My Wedding (Part 2) DIY Pocketfold Invites-with free templates!

Welcome to the second part of a series of posts focusing on my wedding, with ideas, tips, inspiration and downloadable resources. Today is all about invitations.

After looking around for wedding invites online, I found some lovely looking designs. I got lots of inspiration from Pinterest and Etsy. Pure Invitation is one of the sites I looked at as it lets you design your own invites exactly how you want them and then they make them up and ship them out to you, so it's a great option if you're pushed for time but still want a unique design. In the end we decided that due to our limited budget it would be better for us to make the invitations ourselves. So, inspired by the Pocketfold design I saw here, I decided to make my own template. 

I drew out a rough plan on card and experimented until I got the measurements that worked best. Then I got Matt to make a template in Publisher with the correct measurements and he printed it out onto A3 blue card. Next I designed all the inserts using Publisher and Photoshop and printed these out onto A4 pearlised paper. I invited over my sisters and friends and we spent an afternoon guillotining, cutting, sticking, folding and stamping until we had finished them all. It was really fun, actually!

Materials

• Pick 'n' Mix Box of 80 sheets A3 card 240gsm in 'Ocean Blue' from Paper Mill Direct-£13.99 (1 sheet per 2 pocketfold invites/1 sheet per 6 mounted invites).
• A4 Pearlised Paper 120gsm in 'Ivory' from Paper Mill Direct, 100 sheets-£12.30 (1 sheet per 2 invites)
• Luxury Pearlised C7 Envelopes in 'Ivory', pack of 100 from Paper Mill Direct -£9.00 (1 per invite)
• Pearlescent Envelopes 130mm Square in 'Oyster White', pack of 50 from Ideal Envelopes -£7.70 (1 per invite)
• Microsoft Publisher
• Guillotine
• Pencil
• Scissors
• Ruler
• Craft knife and something to lean on
• Double sided sticky tape (2.5mm and 5mm wide).
• Peacock feather rubber stamp from Victoria Frost on Etsy-£4.01
• ColorBox Pigment Inkpad Gold from JewelryMakingSupply on Etsy-£3.33
• 5mm Gold ribbon (approx 60cm per invite)
• Custom self-inking return address stamp from MyClearStamps on Etsy (unnecessary but will save a lot of time!)

Free Downloadable Templates

• Pocketfold Invite Template-for printing on A3 card (2 per sheet)
• Mounted Invite Template-for printing on A3 card (6 per sheet)
• RSVP Card Template-for printing on A3 card (9 per sheet)
• Ceremony Invite Insert-for printing on A4 pearlised paper (2 per sheet)
• Evening Invite Insert-for printing on A4 pearlised paper (2 per sheet)
• RSVP Card Insert-for printing on A4 pearlised paper (8 per sheet)

Method

1) Edit the templates above with your own names, design etc. and print off onto your chosen materials.

2) Cut out all the ceremony invite and evening invite inserts using a guillotine, as neatly as possible.

3) Cut out all the pocketfold invites with a guillotine/scissors along the red lines as shown below:

4) Score with scissors/a craft knife and then FOLD along the red lines as shown below:

5) Place double-sided tape as shown on the red lines below:

6) Stick the ceremony insert in place on the first square and fold over the pocket with the tape onto the second square. Press tightly to make sure they will hold.

7) Add stamps to decorate the invite wherever you like and leave to dry.

8) Cut out the RSVP cards and RSVP inserts. Stick the inserts onto the cards using double-sided tape.

9) Place the RSVP cards with the little envelopes so that they are inside the flap but not the envelope. Address the envelopes to yourself by hand or using a stamp to save time, then pop them into the pocket you have created.

10) Turn the invite over and place double-sided tape in a line as shown:

11) Cut out approximately 60cm of ribbon and stick along the line with equal amounts of ribbon each side, then turn it back over.

12) Fold it up and tie the ribbon together and voilà!

13) For the evening invites simply cut out the templates and inserts into squares and stick them on with a 5mm border.

14) Repeat for however many ceremony and evening guests you have, write on all the names and pop into the square envelopes (don't forget to include RSVP cards and envelopes with your evening invites). Address the envelopes by hand or using a pre-made stamp to make your life easier.     

All done! I hope you found this useful.