Design Wedding Invitations That SELL! - A Wedding Invitation Masterclass

1. Introduction: Hi, I'm LMA. For over ten years, I was the owner operator of an invitation stationary shop and Houston tectonic. Our specialization was wedding invitations. And over that time I've met with thousands of brides, and I booked a great percentage of those that walked through my doors. When I first opened my brick and mortar shop, the entry barriers into the wedding invitation industry were extremely high. And the market was firmly in the control of nationally established brands. But since then, with the advent of print on demand, quality desktop publishing tools and free marketing via social media. The door to the wedding invitation design industry has been thrown wide open. And that is a good thing. Well, sorta. You see, there's actually a formal protocol for wedding invitations. And there are wedding invitation design aesthetics at most, aspiring designers are not yet familiar with. And then there's the mindset of the bride. What does she really looking for when shopping for wedding invitations? When shopping for the symbol of her once in a lifetime moment. There are phenomenal designers out there, maybe your one, but most of those designers are unaware of the secrets that I had learned of what real rise we're looking for, of what makes abroad actually bind. So I created this class to share a few of those most important Design Secrets. If you're an aspiring wedding invitation designer, or if you've been contemplating designing wedding invitations, this class was created just for you in it, I'll be going over the various seen and unseen elements that go into crafting a wedding invitation that actually sells. And I'll be giving you a peek into the mindset of the bride as she shopping for wedding invitation. So that you will be better equipped to know how to design for her for your project. I will lead you through a number of small exercises. And if you finish each exercise, by the time you finish this class, you'll have designed and added to your portfolio a wedding invitation that has not only aesthetically pleasing, but also totally sellable. I hope you'll join me in this class. So come on, let's make something beautiful. 2. A Note Before we Begin: Hey, Mom. And I really want to thank you for joining me in this class. Firstly, I wanted Teoh discuss. I guess what this class isn't This class isn't going to be a class that will teach you how to lay out the design and how to use software. Photoshopped illustrator. But instead, this class is designed to give you a paradigm shift so that, like the title, says you can design invitations that actually sell. I come from a different background in the background. That I come from is not the artistic background, but it's the retail side of selling. I have been working with brands for over 12 years, and I have been working with them face to face and learning about them and seeing the way they shop and discovering things about why they are making certain purchases. So I want to share that with you. E. I have a personality that's very direct. And I will tell you things that sound a little cut and dry sometimes s. So I want to assure you from the get go I have so much respect for everyone that is on this platform and just I am a fan of so many people. So when I'm saying Don't do this for going to see this or bringing toe light, some things that are wrong or some things that are just really big errors it's not me talking down to you. It's me expressing the very, very concrete rules and parameters that are necessary to create wedding invitations that brides will actually want to purchase that brides will actually find. And the reason that I even had the audacity to come on this platform and speak to designers that I know are much more superior designers than I am is because I saw there waas a disconnect, and I I saw these gorgeous design. But I knew a bride would never buy them because they were breaking certain cardinal rules. And that is what I want to share through these classes so that you can learn these rules and then take your art to that level that so many of us really misfired. Teoh. And if we're true to ourselves, we aspire to make a living off of our art and off of our designs, and to make a living off your designs, you first have to sell your designs in order to make that living. So my intent in this class is to give you those tools or to unlock those secrets and give you that paradigm shift so that you will understand what it is a bride is looking for in her invitations. So you can bring that into your designs and turn around and begin designing invitations that brides really will be wanting to buy and will be wanting to purchase from you to make them their own. So, in essence, in that show, in a totality, that is the purpose of this class for you to learn those secrets and those skills, take them and melt them into that creative person, that creative soul that is you. And to design a product for this industry, this very, very viable industry for brides and to actually be able to start making a living off of that art. So let's then go to our first lesson. Our first paradigm ship, our first secret, and that is 3. The Mystery of the Bride: Hey, welcome back. This is less than one, the mystery of the Bri. And this was an, I'm going to start out by telling you a story of how I learned the great bedrock foundational rule design. Because I opened to my store as a stationary store. I didn't have experienced myself