Blog: handmade wedding
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Dan and Ali’s rustic seasonal and handcrafted November wedding

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Seasonal Highland inspired November wedding

Seasonal and handcrafted November wedding

It is lovely to be able to share such a beautiful seasonal wedding full of handmade details, and one that took place in November.  Photographed by Laura Babb, Dan and Ali’s November wedding was held at Folly Farm, a stunning green wedding venue set amongst 250 acres of woodland and nature reserve.  On hearing more about this handcrafted wedding I knew it was just the kind of wedding you would love to see.

Folly Farm eco wedding venue Bristol

Folly Farm rustic eco wedding venue

“When we found Folly Farm we knew it was the right spot. We completely lucked out with the weather on the day, it was hard to believe it was November – but as we fell for Folly Farm’s vantage point and woodland walks on a dreich February morning, we knew it would be beautiful no matter what.”

Seasonal autumn BHLDN wedding dress

Wool tie and autumn buttonhole

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Photobooth and brown luggage tag wedding invitations and how you can make your own

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photobooth and luggage tag wedding invitation

If you don’t want to do anything too complicated for your wedding invitations then this idea might be perfect for you, whilst still being fun and personal to you as a couple.  A photobooth style strip of pictures (with details on the back) and a brown luggage tag fastened together with string.

Making the photobooth style pictures

Both these items could be printed at home – there are lots of photo programmes that allow you to make collages like these (I like Photoscape which is free to download), so you could take some pictures and put them into a collage to create a photobooth style strip without having to leave home.  This would enable you to easily print details onto the back of the photos too.

Creating the luggage tags

Brown luggage tags come in all sizes so you could find the right size for you and simply stamp a message like they have done here onto the front.  If you wanted to include more details printed directly onto the luggage tag, then you can print onto recycled brown card (available from some of these businesses) then cut them out and trim the corners to make them appear like a luggage tag.

You can punch a hole and stick on the hole reinforcers (brown ones are available from Etsy if you search for ‘reinforcements’ under ‘All Items’) and they should look just like a ready bought luggage tag, but with all the details you want printed on – and no nightmare thoughts of how you put a luggage tag through your home printer!!

I love fonts, and am a regular visitor to Dafont in search of fun fonts.  I believe (this shows how much of a font geek I am) that the font used on the brown luggage tag in the pictures, is one called Artistamp Medium.  I love it and use it quite a lot, if you take a look at my Directory Showcase features it is used on my graphics.  You should be able to type the name into the Dafont search engine and download it for home use.

Alternatively, print your details onto paper and glue them onto the back of the luggage tags like they have done here.  You could also jazz up your invitations by using coloured raffia or stripey butcher twine instead of white string.

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Our wedding stationery inspired this reader to create her own handmade invitations

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brown craft wedding stationery

One of my lovely readers, Eulyn, got in touch to share her wedding invitations with me after being inspired by the wedding stationery we made for our wedding.  I can’t tell you how lovely it is to get emails and pictures like this, knowing that something you did inspired someone else – and a photo of another couples hard work.

handmade recycled brown card wedding invitations

If you’ve been inspired by the ‘save the dates’ or stationery that we created for our wedding, do send me an email – I’d love to hear from you and attach a couple of pictures so I can see (and maybe even share on the blog) what you’ve created – it would make my day.  It can get very lonely blogging away, sharing ideas and inspiration, so hearing that you were inspired by something you found here really makes me happy.

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Woodland inspired luggage tag ‘save the dates’

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rustic woodland luggage tag save the dates

Today it’s more handmade loveliness from a lovely bride-to-be and another fab idea for creating ‘save the dates’.  These ‘save the date’ luggage tags were made by Tara and her husband-to-be Ben who run a vintage restoration business called Elegantly Wasted Vintage.  They are getting married in December and are going for a woodland Edwardian feel for their wedding.

