The class lasted about 2 ½ hours and was led by Chiara Perano, founder of Lamplighter London. Through class demos and one to one assistance, she guided us through the basics of modern calligraphy, from ink flow and pen pressure, to mark making and shapes, and learning the modern alphabet. We also received a beautiful personalised modern calligraphy kit including inks, nib, paper and other stationery treats to practice with at home. Classes currently cost £80 and include the most delicious two course lunch at the Town Hall Hotel in Bethnal Green.
Their workshops tend to sell out as quickly as tickets to Beyoncé, so if you're keen, sign up to their newsletter and you’ll be notified as soon as new workshop dates are released. Alternatively, if you’d prefer to learn calligraphy in the comfort of your own home, they’ve just released a new book called ‘
Nib & Ink’ which you can buy online through
Amazon.
Problems Ahead
My initial plan was to hone my calligraphy skills over the Christmas break then with the help of one of my bridesmaids, make all 80 invitations within the space of a few weeks. I wanted to make the website and invitations at the same time so I could include the URL in the invite, but once we’d been on the workshop and realised it would take much longer than a few weeks to become a calligraphy ninja, I had to change tack. By Christmas, guests were already enquiring about flights and wary that prices would increase, I decided to focus on the website and send the invitations a month or so later.
Creating a wedding website
Anyone planning a destination wedding will know that there’s a lot of information that guests need to know before they can make their decision. Communicating this information through a website rather than sending multiple information sheets with your invitations not only saves you money, but means you can update information as and when it becomes available. With most guests booking flights and accommodation online, it’s much easier for them to search from your website with all the links there.
There are lots of websites you can use to make your own wedding website and you don’t need to be computer literate to do it. Most offer ready-made templates and have lots of funky features including RSVP forms, gift-lists and photo sharing (you can even create your own app with some) - the most difficult part is deciding what to write! I decided to go through
WIX, mainly because it was free and I found it the easiest platform to use. It also allowed us to duplicate the finished website which we could then translate into Italian (really useful if you’re a bilingual couple). For £60 we could've had our own domain name but we didn’t think it was necessary (and I much preferred to spend the money on shoes)..! Here’s the final result:
Timeline tips: If you plan on making a website, my advice would be to wait until you’ve confirmed accommodation options and flights are up online, just to avoid sending your guests multiple emails which could easily be ignored. The website took a couple of days to make over the Christmas break and we emailed the link to our guests in early January (nine months before the wedding).
Why we decided not to send invitations
Without being prompted to do so, guests immediately started RSVPing and requesting accommodation at the venue - and the more people did it, the more I began to question the relevance of invitations.
Everyone already knew the date and other key details, so what was the point of sending the same information again? Was it really worth spending hundreds of pounds for the sake of having a momento that would inevitably sit on a mantelpiece before ending up in a bin several months later? Absolutely not. The amount we’ve saved through making a wedding website and forgoing invitations and their associated postage costs is the equivalent to what we’ve paid for a live band during our cocktail hour, and in my opinion, it’s a no brainer. Would I look back in several years time and regret not sending invitations? Unlikely. Would I miss not having live music while supping on Aperol Spritz and circulating the crowds? Almost definitely!
Once we made the decision to forgo invitations, we set up an RSVP form via
Cognito Forms and embedded it into
our website (sounds tricky but it’s super easy). Similar to the website, we popped our questions into a data sheet (number of nights, accommodation preference, song choice, allergies), and I have to say it was such a success. We asked guests to reply within six weeks of sending the website link, then a week before the deadline we sent an email reminder to those who hadn’t yet responded (only 13 people out of 94!) and although my brother still hasn’t submitted his RSVP (hint if you’re reading!), we had hardly any chasing to do. Although I had no cute RSVP cards to look forward to in the post, receiving notifications with everyone’s song choices was even more fun so I really recommend it to everyone, destination wedding or not!
Other areas for creativity
Whenever I read real wedding blogs or go on Pinterest and see the most exquisite invitation suites, it kills me a little, but then I remember there are plenty other snap worthy stationery projects to get involved in, notably the order of service, place names, menus and the seating charts.
Stationery Inspiration