of how to design invitations. So I opened my store mainly with waiting albums. And in the process of working with companies that were built and had been in business for years and years and years. I started learning from them, learning the protocol, learning wording, learning of the design, aesthetics, and seeing what they were doing. I'm seeing these beautiful creations that would come up with every year that brides were just buying and buying and buying and hadn't the need to do my own designing. But when you're a creative yourself and you're in a certain industry, you begin to want to start participating in that industry a little bit more. And so the designing bug got me and I had an organization that was needing to design. And at that time, the Western all over funky lettering and all kinds of different type styles, et cetera. And was really, really hip and really, really in and they were looking for something like that. So I throw my add into the ring and I tried to learn Adobe Illustrator at the same time as I was designing for the first time for a client, totally out of my leg. But I had the audacity of do something like that because I have a brother who has been a very highly sought after graphic designers worked for people like MTV and sony. He did their catalogs for all of Latin America. So he's done some fabulous work and he's always been the person then I would just fall back on. So I had kind of come to a place of where I knew that this was the direction I was going in. It was still needed to tweak it a bit and my kind of passed it on to him and said, Hey, this is what I'm doing. Take a look, you know, give me some input and what do you think about this? And he asked me a very short question and I had no idea what he was asking. And he said. Who's your star? And I was like, what do mean who's my star? I said, Well, who's your hero? And I asked him what he meant. I'm a total New. I mean, I don't know what he's talking about. Who was my hero? And he said, You've got so much going on here. But who is this all about? Who's your Sharpe? Who is your hero? Is it? The name of the ball is at the name of the school? Is that the dayton time? Who is this about? Who who's supposed to be storing. And that lesson, as I'm sure, it was when you learned, it was just like a huge paradigm shift for B. It was like, oh, OK, I get it. I get it. I need to make a decision of who who I'm highlighting on my invitation. It's not about the ball name or the event name or the school name. It's like one or the other. Who is this highlighting? So I'm saying all this I'm teaching nor telling you this whole story to bring that concept back into play, then now start thinking into wedding invitations. This is a huge, huge, huge cardinal rule that so many times I see. No. Let me rephrase that. This is the rural that the majority of what in imitation designs that I see break. They have not understood who the hero is. And newsflash you and your phenomenal work, your phenomenal skill or not the hero. This is a wedding invitation. Who was the hero? It's the bribe. Okay, let's take a step back and think about this. We're designing invitations for a wedding. What do we know about a wedding? Every little girl grows up joining me about correcting. When she grows up dreaming about the dress she's going to wear. The day she's going to become a princess. The day that she, There's going to be the star of this glorious event when she, prince charming. This is the main paradigm shift that every wedding invitation designer must keep in mind. Your bride is your star. Your design is not your star. Regardless of how gorgeous it is. Like I said before, you can not have your design overshadowing the bride. The design must be subtle, must be background. And as designers, we have a tendency to fall in love with our designs and want our designs to be the star. But that's why I call this also the mystery of the bride, is that you're wanting to design for her, but at the same time, she has got to be the element of the design. That is the star. It's got to be about her. It cannot compete with her. This is her day. This is her event. It is all about the bribe. Design has to play the lesser part. That has to take a back seat and has to become the frame. That is why brides will take a look at a gorgeous invitation, but see that there's no way for her to compete within that setting. That it's going to be when her guests get this invitation, they're gonna say, oh my gosh, look at those design. And she's missing, she is going to be overlooked because of this design, is competing with her and is drawing our attention to itself. So very simply, again, it cannot draw attention to itself. It has to be very subtle. That is why abroad will select one invitation over another. I am, I am the bride, I am the star here. Over here, the design is the star. Paradigm shift design. Take the back seat. But we want to sell to Brian's, we want to so wedding invitations, This is the key, number one, key to selling it wedding invitations. So that then is our lesson number one. And now we're on to your project, which would be to design a wedding invitation. That because we're going to be following all of these rules that I'll be sharing with you and all these secrets and will most likely sell as opposed to having created design without knowing these secrets. So our first lessons Project, because we're going to be doing little mini-projects for each lesson. Our first lessons project is for you to do some market