wedding 2024 | Designing Your Invitations & Stationery

date posted: February 28, 2024

Photo by Love Me Do Photography.

Photo by Teresa Horgan Photography.

Getting and sending personal snail mail is delightfully exotic these days. And how many occasions encourage creating pretty, personalized paperwork?

That said, wedding stationery is one aspect of planning that you can get handled as soon as your venue and date are firm. It’s also an area in which you have a lot of flexibility.

All you absolutely need to have are invitation cards with the who, what, when, and where spelled out and response (RSVP) cards with self-addressed, stamped envelopes; everything else can be delegated (for example, the shower organizer handles the shower invitations) or organized online.

If you love the idea of a keepsake suite of wedding papers, consider working together to create a logo that’s meaningful to you as a couple and sprinkling it across any or all of the following

to be mailed

• Save the Date Cards (6-12 months before the wedding) need to include the date, state, and city, and your wedding website if you have one.

Consider working together to create a logo that’s meaningful to you as a couple.

• Invitation Cards (6-8 months in advance) are traditionally sent with both an inner and outer envelope and an RSVP card. If your ceremony and reception are in the same place, add “Dinner and dancing (or whatever your plan may be!) to follow”; if not, it’s good to include a separate card with the details and directions of the reception venue.

• Engagement Party Invitations (2-3 months before a formal party; 6-8 weeks before a casual one) need date, time, and location, and dress code if one exists.

• Shower invitations should include date, time, location, theme, and/or registry.

• Rehearsal dinner invitations can be included with the wedding invitations if you like, with all the usual information, the name of the hosting family, and a request for an RSVP. (Reminder: RSVP already includes the word “please.”)

Photo by Nato Tuke. Planning by Gina Maloney Events.

Remember to check with your post office and find out exactly how much postage each invitation packet will need, and request hand cancellation on these.

Remember to check with your post office and find out exactly how much postage each invitation packet will need.

for the wedding

• Programs

• Place cards

• Menu cards

afterwards

• Thank-you cards. (Pro tip: Take notes as you open gifts (if you’re opening them at the reception, get some help from a wedding party member), so you’re not stuck trying to remember who sent the blender and who sent the drinkware.