Wedding Planning #6 | Designing your own Wedding Stationary - Travel Theme

Getting your wedding stationary personally designed can be super costly, but if you're a little crafty and you don't mind getting into DIY bride mode, you can save yourself quite a bit of money.
 
Some of you may know I am a Digital Designer by day, and I used to create hand-made collages back in the day. During my wedding planning, I had the chance to get my hands dirty and create some beautiful (if I say so myself) digital and hand-made designs. So, I thought I'd share these with you, alongside some tips and tricks.

The invitations

First things first, design the save the date invitations! These were the first things I designed, which I did 10 months before the wedding. At that moment, I had no idea what theme I wanted, I just knew that I wanted something that had blues, golds and looked quite classy. Looking back, these don't really flow with the world/travel theme, but I'm happy with the way they look. When I printed them and wrapped them in twine, I was so proud, ha.

If you're pretty graphic design savvy, you can design your invites in Photoshop or Indesign. Or maybe you have a graphic design friend who can mock something up for you.
Doing these myself saved me a huge chunk of money as I only had to order some A5 cream card, some twine and a gold pen from Amazon! Printing them wasn't too costly either - as long as you have a good printer and some ink!

If you don't fancy designing them yourself, there are also tons of people on etsy and notonthehighstreet that create personalised invitations, so I'd highly recommend going on there.

The Table Plan

The table plan is something you may start planning in the final weeks -  I did mine a couple of days before the wedding, which I'm so glad I did as we had a few drop outs. So my advice would be to design two days before your wedding. But make sure you have all your props a few weeks before!

I immediately knew what I wanted to do for the table plan - a huge map with tags pinpointed to all the places Joe and I had travelled to together.

I stumbled across something similar on notonthehighstreet, and ordered the standard world map which was only £10.50. I then ordered some white tags, navy and white striped twine and white pins from Amazon. The frame was from B&M which cost around £5. For the typography, I hand wrote everything in my own 'scripted/calligraphy style'. If you want to achieve that gorgeous scripted style, you can buy calligraphy books to help you practice, I'd recommend this one!

The Areoplane Name Cards

Alongside the table plan we had to think about the name cards. We've been to weddings and people have kept them quite traditional - a rectangle stand with your name printed on. But I wanted to do something a little different. I liked the idea of creating little paper areoplanes, and so I found some designs on Pinterest, sent them to one of my design friends and she created the above.
They are honestly so beautiful and intricate. She did an incredible job on them, as well as having the patience of a saint to design and make over 90 of them!

To create your paper areoplane name cards, all you need is a paper areoplane template - which you can add text your personalised text on Illustrator or Indesign. As well as cream card, brown card, glue and white ribbon.

Table names and Selfie Station Props

The table name designs were super easy to do! I printed off an A5 vintage looking map onto cream card, glued a brown tag onto the map and wrote my desired country name on them. I bought some A5 frames (which matched the table plan frame) which added the final touch.

With regards to styling them on the tables, I thought the frames worked really well stacked on top of a few log slices which I bought on eBay!

We wanted to keep our guests entertained so we decided to have a selfie station with photo booth props - this went down really well with both the adults and kids!

I found this photo booth stick props template online, which you simply cut out and stick on lolly pop sticks or straws.

To make sure the photo booth props are secure and in place, I'd advise using a glue gun which you can buy really cheap from any arts and craft stores!

Joe, myself and my bridesmaids had such a fun evening making these. There were over 100 to cut out and stick together so I'm glad we had the extra pairs of hands.

To style the photo booth props, I bought a set of jam jars from eBay and some chalk stickers from Amazon. We already had a chalk pen so all I had to do was write 'Selfie Station' on them.

Name tags for the ceremony

Name tags for the ceremony are optional. I only created a few for the first two rows which included the main wedding party.

I found a tag template on the internet and added the text in Illustrator. After I was happy with the design, I printed them on brown paper, cut out by hand, hole punched a hole in every single one and added the final touch of twine.

For mine and Joe's chair's, I bought these Mr & Mrs hessian chair covers from eBay.

Extra bits

We wanted a few extra bits at the wedding, one being - wedding wands. We wanted each chair to have one, so that when we walked down the aisle after we said our 'I do's', everyone would wave their wands and it would create a lovely photo.

I bought these from Ginger Ray. I picked ours up in the sale, I think they were about £3 for a pack of 10. So do keep your eye out for any Ginger Ray sales as I know some of their products can be quite expensive. Alternatively, you can make your own if you're on a budget!

Another item we picked up from Ginger Ray were these cute little 'If You Instagram' cards where you write your own unique hashtag, such as #ZoeyandJoey. These retail at £5 for a pack of 5 which isn't too shabby.

Another nice little touch is to print lots of your favourite photographs of you and your loved ones and hang them up. All you need is twine, your chosen photos, mini pegs and some pins! It works out really inexpensive and you'll make use of the photographs afterwards too!