research. And I'd like you to go online and I've added some various locations that you can do your market research in. And of course, if you have any other ideas of where to go, feel free to go. I'd like you to go online and look through wedding invitations and do some searches and seeing what comes up as trending. See if you're able to notice any specific trends or design elements that are being used in wedding invitations around the time that you're doing your clasp. And I'd like you to take up a few screenshots, selecting three elements that you identified and take some screenshots, post, post, little thumbnails, and a little description describing each one. You can't even use one word if you'd like, or a little paragraph of how you see that trend, how you would describe that term. And now I'd like to invite you to join me on lesson number two. Because unless it number two, we're going to be showing you my best-selling wedding invitation of all time. And then national brands, best-selling wedding invitations and the best selling what invitation brands. And I really think that when you see what these are, you're really going to be surprised. Your mind, miter, beaker, there are writing. You're gonna really enjoy what you're going to learn in class member two. So now on to that lesson number two, which is. 4. The Mystery Of Design: Hey, and welcome to lesson number two. Before we go into our best-selling invitation, I wanted to do a little brief history of the wedding invitation design industry and kind of how we got to where we are today. When I first opened my brick and mortar in 2008, wedding invitations were securely in the hands of national brands. And a very interesting thing happened. There was a revolution in printing. Digital printing took a enormous step up where it used to be. If a vendor was wanting to print something full-color, there would be perturbed offset printing. And they would be doing a very expensive for color print job. And in order to be able to make a profit, often a four color print job, you would essentially have to order 5 thousand, let's say items. And then when you sold all those 5 thousand items, you were making a profit. So it was heard of to do color on wedding invitations because nobody was doing those quantities. What digital printing did was it revolutionized this process by these humungous machines that print companies have now invested in. But they're able to do color prints at a much, much less expensive cost. So while we were having this revolution in digital printing and color was now accessible and economical. The economy was, was basically collapsing. And and the what an invitation design industry. And in the invitation event, invitation design industry, there were many, many casualties. So the numbers of companies that have been in business for many years is substantially smaller. So what begin happening because of this Print Revolution was we begin seeing designers, independent designers throwing their hat into the ring and beginning to design because they now had the capabilities of doing desktop designing. And then they were able to either have them printed very economically or pass that onto a customer so the customer could go to a neighborhood printing shop and get those digital prints Dent for them. I had that time pretty much kind of began to take a step back and watch what was happening to my industry. Because we were in a constant flux and we were definitely being affected very strongly by the economy and by the market. By the change that we were going through. And that's when I began to analyze what my brides were looking for in response to everything that was happening in the industry on a national basis and in the industry on an independent artists basis. And I began to hone in to what my brides were doing in my bribes were thinking. And these are the things that I came up with. I who was realizing there was a big gap that was being created on various avenues. There was the gap between the national chains trying to understand what the market was doing. And there was the gap between the independent designers that we're playing with all these awesome new toys and ways that they could produce products. And then there was the bride that we continued to be dealing with one-on-one. And there was a substantial gap here that I solved for me. I saw national chains begin to start creating products according to what they saw, independent designers creating. And at the same time I saw brides that were being affected very minimally by independent design. And not at all being interested in what independent designers were beginning to design for the wedding invitation industry, I would have brides come in and mind you, by the time of bride is shopping for wedding invitations, she has everything in her wedding planned. The first thing she does is she gets her dress. She's already picked her venue because she needs the place that her invitations are going to invite her guests to. So at the venue, she's got her Let's try and invitations or last. So I've gotten to see that one brides come in. They have already planned out this glorious event that they have been dreaming up for so many years. And they know exactly what kind of creature it is, what kind of adventure it's going to be for her guests. So they come in already knowing all there is to know about their wedding. And now their invitation must fit in to this plan for their wedding. So when my Brian's would come in, also already shopped all of the social