I’ve been in full-time (all day every day) French language training for the last few weeks and have a progress test tomorrow. I’m starting to stress out a bit, so this print by studio mela is helping to keep me calm. Back to studying!
{found via Decor Amor}
The photos from Erica and Patrick's baby shower are just too cute – and it doesn't hurt to have a calligrapher friend to help create such beautiful little details:
Such a sweet and lovely baby shower – I love those cupcakes! Congratulations Erica and Patrick!
{photos via thoughtful day}
I just found out {via Paper Crave} that Pistachio Press is offering 15% off all invitation orders through the month of March. This is a great opportunity for gorgeous wedding invitations at a great price, so head on over to the Pistachio Press website to check out more from their wedding portfolio:
{images via Pistachio Press}
I'm back with more of the beautiful wedding paper ephemera from Liesl & Jeremy's gorgeous wedding, this time focusing on some of the printed wedding details and online material:
Despite a million other things to do, we decided to put a lot of time
into designing most of our own printed and online materials. This was a
great collaboration, with Liesl having a ton of creative design ideas
and Jeremy with the computer and graphics skills to make it happen.
It
also ended up being a key part of our wedding because it was through
all this stuff that our personalities really showed through – making
the whole wedding seem very us and very unlike a typical wedding. Just
what we were going for!
In addition to the Save the Date postcards, the list of elements that Liesl and Jeremy co-designed is quite extensive:
Wedding web site.
We spent a long time putting this all together and giving it the right
feel. We wanted people to know this was a party, not a boring formal
occasion:
Table name cards. Our reception had 13
tables which, coincidentally, is also the number of ranks in a standard
deck of playing cards. We decided to name each table after a card rank
(Adventurous Aces, Quixotic Queens, Suave Sevens, etc.):
Escort playing cards. First, we got
several decks of custom playing cards printed up. We based it on a
print we found of a hot-air-balloon with someone's name on it; we photoshopped out the old name and replaced it with "Liesl and Jeremy."
We also added a space to write each guest's name:
Seating Chart. The guests would find
the playing card with their name on it and turn it over to reveal the
table where they would be sitting.
Postcards
for out-of-town guests. Each guest received a gift basket with various
goodies (candies, champagne, etc.) and we also enclosed 2 postcards
with custom “Liesl and Jeremy" designs on them:
{bottom photograph by Liesl & Jeremy Elson}
Shuttle
information for out-of-town guests. A simple sheet telling hotel
guests how to use the shuttle between the venue and the hotel; we
decided to print something beautiful and thematic rather than a boring
old photocopied black & white sheet:
Kissing Booth Sign. We designed a sign that directed people to our photo "kissing" booth to take their best kissing shot for us to put into our guest book:
We
didn't have one unifying inspiration for our wedding, but rather an
overall feel we wanted to create. We really wanted to avoid any and
all "traditional" wedding themes and ideas because it seemed to us that
so many weddings get lost in formalities and trivial details that can
suck the joy out of the whole experience. We also really wanted it to
be unique so we worked extra hard to break with tradition whenever
possible. So we thought about what was most important to us for our
wedding and we decided that it should be stress-free, incredibly fun,
and wildly inappropriate. A fabulous party for everyone help us
celebrate in style.
We drew most of our inspiration from
vintage French cabarets, burlesque and can-can dancers, the sensational
larger-than-life circuses of the 1920's and 30's, and a bit of the Mad
Hatter's tea party to keep things interesting and unexpected. We had
so many subtle inspirations, many of them very different from each
other, but all with the common art deco theme, even my vintage 1920's
wedding ring. We wanted to do the same for our music so we hired a
traditional Klezmer band (accordion, clarinet, brass) to evoke the
exotic gypsy-esque music played for Jewish wedding celebrations in the
1920's. We chose The Ruins for our venue so it could feel like we'd
descended into our our rabbit hole to a rare undiscovered place. The
backdrop of The Ruins provided a vibrant, eccentric and timeless
setting, and like us, a bit over the top with a few surprises.
We picked out mostly art deco styled ephemera to keep with the classic
vintage feel, but made sure to use the sauciest and most amusing
artwork we could find to create a really wildly entertaining
atmosphere. We wanted to be sure that everywhere our guests looked,
they'd want to laugh and remember that we aren't following any
proscribed set of wedding rules or etiquette, we aren't taking
ourselves too seriously, and we clearly want people to have a good time
WITH us, not around us.
I hope you've all enjoyed Liesl & Jeremy's wedding ephemera as much as I've enjoyed sharing it with you! I love how every design element just oozes a sense of fun and playfulness – while still maintaining a cohesive design approach! For more photos from Liesl & Jeremy's gorgeous wedding, check out the La Vie Photography blog here and here. Thank you so, so much to Liesl and Jeremy for sharing their designs with us – and to Kim at La Vie Photography for sending over so many gorgeous photographs!
{unless noted otherwise, all photographs by La Vie Photography}
I’m super-excited about today’s real invitations – I’ve been hoping to feature the paper ephemera from Liesl & Jeremy’s wedding ever since I fell in love with Liesl’s gorgeous wedding dress after seeing photos from their wedding on Once Wed back in October. Liesl and Jeremy, as well as Kim from La Vie Photography, have been kind enough to send over tons of photographs and background behind the paper ephemera from their wedding.
First up, Liesl and Jeremy’s Save the Date postcards and gorgeous wedding invitations:
Our save-the-date card was the first thing a lot of people saw — it featured an iguana (Hank) climbing the Space Needle, and the exhortation, “Save the date! Or else the city will be destroyed by a giant iguana!!” The design drew from the World’s Fair as well as the classically comical monster movies of old Hollywood:
{design and image via Liesl & Jeremy Elson}
Liesl & Jeremy worked with a local stationer in Seattle to select their wedding invitations. They settled on a beautiful booklet fold-out layout, with the main wedding invitation on the left and an invitation to their rehearsal dinner on the right. RSVP cards were enclosed inside with matching envelopes:
From Liesl: The wedding invitations were a beautiful coral red color inspired by my secret desire to walk down the aisle in Scarlett O’Hara’s sexy red velvet dress from Gone With the Wind.
{photos by La Vie Photography}
I also completely adore the custom Ketubah and polaroid guest book that Liesl and Jeremy incorporated into their wedding:
I’ve got lots more lovely ephemera from Liesl & Jeremy’s wedding to share with you – so check back a bit later for more photos and design inspiration!
{except where noted, all photographs by La Vie Photography}
