Right now cameras, photo paper and color printers are so widely available that printing your own wedding invitations from home is incredibly simple. If you don't have a good color printer, find someone who does and then use our great ideas and techniques to save money while creating your perfect wedding invitations.
If you don't feel that you have time to design your own wedding invitations, check out our range of free printable wedding invitations. Simply customize and add your personal details and then print them off. If, however, you're interested in crafting your own invitations, read on for some great ideas.
Find Inspiration
You can find inspiration for your wedding invitations everywhere. Open a magazine or look through a wallpaper catalogue and see how things are designed, particularly look for what colors and patterns are used. Then, try your local craft store, gift boutique, or furniture gallery for even more inspiration.
Craft stores will have tons of paper, embellishments and scrapbooking ideas you can use for your invitations. In gift boutiques, be sure to look at wrapping paper, which is usually very trendy in design and color. Furniture stores, too, have much to offer by way of inspiration for color, design, and texture.
Use Your Talents
If you're good at drawing by hand, try making illustrations for your wedding invitations. For my wedding, I illustrated my invitations by hand. After some practice, they turned out just perfect. Use simple designs that include traditional wedding motifs, such as heart, doves, cakes, or rings and be sure your design is simple enough that you can easily duplicate it.
Personalize It
With digital photography so easy to find and take advantage of, lots of brides are turning to photographs as a personalization tool for their wedding invitations. Take a camera with you on a date and snap photos of you and your fiancé, a beautiful landscape, or even just s a few flowers. Load the photos into your computer and you'll be amazed at what you can use.
If you don't enjoy taking pictures, you can always get someone else to do it for you. Either way, here are some ways to use pictures in your invitations:
Find your favourite picture of you and your fiancé and print it out multiple times in color or black and white. This works best if you use actual photo paper, which you can find at any good craft or stationery store. Use the picture on the inside or outside of the invitation or as an insert with a reminder of your wedding date on it. Embellish the picture with paper frames, glitter or ribbon to make it extra special.
Take that same picture of you and your fiancé and try running it through a photo program. Lots of free programs, such as paint.net, have different photo effects you can try. Shadow, oil painting, sketch and sepia tone effects can add plenty of interest to a basic photo.
Use those extra photos from your passport application. You can either print duplicates of fun passport photos and then attach them to your invites, or you can scan the originals onto a computer and print them onto your invitation paper.
If you don't have access to a really good printer, you can have someone else print your creations. Upload your photo to photobox.com or a similar site and order professional printed cards. They won't be as expensive as getting cards from a professional card maker, but they'll still be really nicely done. You can even embellish them later, too. Look Online
If you'd rather use an image besides one of the two of you, you can probably find one you love at a free image website. Some of these sites have actual photographs and others have free clipart, which has really improved in recent years. You can either print these images onto the invitations along with your text or print them onto separate pieces of paper and use them as embellishments on any area of your invitations.
DIY Printing
Once your invitations are laid out in your computer program, experiment with printing techniques. You'll want to try different sizes of paper, or you may want to try different types and colors of paper, as they all take ink differently. Once your layout fits and prints perfectly, you can print out all your invitations. When choosing paper, be sure to choose colors that are light enough to print on easily. If you want to mix darker colors in, you can always use them as cut-out frames or backgrounds on which to glue the lighter pages with the actual printing. Experiment with different combinations until your paper really suits your invitation style.
If you don't feel that you have time to design your own wedding invitations, check out our range of free printable wedding invitations. Simply customize and add your personal details and then print them off. If, however, you're interested in crafting your own invitations, read on for some great ideas.
Find Inspiration
You can find inspiration for your wedding invitations everywhere. Open a magazine or look through a wallpaper catalogue and see how things are designed, particularly look for what colors and patterns are used. Then, try your local craft store, gift boutique, or furniture gallery for even more inspiration.
Craft stores will have tons of paper, embellishments and scrapbooking ideas you can use for your invitations. In gift boutiques, be sure to look at wrapping paper, which is usually very trendy in design and color. Furniture stores, too, have much to offer by way of inspiration for color, design, and texture.
Use Your Talents
If you're good at drawing by hand, try making illustrations for your wedding invitations. For my wedding, I illustrated my invitations by hand. After some practice, they turned out just perfect. Use simple designs that include traditional wedding motifs, such as heart, doves, cakes, or rings and be sure your design is simple enough that you can easily duplicate it.
Personalize It
With digital photography so easy to find and take advantage of, lots of brides are turning to photographs as a personalization tool for their wedding invitations. Take a camera with you on a date and snap photos of you and your fiancé, a beautiful landscape, or even just s a few flowers. Load the photos into your computer and you'll be amazed at what you can use.
If you don't enjoy taking pictures, you can always get someone else to do it for you. Either way, here are some ways to use pictures in your invitations:
Find your favourite picture of you and your fiancé and print it out multiple times in color or black and white. This works best if you use actual photo paper, which you can find at any good craft or stationery store. Use the picture on the inside or outside of the invitation or as an insert with a reminder of your wedding date on it. Embellish the picture with paper frames, glitter or ribbon to make it extra special.
Take that same picture of you and your fiancé and try running it through a photo program. Lots of free programs, such as paint.net, have different photo effects you can try. Shadow, oil painting, sketch and sepia tone effects can add plenty of interest to a basic photo.
Use those extra photos from your passport application. You can either print duplicates of fun passport photos and then attach them to your invites, or you can scan the originals onto a computer and print them onto your invitation paper.
If you don't have access to a really good printer, you can have someone else print your creations. Upload your photo to photobox.com or a similar site and order professional printed cards. They won't be as expensive as getting cards from a professional card maker, but they'll still be really nicely done. You can even embellish them later, too. Look Online
If you'd rather use an image besides one of the two of you, you can probably find one you love at a free image website. Some of these sites have actual photographs and others have free clipart, which has really improved in recent years. You can either print these images onto the invitations along with your text or print them onto separate pieces of paper and use them as embellishments on any area of your invitations.
DIY Printing
Once your invitations are laid out in your computer program, experiment with printing techniques. You'll want to try different sizes of paper, or you may want to try different types and colors of paper, as they all take ink differently. Once your layout fits and prints perfectly, you can print out all your invitations. When choosing paper, be sure to choose colors that are light enough to print on easily. If you want to mix darker colors in, you can always use them as cut-out frames or backgrounds on which to glue the lighter pages with the actual printing. Experiment with different combinations until your paper really suits your invitation style.
About the Author
Nicola Ray is the editor of Wedding Invitation Ideas where you can design, create and make your own wedding invitations. With free wedding invitation templates, step-by-step instructions and lots of stunning designs, it's the perfect place to start. You can find more articles like this with plenty of tips on choosing the best card and paper for your invites.
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