckled (ripped) edge later on, you will need to use/order paper sizes larger than the final size that you’re hoping to land on post-ripping. You’ll also need to design your .psd files to ensure that the printed material encapsulates only the intended portion of that larger paper. How much bigger your paper should be than the design itself is really a matter of preference—and you can also ask your printer (letterpress or not) to weigh in and help you make a choice (in fact, that’s an excellent idea because the selected paper size will need to be compatible with their machines). The more room you have around the perimeter of the paper, the easier it’ll be to fold, score, and tear the paper, but you’ll also end up with a lot of wasted space and may have to pay up slightly. Just something to add into your calculations.
For this suite, we went with three envelopes per guest: an outer, durable dusty rose envelope, a more fragile handmade/stitched inner envelope with which I simply fell in love (I literally could not get the look of this envelope out of my head for weeks, and even when I see it now, I feel so much joy), and a final, smaller envelope in a chestnut brown color for the RSVP cards. (You could certainly forget the RSVP card entirely and do digital RSVPs; you could also just do one envelope per guest, rather than have one inside of another—up to you!) We then decided on a handmade paper for the main invitation, and, per guest, three extra pieces of card stock, which we would eventually use for the RSVP card, the “Details” card (which I dubbed the “Other Things” card), and the rehearsal dinner invitation-combined-with-RSVP (for a select subgroup of our guests). We asked people to slip the rehearsal dinner RSVP card into the same envelope as the regular RSVP, so we only needed one return envelope.
Believe it or not, sourcing ended up being *the* trickiest and most stressful aspect of this entire process. I cannot stress enough that if you’re planning on doing a DIY paper project for a wedding (or really any time-sensitive event), getting supplies in order should be one of your first orders of business, right up there with whatever else is on your early wedding planning timeline. For starters, figuring out what sizes and thicknesses would fit into which envelopes was a challenge. On top of that, given all the supply chain challenges of the past few years, we were met left and right with stock outages, missing colors (that dusty rose was nearly a no-can-do), and many missing paper sizes. Alas, the stress/adventure of the whole sourcing process actually made the entire process more memorable. It’s sort of just par for the crazy-crafting-mission course, I guess.
Step 2: Sourcing…All Of The Other Supplies!
In keeping with what I just wrote about supply chain MADNESS, here are a few other supplies you might consider sourcing early on (at least, this is what we made sure we had on hand long before actually needing them!):
- The dried flowers! (these were just from our backyard; we let them sit out for months and that did the trick! In hindsight, pressed flowers—store-bought or handmade—would be a better idea than these more 3-D-ish blooms)
- Metallic copper string
- Wax seal materials: Wax sealing beads, the actual metal seal stamp (which I’ll talk about in a bit), a wax seal warmer and heating spoon, and votive candles for the warmer
- A handheld paper folder/scorer
- Vellum sheets (for the belly bands)
- Paper ripper (otherwise known as a deckled edge ripper—I was very new to the entire concept of this thing and now I’m hooked)
- Small watercolor paint brush
- Rubber stamps (for the vellum belly bands)
- Vintage postage stamps (for the outside of each envelope; more on these below)
Step 3: Selecting Fonts and Designing The Layout of the Entire Suite on Photoshop
To design the suite, I essentially just created .psd files in the various sizes needed for each card, then got to work thinking up what wording to use, throwing in special quotes, and generally going to town on layout. This step is really your chance to get creative—there’s no right or wrong way to go about it. I will say that selecting fonts was probably the most hand-wring-y aspect here, just because that does feel like such a giant decision in the scheme of “general wedding things”—but as far as layout goes, I kept things fairly classic (cursive header followed by a mix of block caps and italicized lowercase letters ). This is the font I eventually chose for our headers; funnily enough, I was actually just using it as a placeholder; I had purchased it back in March of 2020 for a different project. But after staring at it for a while, I fell more and more in love with it and just decided to keep it as is. I liked that it added an ever-so-slightly more modern feel to the rest of the more traditional suite.
Step 4: Printing the Text
Going into this entire process, I knew that I’d like for the invitations to be letterpress-printed if possible (this is the technique that makes the text stand out so beautifully in relief and I just find it very special and keepsake-worthy). I found an incredible printer in Austin, Texas (Sargent Brothers) who was willing to take my very elementary Photoshop designs and print them on his letterpress machine, so that’s where we sent the card stock and handmade paper. If letterpress is something you’re also interested in, you can follow our lead and find a similar printer near you; if not, you can use an online service or local printing service to help you work with the different paper sizes you’ve got going on (again, you’re going to want to check with said service before purchasing the various sizes, just to make sure each one will cooperate with their machines).
