DIY Wedding Invitations: What's Available in Canada

Time VS Money: Are DIY Invitations Right for You?

How much is too much to pay for wedding invitations? That's a tough question! Every couple has different priorities when it comes to their wedding budget. In our current economy, most people are willing to sacrifice a few frills in order to save money – but cutting costs doesn't necessarily have to mean cutting corners. If you're soon-to-be-wed and willing to spend a little more of your time to save some of your cash, then DIY wedding invitations could be the right option for you.

The Good News

The good news is that the market is catching-up to the prevailing do-it-yourself trend. There are a lot of great options out there, so if you're feeling a little crafty, you will probably not have to compromise at all. You 're just trading a bit of time and personal work, but not quality.

The Envelopments Line, giving you a good idea of "legitimate-looking" DIY wedding invites can be these days ...

Our 2011 do-it-yourself-wedding-stationary Market Guide

The following guide gives you the low-down on the different style and assembly options out there for DIY wedding invitations. We've also done the legwork for you and picked out selections from some of the top DIY wedding invitation retailers online and in Canada.

DIY Styles: Some Assembly Required

DIY Wedding invitations may come with one or a combination of the following assembly requirements.

• Printing the invitations and/or envelopes. Some DIY kits come with MS Word Templates on CDs, so you can fill in your wedding specs and then print the invitations and/or envelopes yourself. If you're printing on cardstock, be sure to use a laser printer with a through/flat feed. If you're printing on paper, an inkjet printer will do.
• Folding and assembling the invitations. Whether you fold them, attach layers of vellum or both, certain DIY invitation kits require that you assemble the invites yourself.
• Attaching and tying ribbons. If your DIY invitations include ribbons, raffia, or some other embellishment which requires tying, they will most likely arrive unattached to the invitations.

The Big "Name Brands"

DIY and "name brand" may sound like a contradiction, but it works! The following two companies are very successful in providing "elegant blanks" which you can then turn into exactly what you had in mind..

Wilton's Print-your-own-Invitation Kits

Classic styling, with some variety (details: read the full feature) . Quick, painless, can't possibly mess it up :-) Distributed by The Thank You Company (excellent Canadian eShop)

Envelopments' mix-and-match DIY sets

This one photo doesn't even begin to do them justice. The number of possible combinations of layouts, paper, colours, patterns is ... crazy.. check them out: full feature

Option #1: Shop from Home: Canadian Online Shops

• Thank You Company

  

  The Thank You Company carries the Wilton line of wedding invitation kits, including this print-your-own design, "Happy Day." For $30, you receive a set of 25 blank invitations and envelopes, 25 reply cards and envelopes, 25 pre-tied bows with adhesive, and 25 patterned vellum invitation pockets. A lot more options, too many to list here.. try their website

• The Wedding Invitation Supplies eShop

  

  This is as close as it gets to a stationary superstore.. all kinds of envelopes, cardstock & embellishments, in different colours and textures. Canadian-based, quick service, including phone support.

• Milestone Moments | Envelopments® DIY eShop

  Pretty much exactly as above, only its perfect compliment, focusing exclussively on the every-popular Envelopments® line (which is not available at Wed. Inv. Supplies shop, above). So between these two (and Paper Garden, below) you are mostly covered for bulk paper & stationary.

  Milestone actually offers the "in-between" service: they will professionally producse the different pieces for you and then ship them to you "bulk", so you can do your own assembly and save money..

• MDC Designs

  

  DIY meets eco-chic with these pocket folder wedding invitations, one of the unique DIY items from MDC Designs. These mulberry folders are made from sustainable cardstock and come with recycled PCW paper. . You get to select your own colour and closure style, from satin ribbon to your own personalized seals. Pricing for mulberry pocket kits begin at $30.75 and include 10 pocket folders, 10 reply envelopes, 10 invitation envelopes, 11 invitation panels and 6 RSVP panels.

• Paper Garden

  

  We featured Paper Garden in a previous article on DIY Wedding invitations and were impressed with their wide selection of 80+ different colours of metallic paper with matching envelopes. They also offer a comprehensive guide on how to choose a design and budget for your invitations. For 2011 they have..

  .. added Pocket Folders, Adhesives and Ribbons to our offerings and will be adding more similar items this month. Both the matte and metallic Pocket Folders and matching envelopes have been very popular and we're happy to be introducing Patterned Metallic Pocket Folders, cardstock and papers. There seems to be a high demand for these as they offer a very high-end look for brides wishing to DIY

• Digital Templates

  PrintVites™ & Uniquity Design
  

  This is the high-tech solution! Well, hardly.. :-) Print your own invitations, at home, based on a semi-custom digital template someone desgned for you. So it combines customisation and personalisation with affordability and style too.. All you need is a decent printer - or you can go to Fedex/Kinko's!

  actually, we ran a short feature on Printvites, last year, but Uniquity is extrmely similar.. Check out both of them, see which one suits your style most. The thumbnails above are Printvites, the photo below is Uniquity

  

  Uniquity Design, digital templates..

