Planning a wedding consists of many small details that are easy to overlook. Wedding invitation envelopes easily fall under this category. You can take a great deal of time trying to decide on the perfect invitations and then not give a second thought to the actual envelopes. The invitation envelopes are just as important. These will "carry" your invitations to their destined invitee, so you'll want them to be appealing to your recipients.
Envelopes can either cause someone to want to open the invitation right away or cause them to lay it to the side for later. Getting creative with the envelopes for wedding invitations will give your recipients just a glimpse of how fantastic your wedding will be. They'll surely want to open the invitation quickly and make attending your wedding a top priority.
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Get Ideas Online
Before choosing an envelope design, check out wedding invitation samples online to get ideas. The Web offers thousands of resources for wedding invitations and envelopes. Some sites even provide tools to create an invitation with wedding invitation templates. Even if you don't order directly from that particular site, you can get many ideas. If you plan to decorate the envelopes yourself, look for DIY wedding invitations and wedding craft websites to expand your options. Be sure to factor in the cost of buying craft supplies and compare this to having them printed. You can also opt for printed envelopes and then use other accessories to add your personal touch. Either way, make sure your creative wedding invitation envelopes fit into your overall budget.
Select Invitation Envelope Colors
The colors for your envelopes should match or complement your invitation colors. Both should go along with your wedding theme and colors if possible, but this isn't a rule that's set in stone. Ask your hubby-to-be to help pick out invitations and envelopes. This should be a special invitation from both of you to your friends and loved ones, so both should be involved.
For colors, keep it simple with one or two colors, nothing too bold or tacky. Elegance is the key word for most weddings, and the same should apply to the envelopes. The envelope can be a solid color with other decorations to complement the color. Or, choose a white envelope that's enhanced with colored edging.
Special Designs and Liner
Wedding invitation envelopes can be printed with special designs and have unique liner to reflect your wedding theme. Envelope designs can range from florals to wedding symbols to polka dots! The size and shape of the envelopes can vary as well, depending on the size of your invitations. Envelopes can be long and rectangular, a large or small square shape, or even odd shaped.
There can be plain white liner or a matching design/color. The liner is what the recipient will see when she opens the envelope (an inside design). The liner can be a fancy print or a simplistic foil lining in gold, pearl, silver or a wine color. The envelope paper material can be regular heavy paper, vellum or parchment. Parchment envelopes are probably the most popular due to this paper's fancy look and feel. The flap that seals the envelope can be plain-edged or have feathered edging. Avoid getting too much design work; keep it simple. Keep in mind that the more you personalize the envelopes with fancy prints, liner, etc., then the more they will cost.
Invitation Envelope Stamps
Stamps are great for personalization. Wedding invitation envelopes can be stamped with a personal message from the bride and groom, a lovely wedding symbol (rings, ribbons, cake, etc.) or even a photo of the bride and groom. You can take a digital photo and use the resources at the U.S.P.S. website to create a personalized photo stamp.
Where you stamp an image onto the envelope will depend on the size and shape of the image as well as the size of the envelope. If the stamp image is small, consider placing it near the name and address of the recipient on the front of the envelope. If using a large image, stamp it on the back center area of the envelope.
Addressing Wedding Invitation Envelopes
Use a specialty pen to handwrite the names and addresses on the envelopes. As the bride, address those envelopes that will be going to your family and friends. Have the groom do the same for his recipients. This helps personalize your envelopes even more and lets your recipients know that it's a personal invitation from you (or the groom) to them.
The ink should match or complement the colors on the envelopes and invitations. For example: If your invitation colors are red and gray, then use red or black ink. If you absolutely don't have time to write out the addresses yourself, consider using a fancy cursive font to print them from the computer. Or you can hire a calligrapher to write them out in fancy handwriting. The same goes if you and/or the groom don't have good handwriting!
The Formal Seal
Once you're ready to seal the invitation envelope, use a formal wedding seal (sticker) as a final touch. A seal can be personalized with the bride's and groom's initials, hearts, wedding rings, a flower or any symbol you want to use. The seal helps to create a sense of importance, indicating that only the intended recipient should view the invitation inside.
Postage for Invitation Envelopes
Before buying postage stamps for your envelopes, ask the clerk at the post office about specialized wedding stamps. You can likely get stamps that are wedding related or at least to match your wedding colors or theme. There's nothing worse than a beautifully decorated envelope with a tacky postage stamp!
Wedding invitation envelopes can be fun to decorate and they will finalize your invitation process. Once you mail them....it's official! So try to choose invitation envelopes that reflect your wedding theme and the personalities of both you and groom.
Ready to start your wedding planning? Don't go any further without checking out our comprehensive guide - Planning Your Dream Wedding: A Stress-Free Guide to Navigating the Process with Ease.