Please, please, please heed this note from earlier, which I’ll repeat because it’s so important: If you’re planning on creating a faux deckled edge like we did, you’ll need to ask your printer to add or accommodate a sizable border on all edges of each piece of paper in the suite so that you have ample room for the ripping process. I’ll stress the “sizable” thing; while creating a narrow border might seem like an efficient use of paper, you’ll find that it’s nearly impossible to fold and tear unless you’ve got at least ~3/4″ to work with. (And even that was a bit dicey. Our poor, poor fingers.)
Step 5: Designing and Creating a Custom Wax Seal
At the time of this crafting adventure (2022), I couldn’t find a single maker specializing in Hebrew wax seals—I was actually surprised by that! So, another DIY was born: designing a seal of my own. I downloaded a Hebrew font so I could type out the first initials of our Hebrew names within Photoshop, then purchased and added some pretty olive/flowering branch clipart, and voilà! Then, I hopped on Etsy to look for someone who could transform my design into a custom stamp. The lovely folks at Get Marked agreed to do exactly that and were wonderful to work with. I opted for a 30mm circle—that’s a pretty standard seal size, and I didn’t want to use more wax than necessary—and they got to work. I really loved this part of the process, and I now have this beautiful and very personal seal stamp that I can use in the future.
Step 6: Creating a Faux Deckled Edge
The idea here was to rip the edges of our card stock to make it look more like handmade paper, and I can say confidently that we were successful in doing exactly that because one piece of our suite is on handmade paper (the main invite!), and the resemblance was uncanny. Here’s how we made it happen:
What you’ll need:
- Your printed invitations (it goes without saying, but you might make some mistakes in this process, so it can be a good idea to have extras lying around
- A sharp pencil with an eraser
- A ruler
- A small bowl of water—keep it far away from your invitation suite, of course (spills have financial and emotional repercussions here, my friends)
- A handheld paper folder/scorer
- Small watercolor paintbrush (size isn’t too important; something standard)
- Your handy paper ripper
What you’ll do:
Note: As I mentioned earlier (twice! It’s important!), you will need to ask your printer to add or accommodate a sizable border on all edges of each piece of paper in the suite so that you have room for the ripping process. Creating a narrow border might seem like an efficient use of paper, but actually, it’s nearly impossible to fold and tear unless you’ve got at least ~3/4″ to work with. Assuming you’ve done as much, you can safely begin crafting.
- First, flip the printed invitation over so that you’re working on the “blank”/unprinted side, and, using a ruler, measure exactly how far “into” the paper you’ll be able to fold/rip without touching any of the text on the other side. You’ll have to make two measurements: one from the top of the paper to the intended margin just above the first line of text (in a perfect world, this will be the same as from the very bottom to the bottommost line of text, but double-check that because we do not, in fact, live in a perfect world) and a second measurement from the side of the invite to the intended margin (again, the measurement you take on one side should be the same on the other side, but you have to double-check that before you start ripping away at the paper; you could end up with four different measurements).
- After making those measurements, carefully mark a small dot in each of the two (or four) areas, and draw a straight line on each side of the paper to mark where you’ll fold the paper. (I did this by drawing two dots on the same measured-out plane of each side, then connecting them).
- Next, line up the edge of the ruler with one of the lines (simply to give yourself a surface to fold against) and press the paper up and onto the ruler. Again, the ruler involvement isn’t a science or anything; your measuring is done. It’s just a trick to help out your fingers with the heavy card stock and to make sure the lines are straight.
- Use the paper scorer to deepen the fold on each side, then turn the paper over, reverse each fold in the opposite direction, and score once again for maximum scoring depth. Finally, turn the paper over one last time and fold, scoring again, for a total of three folds.
- Dip the paintbrush into the water to dampen it slightly, then run it along the fold lines on the back of the invitation (better to work on the blank, unprinted side so that you don’t accidentally get water onto the invitation ink). Just in case it’s not clear, in this step, you are essentially working to dampen the paper ever so slightly in order to help weaken the paper’s bonds and make it easier to tear in the next step. For that reason, you don’t need too much water—a few drops will do!
