All things wedding… it can be a bit of a minefield at times – and unless you hire a wedding planner, who tells you how to do all this stuff? Before I got married, I assumed a wedding invite was just like a party invite that you popped in the post, date, time and location – done. But with a wedding, there’s a bit more to it than that, and some of the details you do want to nail, because they can make life much easier for you in the lead up, and on the day.
So, this is how we did ours – it’s not how they have to be done, and you may wish to structure yours completely differently; but this can be used as a good guide to ensure you’ve captured everything you may need to.
We had three parts to our invitations. The main invitation card, an RSVP information card with menu details, and a print out sheet with all the ad hoc info included.
On our main invitation we had an illustration on the front of our chapel and the two of us; then on the back we had pretty calligraphy detailing the following:
Our names – our names followed on from the text “the pleasure of your company is requested at the marriage of”, dependant on who is paying for the wedding, you may want to re word this
The date of the wedding
Arrival time (we set this to half an hour before the service begins, the last thing you want is people running in right before you’re about to walk down the aisle)
The location and address
We then had a second identical card for our RSVP information. We are providing our guests with three different menu choices, and are asking for the choices to be made with the RSVP. Therefore on this card we included:
The RSVP date
Details of how and where to RSVP – some people may choose to use a card that needs to be posted back, although we opted not to do this and used an RSVP website to capture our information instead
The full menu
Dietary requirement instructions
We then created our own A4 information sheet with all the boring ad hoc information, that would have been too much to display on the main invitations. This included:
Arrival time – yes this was included on the main invitation, but I mentioned that we have asked guests to arrive 30 minutes before the ceremony begins. Now some guests may take this as the service start time, and therefore arrive maybe an hour before, very boring for your guests! So to make it crystal clear, we detailed on here that guests would need to be seated for a certain time (which was 15 minutes prior to the start of the service).
Service and reception details – Here we explained where the service and reception would both be held, and that transportation throughout the day wouldn’t be required, as both are within the same vicinity. If transport will be needed from your wedding service to your reception venue, you may want to let guests know this. We also explained access details and how to find the chapel.
RSVP’s – We also touched on RSVP’s again and explained that we would need responses by a certain date in order to provide personalised wedding stationery and menu choices.
Accommodation – Here we detailed information for if guests wanted to stay over at our venue, the price of the room, what that price included, and how to book.
Parking – We explained here that there is adequate parking on site, and that the car park is a very short distance from the chapel, and the wedding reception room is opposite the chapel – therefore anyone wearing heels didn’t need to worry. If your venue only allows cars to be left until a certain time the next day, you may also want to explain this.
Children – Ah the controversial one. Most wedding packages will include a headcount number, if we invited everyones children too, we would only be able to spend our day with about two thirds of our desired guest list. Therefore we opted for an adult only wedding, excluding children in our immediate family. It can be upsetting to some people though, and they may not understand your reasons why (ours wasn’t because we don’t like children, we do!) so we popped a note in stating “Whilst we love and adore your children, to allow us to spend the day with as many of you as we can, we have opted for an adult only wedding.” We also explained that although it was adults only, any feeding dependent babies were of course welcome – newborn babies won’t have an impact on your headcount, and although not a parent myself, I imagine if a baby depended on me for feeding, a whole day and evening away from them, may make life a little bit stressful.
Gifts – It’s also an idea to put a note around gifts on, so people understand. Wanting charity donations instead? Would you prefer people gifted money as oppose to physical items, if they wanted to gift? Chosen to go with a gift list? Don’t want gifts at all? You can add a note here to explain this, as you will more than likely get lots of questions about it if you don’t. If you’re struggling with ways to word things, there are lots of lovely little poem ideas available on Pinterest.
