As you’ve heard me say countless times before, I love love love it when couples incorporate their unique personalities into their wedding invitations! For these two mechanical engineers, that meant incorporating gear illustrations into the invitation design for their Texas ranch wedding. Ashley and James worked with Liz at The Nouveau Romantics to bring their invitation vision to life. The result is the perfect quirky mix of modern design and rustic texture!

From Liz at The Nouveau Romantics: Ashley and James are two mechanical engineers with a penchant for modern design. They were married on a rustic ranch here in Austin, Texas. They were both actively involved in the design process, and wanted their invitation to reflect a masculine and feminine sensibility, while also incorporating gears, if at all possible.

We opted for an unusual shape in the long and narrow, as well as an off-centered assembly. As guests opened the kraft envelopes, they were greeted with a blind printed main invitation texture and the front of the RSVP postcard that had the couple’s separate “venn diagrams” with appropriate descriptions of each of their personalities. As you unwrapped the chambray band and wax seal, you revealed the shared qualities of the couple as the “overlap” in their diagram.

I loved the texture in the color fields of the venn diagram via the two color letterpress as it’s perfectly imperfect and gives a really big graphic impact. Underneath the venn diagram postcard was their info card and finally the double-sided invitation. The back of the invitation was a flood of color in a medium blue, with a darker blue outline for a technical sketch of a complex gear-oriented machine. Pretty perfect! The front of the invitation was a mix of blind printing and grey ink for the invitation wording, while the machine drawing was blind printed to the left hand side.

For their save the date, we went the postcard route. Something simple and quirky with two vintage Austin postcards and a welcome note on the front, and Ashley’s handwriting scanned in as the back. I love the 5″ x 7″ size; while it’s more postage, it definitely has an impact!

The rest of the day-of paper goods incorporated the same quality of modern fonts in a range of grays, blues, and chambray to create the perfect mix of modern and mechanical for these two!

Thanks Liz!

Design: The Nouveau Romantics

Letterpress Printing: Thomas Printers

Check out the Designer Rolodex for more tal­ented wed­ding invi­ta­tion design­ers and the real invi­ta­tions gallery for more wedding invitation ideas!

Photo Credits: Heather Curiel Photography