As weddings and small gatherings start to creep back in to people’s calendars, or once upon a time you sent out a Save the Date, and everything paused since you may find it’s time to tackle your wedding invitations! Not something you know much about? No worries! Why should you? You’ll probably only be expected to do this once or twice in your life. I’ve got you. In this post, I am going to start to break down the many parts to a wedding invitation suite. Some are optional, all are pretty flexible. That way when it comes time to make decisions, you will have some clarity on what’s what. Often the parts of the wedding suite that you choose go hand in hand with sculpting the feel, the style, and the amount you wish to invest in to your beautiful paper goods.
Wedding Suite Components 101
Photo by Jessa Schifilliti
The Invite Card - Gotta have this one.
The Invite Card in your wedding invitation suite is the main event, for both your calligrapher and for your intended guests. Filled with all the important information necessary for the big day, the invite card is the one you’re probably most familiar with. It’s the one you see in the movies when Katherine Hiegel’s ex is getting married.
You tell your guests who is getting hitched, when, and where they’re getting hitched. And you’re letting them know that they’re invited to the celebration! It’s the Who, What, When, and Where for the big day.
This card generally includes who is throwing the affair (whether it’s the parents, the kids, or everyone.) Some possible ways to word this part:
“Please join us to celebrate” - aka we don’t reeeally need to go in to details about who is the “host” of this wedding. We all put our money in in various ways, and that really isn’t very important to anyone or anyone’s parents, so let’s just keep it simple.
“Together with their families” - aka, our families are into this wedding! We are all helping to pay for this day and host the wedding, and we’re one big happy family who is welcoming you to the wedding.
“Mr. and Mrs. Stan Smith invite you to join in the celebration of their son/daughter” - aka parents of the bride/groom are the hosts of this wedding. And likely took on the lion's share of the cost.
“Mr. Stan Smith and Ms. Sara Williams and Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Kelly invite you to celebrate the marriage between their children” - aka both of our parents pretty much split this, and we want to give them their big shout out to thank them by name!
You also want to give the date and time of the wedding, and the venue for the ceremony, if it differs from the reception and cocktail hour. (You can include the reception info on another card or on your wedding website if you don’t do it on the main invite card.) I always advise including a “general” address for the venue as well. I say ‘general’ since (in my opinion) I don’t like a ton of numerals busying up the main card, and because let’s face it: nowadays, people can look it up. But it’s usually a good idea to call out the street name, city, and state so that they can confirm the venue they found is indeed the correct one for the wedding. (You’d be surprised how many venues across the country and world have the same or similar names!) If the venue is somewhere really specific or has a fun name that will give your guests a very specific place on a map, you may not need to add much else. Use your best judgment!
If you have a reception in a different location than the ceremony, some people like to include that detail on the card as well, something like “Reception to follow” at the bottom.
Any particular dress code for the wedding? You could add this as well.