Oh So Beautiful Paper

Archive for January, 2011

I know we’re barely out of January, but I can already tell that these wedding invitations are going to end up as one of my favorites from 2011.  Samantha and Whitney, the talented ladies behind Gus & Ruby in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, teamed up with illustrator Nate Duval to create a truly custom wedding invitation designed around the wedding venue – the groom’s family farm!

From Samantha and Whitney: Elizabeth and David came to us looking for a completely original wedding invitation design. After much discussion and many sketches, we hired illustrator Nate Duval to bring our vision to life.  With our direction, Nate illustrated the farm that David’s family owns in Madison, New Hampshire (and the wedding venue!).

Their color palette was a mix of bright colors: yellow, orange, green, and blue and they gave us complete free reign to be as creative as we wanted.  Nate did an awesome, graphic illustration of the house, barn, and hills and even incorporated geometric patterns to fill in shaded areas.

Nate did a singular illustration of a day lily (they are abundant on the property) as well as a ridiculously awesome illustration one of the cows (a very specific breed) that graze on the farm fields.  One of our favorite moments with this couple was when the groom’s mother saw the suite for the first time and exclaimed “Oh, it’s Fiona!” upon seeing the cow.  She recognized the specific cow immediately!  Too cute.

Instead of pairing a refined font with Nate’s rad illustrations, we decided to opt for hand lettering.  Whitney set out and hand wrote every piece of information – from the invitation text to the wording for the rehearsal dinner card – it was a labor-intensive process, but we couldn’t have been more thrilled with the results.

Our favorite part of the suite, which Whitney dreamed up just as she was preparing the final files, was to create barn doors as a vehicle to hold the invitation.  When guests pulled the suite out of the envelope they were faced with the doors and had to untie the rustic twine to reveal the invitation.  The additional pieces (reply card + envelope and rehearsal dinner invitation) were tucked underneath the twine on the backside of the doors.

Are these not the most adorable farm wedding invitations ever?  The entire suite is absolutely stunning, from the save the dates to the illustrated RSVP card.  Thanks Samantha and Whitney!

Illustration: Nate Duval
Hand Lettering and Letterpress Printing: Gus & Ruby

Invitation Styling by Meagan Gilpatrick of Maine Season Events; Photography by Brea McDonald

Happy Monday everyone!  I hope you all had a nice and relaxing weekend.  Last week I shared a few of my favorite Valentine’s Day cards (here, here, and here), but as promised last week I pulled together a quick round-up of love notes for Valentine’s Day.  So if you’re still searching for the perfect Valentine to give to your loved ones, here are a few other options to consider:

{Ephemera Press}

{The Wheatfield}

{Mr. Boddington’s Studio}

{Lulu Dee}

{Egg Press}

{Lucky Bee Press}

{Bon Vivant Press}

{Beau Ideal}

{Paisley Dog Press}

{Fine Day Press}

{the hungry workshop}

{Papersheep}

I have a few more to share, but you’ll have to wait until tomorrow morning for those.  Coming up next, an awesome wedding invitation suite that I think you’re all going to love!

{images from their respective sources}

*Paisley Dog Press is a sponsor of Oh So Beautiful Paper

Happy Friday everyone!  It’s been a long week for me, and I have mixed feelings heading into the weekend.  I’m looking forward to hanging out with friends and relaxing a bit, but still really missing my hubby overseas.  I’ve also been spending a lot of time listening to the band in the video below, Two Door Cinema Club – they’re from Ireland and it’s just what I need to keep my spirits up.  But in the meantime…

…a few links for your weekend:

• Love these city map prints
• These pink + green wedding invitations are just too cute for words
• A Jane Austen inspired shop!  (via Summer)
• Jordan’s presentation at Alt was one of my favorites from the entire conference – here are her tips for planning an awesome party!
• A pretty ketubah
• Cute travel-inspired birthday party invitations
• I’m loving this collaboration with two of my favorite things – stationery and jewelry

This week on Oh So Beautiful Paper:

• Simple + sweet valentines.
• Paige + Adam’s vintage equestrian wedding invitations!
• Modern red, white, and blue baby announcements
• Loving these pink silhouette wedding invitations
• Romantic calligraphy valentines.
• Lovely new invitation collections from Bella Figura and The Pressroom & Co.

That’s it for me this week!  I hope you all have a lovely weekend!  I’ll be trying to stay warm with these two fuzzballs.  And yes, that’s our cat Leopold in the upper left, still in his cone of shame from his surgery back in November.  What an ordeal.  See you back here on Monday!

{photo by me}

I’m going to try to pull together a small collection of Valentine’s Day cards for next week, but right now I’m loving these cute Love Notes occasion cards from Susy*Jack – sweet and simple, perfect for telling someone just how much you care about them!

Check out the full collection right here!

{image credits: Susy*Jack}