Destination Save the Dates in View Master Reels

View Master Reel Finder Invitation Wedding Tropical Watercolor Pineapple Palms

I am so excited to finally share the newest type of wedding invitation Pigment & Parchment offers! 

I created a Save the Date reel for Team Wanderlust's display at Freshbash and could not have been more in love with how they turned out. 

I even won an award for Best Travel Detail in all of Freshbash 2016!*

*cue nerding out, hardcore. 

calligraphy hand lettering freshbash team wanderlust green

The inspiration behind our team's styled wedding installation was an adventurous travel loving couple having their tropical destination wedding in Thailand! 

Luckily, our team's event designer (Wild Heart Events) had just styled an engagement shoot for Mollie Crutcher Photography. Her photographs worked perfectly as the backgrounds I laid my calligraphy & brush lettering artwork over. 

I had so much fun picking which photos to use & coming up with the wording for the Save the Dates to really tell our wanderlust engaged couple's love story.

View Master Reel Finder Wedding Invitation Save the Date Stationery Watercolor Calligraphy

I'm a big advocate for wedding stationery wording that reflects each couple & how they live their real lives. 

If you're fancy at heart, then of course let's get fancy! But, if you're romantic, witty, vintage loving, quirky, minimalist, etc. your wedding invitation wording can encompass your personality too!

There's nothing wrong with traditional wording. I just encourage couples to do what suits them best without judgement. The etiquette rules people are told they HAVE to follow are absolutely optional.

You do you, boo.

That's my wedding stationery wording advice. 

And without further ado... The slides that went into the Save the Date reels!

I wish I could mail each of you one to fully experience seeing them through the view finder but this is almost as good.

Enjoy!

Wanderlust Bride Brush Lettering Beach Wedding Travel Destination

 

Travel Inspired Wedding Engagement Shoot Palms Wanderlust Tropical

 

Beach Bike Calligraphy Engagement Save the Date Destination Wedding

 

Destination Wedding Calligraphy Engagement Photos View Finder Reels Stationery

 

Calligraphy Destination Wedding View Finder Save the Date Reel Tropical Beach

 

Travel Wedding Save the Date Reel View Finder Calligraphy Wanderlust Beach

 

Save the Date Calligraphy Watercolor Tropical Palms Wanderlust Travel Thailand Greenery

 

Ephemera Obsession

Watercolor Calligraphy Invitation Wedding Berry Fern Purple Pigment & Parchment

Here's a suite I'm sending off to Utah for a styled shoot this week. First off, I have to say I am not a purple person. 

Of all the colors it has always been my least favorite. For some reason though, when I was looking at Amber Michelle Event's mood board for the photo shoot I was really drawn to the berries & their colors.

I just leaned into it, even though it's not my usual palette choice. I even had to run to Paper Source since I didn't have anything in purple in my studio! I had snippets of every other color but no violet hues. 

I am so happy I went against my own grain this time. The abstract watercolor berries in blue violet & red violet swirling together is my favorite part of the stationery suite. Well, that and the stamps...

The love affair I have with paper ephemera started when I was young. I used to hoard packaging, labels, stationery from traveling and my prized collection of Audrey Hepburn, Lucille Ball & Judy Garland stamps.

Watercolor Calligraphy Invitation Wedding Berry Fern Purple Pigment & Parchment

Watercolor Calligraphy Invitation Wedding Berry Fern Purple Pigment & Parchment

Watercolor Calligraphy Invitation Wedding Berry Fern Purple Pigment & Parchment

Fast forward to preparing my own wedding invitations in 2013 & I became obsessed with vintage stamps overnight. Once I realized I could find old stamps online that were still usable to mail my own invites it was game on.

It was just a bonus that it wouldn't cost too much more than the standard stamps at the post office. Some even cost less than their face value if you search long enough! The main thing you have to do is make sure to search for 'unused' stamps. They can't have any markings on them for the post office to still accept them. 

Also, a good rule of thumb for mailing wedding invitations is to go into the post office and have them weigh one.

They'll let you know exactly how much postage is necessary for the weight. I normally even pad it to  just to be safe. No one wants returned invitations, plus you can never have enough mini art pieces decorating your envelope!

