Etiquette

When should I order my invitations?
Prior to ordering your invitations, all event details, including, date, time, and place must be finalized. Once you have all your event details you may begin looking at and ordering your invitations. Invitations are generally ordered between 2 and 9 months prior to the event. Keep in mind that you must give yourself time for the invitations to be printed and received by you, and subsequently you must have time to stuff, address and mail the invitations. You must also leave enough time prior to the event for guests to respond (and for some events, for a seating chart and place cards to be completed).

How many invitations should I order?
The first thing you must consider prior to calculating the number of invitations needed is how many guests you are inviting to your affair. Once you have made your guest list keep in mind that one invitation will be sufficient for each household. After you have determined the number of invitations you will be sending out, be sure to order an additional ten to twenty five for extra guests you may add later and in case of mistakes made when addressing your envelopes. It is much less costly to order extra invitations now than it is after your invitations are already printed.

How much text goes on my invitation?
Generally, ten to fourteen lines of text is recommended for invitations. Depending on the invitation, we can often accommodate additional lines of text, but such additions often incur an additional charge.

Does my invitation need to match the rest of my wedding?
While some people do want to have a specific color scheme to carry through their wedding and invitation, it is not necessary to do so. However, if your wedding is going to be a very formal affair, the invitations should be formal as well. This could mean using a more formal font or invitation itself. (The same holds true for an informal party).

There are so many fonts to choose from, how do I choose one?
It is recommended that the font used on your invitations matches the style of your affair. For more formal affairs, a formal script is often suggested. In addition, many people choose to use two different fonts to emphasize certain text. Whatever font you choose, be sure your guests will be able to read it easily!

How do I decide what ink color to use?
Ink color is all a matter of taste. That said, be sure the ink will be able to be seen on your invitation. Remember that different color inks show up differently on different color papers. Certain ink colors (black and charcoal) are more traditional than others (café au lait, teal).

How do I organize the invitation when I stuff the envelopes?
Typically the invitation is the anchor piece of your ensemble and thus the enclosure items should be placed on top of your flat invitation. All items should be facing your guests when they open the envelope. If your invitation includes an inner envelope, all items are placed in the inner envelope facing outward (so they can be seen when the inner envelope flap is opened). The inner envelope is then placed inside the outer envelope with the guests’ names facing them when they open the outer envelope.

When should I mail out my invitations?
Invitations should be sent out six to eight weeks prior to your event. To let guests know about your affair earlier, you may want to send out Save the Date cards. These can be sent out up to one year before your wedding. For destination weddings and those weddings including many out of town guests, Save the Date cards allow you to provide guests with hotel and travel information in a timely manner.

How do I address my invitations?
When addressing formal invitations, titles should always be used. When specific professional titles exist, they too should be used (for example, Dr. or Senator). The same holds true for clergy.
A married, divorced or widowed woman can be addressed as either Ms. or Mrs. However, a widowed woman named Jane Smith would be addressed as “Mrs. Jane Smith”; whereas she was “Mrs. John Smith” prior to the death of her husband.
*The possibilities are endless when considering the various titles used for addressing invitations. If you are unsure of how a certain couple should be addressed on the invitation, do not hesitate to contact us with your dilemma and we would be happy to help you ascertain the proper procedure to follow.

Do I address children with titles?
The general rule is that females under the age of eighteen (and unmarried) are Miss, while single females over the age of eighteen are either Miss or Ms. As for males, the proper title for those seven and under is Master; those over eighteen is Mister. For males in between the ages of seven and eighteen, no title is used.