- Wait a minute or so to ensure that the water has thoroughly soaked into the paper (best to work in batches to keep things efficient), then place the paper under the ripping tool, hold down the tool firmly, and tear quickly on each side.
- That’s it! Repeat the process with all of the other pieces of the invitation suite—or create a factory-line-type situation (but remember, you shouldn’t wait too long after brushing on the water before tearing).
Step 7: Address the Envelopes
We chose to send our two outermost envelopes to Fran Heider of Lil Flower Calligraphy in Ohio, and she was remarkable—I really can’t recommend her enough. But of course you could print on your envelopes digitally (perhaps enlisting the services of a printer with whom you might have chosen to work in one of the previous steps), calligraph them yourself, or just hand-write the names of your guests. There are so many wonderful calligraphers on Etsy, and if you’d rather not send out the envelopes to another state or city, you can also search around for an artist in your town or nearby area so that you can drop them off and pick them up in person.
Step 8: Make and Stamp the Vellum Belly Bands
We measured out appropriately sized belly bands on simple vellum sheets using a pencil and ruler, then folded them along the marked lines and enlisted our trusty paper ripper (otherwise known as a deckled edge ripper) to carefully tear them to the right size. Afterwards, we stamped each of them with a few tiny acorn and foliage stamps and a mixture of brown and metallic copper ink (we pressed each stamp into the brown first, then the copper to achieve the exact color we were after; there’s no need to use two colors of ink, of course!).
Step 9: Assemble the Invites, Apply the Wax Seals, and Add Stamps
To assemble the invites, we placed each of the interior elements carefully on top of each other, one by one, and inserted the RSVP card inside of the flap of its respective envelope to keep things organized. Then, we added the vellum band and wrapped the whole thing up with bronze string (we tried to get fancy with a few of them by wrapping the string several times around the band, but this proved a bit trickier than expected). To secure the string in place before letting go of it and beginning the wax seal process, we used a tiny glue dot. Then, we put the dried flowers in place and poured on the hot wax seal before sealing everything with the seal stamp. Finally, we slipped everything into the inner envelope, slipped that into the outer envelope, and applied our stamps!
A note here on the vintage stamps, because I received a lot of questions about those: The trick here is to search for options you love (Etsy is a great place to start), then add up the cents to ensure that you can actually mail the letter in question. Vintage stamps are, as you might expect, offered with much lower values than their modern-day equivalents (5 cents, 2 cents, 15 cents, etc.), so you will need more of them in order to actually mail a letter. Here’s a good, thorough resource for learning more about the process.
Personally, I like the idea of mixing and matching the stamps yourself so that each one feels unique and personal to you, but as that article states, it’s also possible to purchase them in sets that come pre-portioned with helpful dollar/cents amounts, and after you’ve spent, oh, weeks or even months on the rest of this process, you might be inclined to hurry things along toward the end here. Understandable! (I’ll note that we had to send a lot of invites to Andre’s family in Brazil and other overseas guests; for those envelopes, we definitely went with regular, modern-day stamps—the entire envelope would’ve been filled with stamps otherwise.)
Step 10: Hand-Cancel The Envelopes At the Post Office and Be Prepared for Postage Issues
Hand-canceling (the process of marking each of your envelopes by hand at the post office, rather than sending them through a machine) isn’t necessary, but after all the work you’ve done, I’d say it’s worth it. It’s a nice way to ensure that the envelope doesn’t get torn or otherwise ruined by the post office’s typical machine-driven process. This (hand-canceling) is typically a possibility at post offices around the country, but pay yours a quick visit to be sure.
That said, the envelopes’ initial journey out of your post office is not the only road it’ll travel on its way to your recipients’ mailboxes—all sorts of things can go wrong, from that swirly calligraphy being misread to one of the envelopes simply getting dropped in a puddle. It happens! For all of these reasons, it’s a good idea to set up a separate, digital RSVP form for those just-in-case moments; we ended up using it for about 10 guests in the end (there were others who had simply misplaced the paper copy and needed a way to get in touch with us about their attendance).
PHEW! That’s it. Drop me a line if you end up going this route; I’d love to hear about your crafting adventures and misadventures. It was certainly a lot of work to pull this off, but crafting these with my mom will remain one of my favorite memories from the entire wedding year.