A Yellow + Gray Collaboration

One of the best things about blogging is getting to meet so many fantastic new people — and Julianne Smith is by far one of the nicest I've met so far!  Juli creates custom handmade wedding garters, each of which is infused with a whole lot of love and Juli's signature modern style.  Juli sent over this colorful collaboration with a local DC designer, Carla David:

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Carla took one of Juli's yellow and gray wedding garters (#211) and designed a matching invitation suite around it.  So fun!  Check out the rest of Juli's collection right here.

{image credits: Carla David via Julianne Smith}

A Paper Chandelier!

I came across this fantastic chandelier while browsing through the Pottery Barn catalog last night and thought you might love it as much as I do:

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It’s made with paper!  With three tiers and 35 clips, that’s a lot of space to display love letters, travel post cards, holiday cards — pretty much whatever you want.  This is clearly Pottery Barn’s (much more affordable) take on the Ingo Maurer Zettl’z chandelier:

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As much as I love the Zettl’z, I think I actually prefer the rustic look of the Pottery Barn chandelier.  I’m definitely putting it on my wish list… even if I have to wait a little while before we actually have the space to properly hang and display it!

{image credits: top photos via pottery barn, bottom photos via house beautiful and illums bolighus}

Real Invitations – Cynthia + Michael, Part 2

Cyd’s wedding ceremony programs were a true labor of love — with a beautiful result! — deserving of a post all their own.  Plus they were inspired in part by my own wedding ceremony programs, so I just had to give Cyd’s lovely blue and kraft paper programs a bit of extra love!

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From Cyd: For our ceremony programs, I was inspired by your cute pocket-sized ceremony programs and the lovely programs you featured by Erin Jang which had kraft paper pages and gocco’d covers.

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These were easily the most time consuming of my DIY projects – I designed them and laid them out myself in InDesign.  Every cover was individually cut, scored, lined on the inside with the same paper as our envelope liners, and then hand bound (we’re talking old school book binding with a needle and thread here) with blue and white striped baker’s twine.

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The pages were kraft paper, which was a material I introduced with the envelopes of our Bookmark the Dates (DIY bookmarks as I’m a literature buff and my husband is an English teacher) and later incorporated in several areas throughout our event.

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I gocco’d both the front and back covers, picking up on the flourish from our invitations, and used Paper Source cardstock in Lake for the actual covers.

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They were immensely time-consuming, but guests loved them and very few were left behind. I can’t say I’ll be making any more miniature books anytime soon, but I sure did love the way these turned out!

Beautiful!  Don’t you all just love the mix of craft paper and that gorgeous lake blue?  You can read more about Cyd’s wedding over on The Sweetest Occassion or on her column on Elizabeth Anne Designs.  Oh, and for those of you curious about the script font used in Cyd’s programs, it’s called Burgues and can be found at Veer.  Thanks so much, Cyd, for sharing your lovely programs and gorgeous wedding invitations with us!

{all photos by Oh So Beautiful Paper}

A Crisp White Bedroom

Today I love this crisp white bedroom:

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Don’t get me wrong, I’m a girl who loves pattern, color, and texture and often prefers that over clean white walls.  But I’ve been plagued by insomnia as far back as I can remember, so when I saw this serene bedroom on desire to inspire today, it made me stop and consider a relaxing white room as a better way to get a full night’s sleep.  Doesn’t it look peaceful?

What about you – do you prefer white or a bit of color on your bedroom walls?

{image credits: Maura McEvoy via desire to inspire}

Bella Figura Election Sale!

Hey there voters!  In honor of Election Day (today!) Bella Figura is offering a special limited time promotion for orders placed in November — send Bella Figura an e-mail with a photo of yourself voting at the election booth and you’ll get 25 free invitation sets when you order 75!

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Orders must be placed by 5 p.m. on November 30 — check out the Bella Figura blog for all the details.  Happy voting!

{image credits: Bella Figura}