We also bought a few extra personalised things too. We bought our gorgeous gold glittery cake topper from notonthehighstreet, and our personalised ring box from etsy. 

I found designing and making the wedding stationary the most stress-free and one of the best parts of wedding planning and I'm sure you'll love it too.

I hope this has been somewhat helpful. If you have any questions about any of the above, then please leave them in the comments below.

If you're interested in reading more about my wedding experiences, I blogged about mine and Joe's initial ideas here. As well as my initial hair and make-up ideas here. The stressful period with eight weeks to go, which you can read here. And last but not least I talked about choosing your wedding make-up here.

As always you can reach me on social media. I have Instagram: @zoeyoliviablog, and twitter: @zoeyoliviablog.

Wedding Planning #5 | Choosing your wedding day make-up

Planning to do your own wedding make-up? Or interested in what I wore on my face? Then keep on reading...

I recently wrote about 'choosing your wedding day lipstick', but after writing it I thought it would be useful to talk about what I wore on my whole face and talk about the daunting task of choosing and doing your own wedding day make-up.

Doing your own make-up on your big day is for sure a stressful task, but if you're fussy like I am it makes perfect sense to do it yourself. I could of had a make-up artist and not worried about my make-up but I thought what if I hate it? What if I have a nervous breakdown and call the wedding off because I didn't like my make-up? Bit dramatic, yes...  But you know your face best, and you know what you like to put on your face.

I trialled more make-up than you could of possibly imagined, but to me that seemed normal as I am a massive make-up fiend anyway.

I began researching on my desired wedding day make-up look back in June last year, so I'd say around six months before my big day was when I started to trial my make-up. Maybe this is a little extreme, but I wanted to get my make-up just right. I wrote about my initial ideas for my hair and make-up back in August here.

Towards the final few weeks, I was set on using my all time favourite foundation, Estee Lauder's Double Wear and then I tried Giorgio Armani's Luminous Silk Foundation two weeks before and decided that was the one. It appeared more natural on the skin and didn't have any SPF in it which was great in case my photographer was using a flash.

I also changed my mind ten million times on what lipstick and blusher I was going to wear. I go into more detail about this in my previous post on 'choosing your wedding day lipstick'.

As well as the daunting task of finding the perfect eyeliner to stay put on my annoyingly watery eyes. I trialled Guerlain's Liquid eyeliner and Bobbi Brown's Long Wear Gel Liner and it was so hard to choose between the two. The struggle was real ladies!

The amount of eyeshadows I bought and ended up wearing my all time favourite from NARS' Limited Edition Laser Cut eye, cheek and lip palette that I got a few years back...

Sometimes you may already have it in your bag. So experiment with what you've got, try new things and make sure it's what you want. It's your wedding, your face, so do the look that's going to make you feel like a million dollars on the day.

Also, do experiment with your bridesmaids! Two of my bridesmaids came over a few weeks before the wedding and we did our make-up together. It was great to get their opinions and ensure we were all happy with what was going on our faces. It was also nice to talk about other beauty related things, such as 'What nail varnish should I go for?' 'Should I spice things up with a red lip in the evening?' 'Will this look go with my bridesmaid dress'. There's lots of things to consider in the beauty department and it's great to bounce off other peoples ideas and opinions.

My wedding make-up was very natural yet provided enough coverage to cover any blemishes or dark circles. I went for coral-nude shades with a teeny bit of sparkle on the eye lids. I wanted to rock a winged eye as it's my go to too. I wanted that 1940's look, yet very natural and pretty.

Here's what I wore on my face. Let's start with the base, I moisturised with my Environ AVST moisturiser and then primed with my Urban Decay All Nighter make-up setting spray to ensure everything would stay put all day. I then chose Giorgio Armani's Luminous Silk Foundation for a natural radiant glow, as well as concealing those pesky blemishes and dark circles with my NARS trusty creamy concealer (I could not live without this!). I left it for five minutes before applying Laura Mercier's Translucent Loose Powder to ensure my foundation and concealer wasn't going to slide around.
I also applied a teeny bit of my Hourglass' Ambient Ethereal Light Powder too.

After that, I applied my holy grail Hourglass Ambient Lighting Blush in Dim Infusion and my Mary Lou Manizer highlighter on my cheekbones, underneath the brows and on the cupids bow.

For the eyes, I applied my Maxfactor cream eyeshadow and then applied a beautiful gold shade from my NARS Laser Cut eye, cheek and lip palette. I then winged it out with the Bobbi Brown Long Lasting Gel Eyeliner and applied this to my waterline too.

For my lips, I prepped my lips with Charlotte Tilbury's Lip Cheat Lip Liner in the shade 'Pillow Talk and then applied my lovely Chanel Rouge Coco in the shade 402 Adrienne. To make my lips appear fuller and plump, I applied Chanel's clear lipgloss on top.