Tara was happy to share the details of how she made them and where she got her supplies…  The ‘save the dates’ were easy to make – although all the furious typing on the old typewriter gave me very sore wrists – I don’t know how my mum, who was a secretary in the 1970s, did it!  The whole lot cost about £15 to make 50.  I used letter stamp blocks from Dunelm Mill and cost £2, the tags were £2 for 50 from Ebay, the twine was £3 from Nutscene, and I ordered the stag stamp online from stampsdirect for £7.  I trimmed the paper with the details using scalloped edged scissors.

rustic woodland luggage tag save the dates

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Printable floral tags for gifts, place cards or save the dates

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printable floral tags

I don’t usually squeeze in a lunchtime post, but I really wanted to share this find as I thought it would appeal to a lot of you.  These beautiful floral tags are offered free to download and print from Packagery, all you need is a printer, some card and a pair of scissors.  There is such a wonderful choice of recycled cards available now, so do check out the DIY section on the directory for a list of where you can buy it from.

I thought they could be used for everyday gift giving, customised into ‘save the dates‘ (I have a fab handmade luggage tag ‘save the date’ idea coming soon) or perhaps as place names for your wedding guests.  Any other suggestions on how these could be used?

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A sweet, homemade animated ‘save the date’ and how you can make your own

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homemade animated save the date

I have something very special, fun and inspiring to share with you all this afternoon – a homemade animated ‘save the date’!  This was sent to me by the lovely Beth who is getting married to Ben this coming July 2012.  She described it as a country-wedding inspired, budget ‘save the date’ – why don’t you watch it for yourself…

How fun is that?  And it’s accompanied by a song (Crystal Fighters Plage) that seems to perfectly fit the style, and it’s short but sweet – I would be pretty excited if I was a wedding guest and this landed in my inbox.  So after watching it half a dozen times I decide to ask Beth how they created it, as I was pretty sure some of your lovely readers might want to create something like it yourself.

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Holly and Dean’s village fete wedding with a coconut shy and Morris Men

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country wedding flowers village fete

Village fete wedding with Morris Men

This beautiful wedding photographed by Dawn Potter was inspired by the nostalgia of village fetes, and is full of fun and games for the many children who came – something I think too often gets over-looked.  Holly crafted such a colorful and fun wedding that really went that extra mile for her guests.

village fete wedding flowergirl

Holly and Dean got married in the picturesque village of Loders in Dorset, with the ceremony in the village church and the reception just down the road.

country church wedding

The church was decorated with pretty country style flowers and the order of service is one of the most beautiful I’ve ever seen – isn’t it stunning, like a page out of a fairytale…

hand made illustrated order of service

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Handmade ‘tying the knot’ save the dates made from brown card and twine

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tying the knot rustic save the dates

The joys of having a photographer husband-to-be!  If you’re the lovely Lisa, one of my blog readers, it means you can make pretty wedding details and get great pictures of them – which in turn means lovely photos to share with you all.

raffia save the dates

Lisa was inspired by my own rustic ‘save the dates’ and got in touch to share hers – I think they are so beautiful and they incorporate a really neat extra that Lisa found on this blog whilst searching for inspiration – a twine knot.

tying the knot handmade save the date

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Beautiful favours and crafty supplies for the creative bride

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afternoon tea inspired wedding stationery

It was lovely this afternoon to discover that one of the newest businesses to join the directory has featured The Natural Wedding Company on their blog.  The delightful Wedding in a Teacup can be found in our Stationery, Details and DIY sections and is a treasure trove of beautiful things for the creative bride.  Lots of their products are sourced ethically or eco-friendly, so a perfect match for the directory.

I thought I’d share some of my favourite products from their wonderful website…

Meant to Bee Honey Favour Stickers

honey favour brown craft label

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Allie and Tom’s handmade 1930’s inspired country wedding ~ part two

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1930s inspired country wedding

1930s inspired country wedding (part two)

If you missed yesterday’s part one of Allie and Tom’s handmade 1930’s inspired country wedding be sure to read it first – it’s full of beautiful details and photos of their ceremony and how they got Allie’s parents field ready for their wedding.  So without further ado, after their ceremony, Allie and Tom had some photos taken whilst dodging the rain showers – what a beautiful vintage car.

>> View Allie and Tom’s 1930s inspired country wedding (part one) here <<

vintage wedding car

Then everyone headed back to Allie’s parents field where they had Pimms in the marquee, followed by an afternoon tea of cakes, scones and sandwiches, all made by her mum’s friends.

country flowers and afternoon tea wedding

Afternoon tea was served on vintage crockery collected over the year by Allie and her mum.  I spent a lot of time the day before the wedding selecting all the crockery and it really did look as I imagined it.

vintage crockery afternoon tea wedding

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