We were excited to spot Sara and Ryan’s wedding featured in the Weddings section within the Washingtonian! The couple married at the Dumbarton House in Georgetown. We printed their letterpress invitations in Navy and Gold Matte foil as an accent color. The belly-band, envelope liner, and details card insert all printed on Light Gray paper added another color to this set without having to add another ink. This subtle color palette mimicked the sweet setting of their wedding with pops of blue throughout. Be sure to head on over to Washingtonian to see even more pictures from their big day!
We were thrilled to have had the opportunity to create Michelle and Neema’s maple foil invitations thanks to the help of our friends at the Dandelion Patch. We were even more excited to see their wedding come to life through the eyes of their photographer Katie Stoops. The couple was married at Union Market’s Dock 5 which they transformed into a space filled with gorgeous greenery, Persian rugs, and all their loved ones surrounding them. Michelle and Neema wanted their special day to be reminiscent of a dinner party on a much grander scale so they created a warm, intimate overall environment for their guests to experience. Their invitations reflected the color palette of their day with burgundies and blushes represented in the florals on the envelope liner and invitation backer. After attending 21 weddings with Neema by her side, we’ll let Michelle share more about the most special wedding of them all, her own:
What was the inspiration for the wedding?
We host dinner parties for friends at our home in DC all the time, and our goal was to create an (obviously much more elaborate) version of that. We wanted it to feel warm and personal, centered around delicious food paired with good wine and conversation. For example, we picked menu items that we like to cook at home (crab and avocado salad; duck breast with port wine sauce; vegetable wellington); we created versions of the dishes at home and tasted various wines alongside them to choose pairings for dinner; and we used our guests’ nicknames on the menus to serve as place cards. Hosting the wedding at Union Market, DC’s favorite food market was the perfect anchor for it all.
What surprised you the most and what was your favorite moment?
My answer to these two questions is the same – the ceremony! I was mostly looking forward to the dinner and dancing part of the evening and didn’t really expect how meaningful the ceremony would feel. Our officiant (a good friend) wrote a beautiful tribute to our relationship filled with insights from our family and friends; our mothers and my sister participated in a traditional Persian sugar ceremony (happily married female relatives grind sugar cubes over the couple to ‘sweeten’ the marriage) to honor Neema’s heritage; and instead of feeling self-conscious and overwhelmed as I expected, I felt so in tune and in love with Neema as we said our vows. The dinner and dancing parts of the evening were obviously amazing too, but I have to say the ceremony was my favorite part!
Advice to future couple’s planning their own wedding?
It’s easy to say “try to relax and have fun with it!” but the reality is, there will always be moments of stress, conflict, and indecision. Our best concrete advice is to sit down at the very beginning with your partner and make a list of which wedding elements are most important to each of you, and which elements you care less about. That way, down the road when it’s time to make decisions, compromise will be easier because you’ll have established priorities from the start. For example, I wanted a band but Neema felt very strongly from the beginning about having a DJ, so I compromised on that; I felt strongly about having a small bridal party (only our siblings) so Neema gave his group of five best friends the role of ushers.
How did you choose your invitation design and ink colors?
I was initially hesitant about sending paper invitations for environmental reasons, but after some urging from my more traditional mother, I did some research on printing options and learned about Bella Figura’s green printing commitments, which made me feel much better about the whole process. We visited The Dandelion Patch in Virginia who helped us create a gorgeous fall floral suite, again finding a compromise – I adore big splashy florals, but Neema preferred something more streamlined, so we designed a simple maple shine foil invitation card with Bella Figura’s amazing floral print on the back and on the envelope liner. The beautiful purples, burgundies, and blushes of this print matched perfectly with our décor colors. The wording on the invitation was very important to me as well – we avoided the standard language and crafted a message carefully to reflect the kind of evening we were planning and how much we appreciate our guests.
What’s next for the happy couple?
After our wedding, we took a couple months to enjoy some downtime before traveling to Sri Lanka and the Maldives for our honeymoon over the holidays. We can’t recommend this break between wedding and honeymoon enough – the comedown after a wedding is very real, and the delayed honeymoon gave us something additional to look forward to while allowing us to rest and recuperate in between.
With the help of our friends at The Dandelion Patch, Courtney and Garet used a pastel palette to personalize our Maeve design for their New Orleans wedding. They added a blind debossed border to the invitation and a coordinating envelope liner to tie in the rose quartz letterpress ink used to highlight their names.
letterpress inks: charcoal + rose quartz + blind deboss (no ink) | fonts: didot + sans capitals + riviera | paper: bella smooth cotton white 1-ply | foil edging: gold matte | envelope: bella cotton white | liner: classic color pattern in rose quartz | The Dandelion Patch | customization #37163
With the help of our friends at the Dandelion Patch, Patty and Roman customized our Elodie design for their duel ceremony wedding celebration. They chose a palette of yolk and pewter letterpress inks for their save the date, invitation and reply card and coordinated their envelope liner for another punch of color. These simple typography wedding invitations gave them plenty of room to add both ceremony dates and venues and allowed for a sweet personalization – the couple’s letterpressed fingerprints in the shape of a heart.
The Ritz-Carlton in Naples, Florida was the backdrop for Kathryn and Murat’s beach side October wedding. They chose our Joie de Vivre design and customized with bold fonts, a dramatic color palette and a foil stamped pocketfold that boasted their duogram and wedding date. Thanks to our friends at The Dandelion Patch for working with us on these stunning blue and gold wedding invitations.
Gretchen and George sent these custom Fanfare letterpress wedding announcements, personalizing with the state flags of Virginia and Texas. They included a moving card that paid homage to their new home in Texas and added a striped liner to accent the set.
letterpress inks: prussian blue + wine | digital printing: cmyk | fonts: pike + carly + irene | paper: bella smooth cotton white 1-ply | edge painting: wine | envelope: bella cotton white | envelope liner: dune pattern in prussian blue | The Dandelion Patch | customization #29485
Jessica and John created these custom rose gold wedding invitations with fonts and motifs from our library. They personalized their design by adding a custom duogram and a vintage map envelope liner.
letterpress ink: charcoal | foil stamping: rose gold shine | fonts: engravers + botany + aiden + impression + keeva | paper: bella cotton white 2-ply + 1-ply | envelope: bella cotton white | envelope liner: vintage washington d.c. pattern in charcoal | The Dandelion Patch | customization #26371