I then spritzed my face with the Urban Decay All Nighter setting spray again and that was the look complete!

I also trialled another 'Bridal make-up look for Pale Skin & Brown Eyes' here if you're interested. I don't go into detail about the products but it's a sped up video on the look I was going to go for.
Perhaps I'll create another video on my actual wedding day make-up in the near future. If that's something you would like to see then do let me know :).

If you're interested in reading more about my wedding experiences, I blogged about mine and Joe's initial ideas here. As well as my initial hair and make-up ideas here. And last but not least, the stressful period with eight weeks to go, you can read about that one here.

As always you can reach me on social media. I have Instagram: @zoeyoliviablog, and twitter: @zoeyoliviablog.

Wedding Planning #4 | Choosing your wedding lipstick!

If you're planning on doing your own make-up on your big day or if you're in search of the perfect everyday lipstick, then this may be somewhat helpful to you. Or if you're interested to see what combination I wore on my big day and liked it then perfect!

Choosing my wedding lipstick was a real struggle. Lipstick's are my guilty pleasure and I had six options to begin with. It was a toss between Charlotte Tilbury's Bitch Perfect or Stoned Rose, Mac's Brave, Cosmo, Fanfare or Bare Again (which sadly they've now discontinued... why MAC, why!!).

Four weeks before my big day, I was settled on going for Charlotte Tilbury's Stoned Rose, and then I went shopping the week before my wedding, stumbled across my local Chanel counter and decided to look at some more lipsticks.

I spoke to a lovely lady named Chloe and explained that I was getting married in a week's time and that I'm unsure if I have found 'the one' in terms of lipstick talk. I said I was after something subtle, very natural and something that would work well with my hair colour and fair skin. I also wanted it to be a little glossy as I think gloss tends to suit me better.
She came back to me with a couple of options, and I settled for 'Rouge Coco 402, Adrienne' paired with '171 Levres Scintillantes Glossimer'.

These two paired together create the most beautiful natural lip. And they will always have a special place in my heart. Adrienne is the most gorgeous nude with a bit of shimmer. It has specks of glitter in the formula, but don't let that put you off as it gives your lips dimension! The formula is ulta hydrating and easy to apply. I did re-apply this a few times during my wedding but that didn't bother me so much as it was simply beautiful to wear.

The lipgloss really wowed me too. I never thought I'd spend so much money on a simple lipgloss, but it gives your lips a gorgeous plumping effect. They appeared fuller and almost seemed like you had a lip job (lol). This also has specks of glitter in, but again it gives that dimension to your lips.

As for lip liner underneath, I wore Charlotte Tibury's infamous 'Pillow Talk Lip Cheat Lip Liner' - the only lip liner I wear these days. As a trio they worked really beautifully together.

So, moving swiftly on, if you're in search for your perfect wedding lipstick, I would say go to a huge department store like John Lewis or House of Fraser and browse around. Explain that you're getting married, and 9 times out of 10 everyone is so helpful and so excited to help you as it's a huge huge deal.

I looked at what Laura Mericer, Charlotte Tilbury, MAC, Chanel and Estee Lauder had to offer. Looked like a crazy lady with about 35 swatches on my arm as I walked around but it was worth it as I wanted to be sure.

When you think you may have found the one, you always find another, so don't buy it straight away unless you're one hundred and ten hundred percent sure. You're kind of treating your wedding lipstick like your bridal gown, so it's ok to be fussy and trial it a few times before you buy.
The mistake I made was I brought far too many, but I do love every single one of them and I do wear them all!

A wedding lipstick needs to compliment your blusher, your skin-tone, your eye colour, your hair colour, so bare this in mind. If you've chosen the rest of your wedding day make-up, I would say look for your lipstick last. If you've got fair skin or ginger hair than great, these three products will work for you if you're after that every day natural lip.
It would also look lovely on medium skin tones.

A wedding lipstick is always going to have a special place in your heart, so make sure it's perfect.

Chanel's Rouge Coco number 402 has so many wonderful memories attached to it and I keep it in a safe place. And funnily enough, I only own two Chanel lipsticks in my collection, so it means this one is extra special to me.

Anyway, good luck finding your dream wedding lipstick! It's such a fun task and something I really enjoyed doing to take my mind off the other mundane tasks. Enjoy the process and remember it's ok to be fussy, it's your wedding day after all!

Also, if you're interested in seeing photo's from my wedding I have uploaded a few up on my Instagram: @zoeyoliviablog. And if you're interested in reading more about my wedding experiences, I blogged about mine and Joe's initial ideas here. As well as my initial hair and make-up ideas here. And last but not least, the stressful period with eight weeks to go, you can read about that one here.

As always you can reach me on social media. I have Instagram: @zoeyoliviablog, and twitter: @zoeyoliviablog. Have a fabulous week all.