I am absolutely loving these new wedding invitations from Hammerpress over on 100 layer cake today:
I love the entire suite, from the design details to the color palette. Check out the full post for great inspiration for a rockin’ desert wedding in Palm Springs, and this post from back in January for past wedding invitations from Hammerpress.
{images from Hammerpress via 100 layer cake}
You might remember Jessica's gocco'd Save the Dates from a few weeks ago – and now Jessica is back with her gocco'd bridal shower invitations!
Today’s real invitations come courtesy of Michelle from Armas Design. Michelle’s rockin’ wedding was featured on snippet & ink a few weeks back, where I fell in love with her Paris-themed invitations. Michelle was kind enough to send over some additional photos and information about how she put her invitations together – so I’ll turn things over to Michelle:
We had a small wedding, and I wanted to make the invitations very special, but not too precious. I wanted the invitations to exude a playful, quirky quality but with a crisp, buttoned up undertone. That pretty much sums up our wedding look!
We also had a tight budget, so I bought some plain ivory cards embossed with a wreath on the top and printed the invitations at home:
The special details come from the vintage reproduction maps of Paris that I used to line the envelopes with, which were too dull and thin on their own, and vintage stamps. I bought tons of vintage stamps on eBay and peppered the envelopes and the reply envelopes with gorgeous colored stamps:
I also printed the programs and the reply cards at home. For our thank you cards, I bought an embosser with our initials and some red rimmed cards from Crane and made “custom” thank you cards. I also used that embosser to make our programs unique and give them a more tactile feel:
To add a little bit more of an irregular, organic element, I had the post office hand stamp the envelopes, so they have that nice round stamp on on them. It was a nice finishing touch since the suite was very symmetrical and classical.
I love the way Michelle incorporated vintage maps and stamps to balance out the more classic invitation elements. And the use of a custom embosser is one of my favorite details – particularly since it can be used to customize any future personal correspondence. Just lovely!
{images via Armas Design – thanks Michelle!}
The only thing better than ending the week with a stationery giveaway is starting the week with a giveaway! This week's giveaway is sponsored by one of my favorite letterpress studios, Smock Paper. In addition to a fabulous line of eco-friendly letterpress wedding invitations, Smock Paper has a wonderful line of social stationery, which is the focus of this week's giveaway:
Okay, so here are the rules: Head on over to the Smock Paper website and browse through the social collection. The contest includes the boxed sets of note cards, thank you cards, and fill-in party invitations. Pick out your favorite design (just one design please, not one from each category), then pop back on over here and leave a
comment with telling us which one you picked. The winner will win three boxed sets of their choice!
You'll have until midnight (EST) on Thursday, April 16th to enter the giveaway, and I'll announce the winner here on Friday. Bonne chance!
{images via Smock Paper – thanks Cyd!}
I love, love invitations that incorporate hand-lettering or illustration, particularly the work of Florida-based illustrator Anna Melcon Bond of Rifle Design. Anna seems to effortlessly blend traditional illustration with folk art elements to create some of the most lovely Save the Dates and wedding invitations.
This first Save the Date is one of my all-time favorites – I love the the contrast between the black background, floral illustrations, and white hand-lettering is just so beautiful:
The next set is one of Anna’s most recent invitation suites, created for a late Spring wedding in North Carolina:
As you might expect, Anna designed the invitations for her own wedding. She then carried those elements through to other elements of the wedding, such as the ceremony programs and even to the cake!
I love the way Anna brings a sense of fun and whimsy to every invitation design:
Gorgeous, right? For more of Anna’s lovely work, head on over to her website, blog, and flickr page (where you can also see a few photos from her lovely, lovely wedding)!
{image credits: rifle design}