• Botanical Paperworks

  

  Like Paper Garden, Botanical PaperWorks is Winnipeg retailer that specializes in paper – but with a twist. As mentioned in a previous profile we did on the company's plantable seed-paper wedding invitations, they carry an entire line of plantable paper embedded with wildflower seeds, so your guests can actually plant their invitations after the wedding and watch your love bloom!

These are not your only options either. Just a reasonably comprehensive list to get you started. You can find the complete list in our directory, under wedding invitations in Canada (where else? :-) )

Option #2: Hit the Pavement! Local Suppliers

If you 'd rather see, touch, feel & smell the invitations, sit down with your vendor, ask questions, explore options etc, you will probably prefer to find a good store in your own city. There a quite a few, usually at least one in most major metropolitan areas. Here is a short regional list to get you started.

For the complete list for each city, click the city name
- we 've linked it straight to the local directory.

• Montréal
  • Over the Top Events & Design

    

    Montréal's Over the Top carry both Envelopments, as well as other DIY (and of course custom design) They actually provide full hands-on tips and tools to assist you in making your invitations.

• Greater Toronto & South/West Ontario
  • Milestone Moments

    

    East York's Milestone Moments carries a wide selection of card stocks, papers, envelopes, ribbons, and other embellishments for you to create your own invitations. With so many different types of stationary to choose from, Milestone Moments offers an Envelopments® Mini Swatch Deck for $20.00, which features all of the paper colours and patterns they carry.

  • Little Details (Waterloo)

    

    They specialise in the Envelopments line also: Their DIY service will either allow the clients to buy all the envleopments components and create their own invitations, or they can actually work with you to design, print and trim the materials and then deliver the pieces to you for self-assembly. Cool..

• Vancouver
  • Inspirasian Creations

    

    Vancouver's own, Inspirasian Creations offers beautiful and affordable papers and envelopes made of recycled cotton and embedded with tiny, dried flowers. The "Petals Collection" DIY kit includes 50 Handmade Invitation sheets, 50 Vellum Overlay sheets, and 50 matching envelopes, at around $35 per kit.

  • Paper Artistry & Forever True Wedding Design

    Mentioned together because in both cases their DIY component is the ever-popular (and ever growing!) Envelopments mix-and-match line..

• Calgary
  • Papers in Harmony

    

    Calgary company, Papers in Harmony offers DIY invitation kits in fresh, modern designs; like the "Summer" featured above. Each kit is sold for $65.50, and contains 25 printable cards, sky blue backing cards, and white outer/mailing envelopes.

  • The Social Page

    

    One of Calgary's most established stationary shops, The Social Page carries just about everything, including paper, envelopes etc but they definitely carry the full Envelopments line as well

• Winnipeg
  • Karta House

    

    If you're really creative and only looking to purchase base materials to start with, Winnipeg-based design studio, arta House sells these 5 1/2" x 5 1/2" folded square pocket folders in Chocolate, Black, White, Cream for $9.90 per pack of ten. They also carry these pockets in Metallic Quartz (White), Metallic Silver, for $13.50 per pack of ten.

  • Enchanted Moments

    

    Brandon's Enchanted Moments is great: they offer both custom DIY invitation kits (they will pre-make the components for you) as well as the full line of Envelopments mix-and-match products. Check out the minature wedding invitation above.. cute! (but why?? lol)

Stil not enough options for you?

(sigh!...) Well, as we said, the complete list of everything-wedding-in-Canada is in our directory, but here are a couple of tricks:

The Smart Search trick

Search for "DIY wedding invitations" or "Do-it-yourself wedding invitations" PLUS your city name, on the search page. For example,

• DIY wedding invitations in Toronto, or
• Do it yourself wedding invitations in Vancouver, or
• Do it yourself wedding invitations in Calgary, or
• DIY wedding invitations in Montreal etc etc

and scroll down (it will show you articles first..) to the directory listings.
This search may manage to dig up some more suppliers you've missed so far..

The Lazy, let-them-do-all-the-work method

My personal favourite!

• Go to WeddingRequest.com,
• do a quickie registration (if you do not already have an account) and
• make a request for invitations.
• Pick the widest allowable area and
• make sure you type a small comment with your request saying "I am looking for do-it-yourself supplies & kits" - or whatever.
• The clever website will email every single invitation supplier in the area and forward them your request. Only those who actually carry DIY inventory will bother to reply to you - so you will now have pre-screened everyone for zero effort..

Have Fun!.. send us a photo of your invites when you 're done :-)