The way I see it, you pour all this energy into making beautiful invitations with all the bells & whistles so why not apply the same attention to detail with art on the outside of the envelope too! 

*I speak from a place of stationery art-loving nerd. If paper isn't your way of showing your love & style, don't spend money on it. Don't spend money on any aspects of your wedding if you don't really care about it. Celebrate your love in whatever ways that are most meaningful to you both. No wedding industrial complex pressuring here... Ew. 

Watercolor Calligraphy Invitation Wedding Berry Fern Purple Pigment & Parchment

However, if you're wanting to use vintage stamps to just make envelopes look pretty for styled photos- save a bunch & buy used stamps! I love the look of the postal markings!
You can really dive into depths of Etsy & Ebay if you want to find specifically themed stamps. Ebay has better deals, but you'll have to do more sifting. Examples of themed stamps I've purchased are: dinosaur, geode, fruit, films, travel posters, cacti, musicians, lighthouses, berries like the ones you see here, & the list goes on & on. 

Stamp lots are perfect if you're wanting to save some money & are okay getting whatever you get from all over the world. What I do now though is get lots of 500 used stamps from Stamps for Crafts. When they arrive, I turn on some Netflix and start sorting through them by color. Once they're all separated out in about 20 piles, I store them in little envelopes with their color name on front. 

Then when I'm ready to pretty up an envelope, I just grab the envelope with the color I'm looking for & my stationery suite is complete within a minute or two!

For the most part, I have to use double sided tape on really old stamps since their glue isn't in the best condition anymore. 

I hope this was helpful if you've been eyeing vintage stamps but don't know where to start! 

Watercolor Calligraphy Invitation Wedding Berry Fern Purple Pigment & Parchment

Ranch / Glamour

I live for juxtaposition. It's where the spark of something new & interesting generally occurs in art. Generally when you think of a rustic ranch, glamour is the last thing that comes to mind. 

So when Mitra of Be Wed told me her words for the mood of the shoot were 'Ranch' & 'Glamour' I fell in love. She showed me her color palette of magenta, gold and Pantone's Color of the Year marsala and just said GO. A special kind of magic happens when someone gives you just a taste of art direction & then says run free like wild horses. My best work is always created this way. 

It requires a lot of trust from clients & wedding planners to work this way- so Mitra gets mad props for giving me that space to create what my dreams are made of.

Love Flowers Watercolor Calligraphy Vines Greenery Pink GoldWedding Vows Backdrop Watercolor Calligraphy Scroll Chair Backs

Watercolor Gold Foil Wedding Menu Place Cards Magenta Calligraphy
Menu Watercolor Calligraphy Wedding Vines Pink Gold Place Setting Table
Table Number Watercolor Calligraphy Pink Gold Hand Made
Wedding Watercolor Calligraphy Suite Invitations Map Vines Magenta Pigment & Parchment Vintage Stamps Gold Wax Seal Velvet Ribbon
Gold Wedding Cake Square Sign Topper Lettering Calligraphy
Escort Card Calligraphy Vines Watercolor Pink Feathers Sequins Rose Gold Ampersand SF Flowers
Escort Cards Place Calligraphy Leaf Illustrations Gold Pink Modern Magenta
Bar Signage Sign Menu Gold Marsala Calligraphy Watercolor
Bar Sign Menu Wedding Calligraphy Gold Pink Marsala Vines Greenery Signage
Wedding Vow Calligraphy Scroll Watercolor Backdrop Chair Backs Romantic

This shoot was a day full of fun. Mitra popped the Champagne when we finished and Jolene of Batter Up Cakery let us dig into her delicious gold marshmallow cake! It's tough being a wedding vendor sometimes.

Botanica supplied the gorgeous vintage rentals. Gold utensils- say what!?! The Linen Bar brought the bling & rounded off our shoot with her glamorous metallic linens. Ampersand delighted us all with the garland & blooms they sent from San Francisco! This was all shot on location at the beautiful Lawley Ranch in Woodland, California (near UC Davis). Vendors came from all over the Bay Area & Sacramento.

All these beautiful photos lovingly taken by Lanny Nguyen Photography. For more photos and words about Mitra's inspiration click the button below!