media. And they've got the little pin boards or they've got their inspiration images. They know what they're looking for, they know what they want to do. Sort of. I would notice that my brines would come in affected by trend. But they were affected by trend in this very general sense, the trend was the trending colors. The trend was maybe a little bit of that thing that everyone was doing right now. But not necessarily. They get to us, maybe seen something they liked. But everything they did had to go again and fit in this beautiful creation they had been planning. They would take a trend and they would meld it with who they were. And they would meld it with this dream that they were creating for their wedding. And each one would interpret this trend in a completely different way and it would fascinate me. And it was marvelous to know that every one of my Brides was individual, and she was doing things in a way to represent herself and her own individuality. And it reflected in her invitations and in her wedding in general. And I began to see, even though there was some fascinating things happening in design, my brides were still beginning to go in a way that almost seem to buck the trends. But then at the same time incorporate trends. So let me see if I can give you an idea of what I mean. And now I think it's a good time to show you my best selling, what an invitation out or best-selling wine. Now at the point of doing this video, we have been in business for over 12 years working with brides. And this is the invitation that we have sold better than any other imitation before. So now drumroll, please. Please. Behind this envelope is the wedding invitation that is still better than any other invitations. Double envelope as is be fitting every formal invite. And that invitation is we sold it so well. We also learn lions and we sold it so well. We also did it in Girls of s. S And yes, ladies and gentlemen, this is our best-selling Wayne imitation of all time. So more about that secret and other things over here. Alright, so before you all think I'm out of my mind, let's look at these invitations a little more closely. Invitation number one. Number two. What do you see as a consistency between all of these? There's a simple layout using gorgeous text, fabulous spacing, and just one simple element added to each invitation to make it a little more unique and a little more specific to H bride. But what I want you to know. Is that there is no frame around any of these. There is no extra embellishments. There's no extra Embassy. But they're simply beautiful in their simplicity and elegance. So let me show you a few additional designs. Let's take a look at how you can start mixing things up a little bit. Then one of my favorite uses of thinking outside the box impact that this is, again is simply a card with the lovely envelope minor. Now, let me introduce you to our second best-selling play invitation for all time. And it is this invitation with simply an imbalanced Swiss Stock edge. We also did this quite often in white. So now seen all of this in order so that you won't be thinking that I am an exception to the rule. Let me show you a national chains best-selling wedding invitations for their entire year. Now, do you remember when I introduced you to this infographic earlier in this lesson, let's take a closer look at it. White arrows, three of these companies were actually absorbed into this one company that is still in business today and further down here, the last two that were not crossed off are because they are also part of this national brand that is still in business today. And that's the wedding invitation vendor that I'm going to show you their SLE invitations for their entire year. So take a look at this. For the entire year. Their best selling items were neutrals, were practically color freak. You do have in this a little bit of filigree which knowing this particular invitation could be actually changed into the various colors depending on, for instance, when a brides colors or for her wedding, you have lovely laser cutting. Example, hero tastefully done with a nice ribbon on your very far right? We now have what they call their second sound, which is a very budget friendly version of an invitation that's done all in one where you can actually tear off your RC keep bar down here and mail that back. And then on the bottom we have this beautiful, elegant example of a goal edge Decker cart. And again to the right, it vary. Pearl embossed frame on Lafley quality piece of card stock. And these ladies and gentlemen again, are the best selling wedding invitations for their entire year. And this is a brand that has hundreds and hundreds of invitations that they offer to lines. And what is the common denominator? Neutral and very, very minimal use colorants. Now, in the wedding invitation industry, cross aircraft is considered a moderately priced vendor. However, by no means is it considered a vendor with solely traditional and neutral invitations. As you can see by the examples of their first page on their online catalog. So let's take a look at a couple of other vendors that are nationally established in very, very highly esteemed wedding invitation brands. But before I do that, I first like to introduce them to you via the stationary trends Magazine. Now, stationary trends is a magazine that stationary Retailers receive quarterly and this keeps us up to date as to what is trending. Also the lines that are really coming to the forefront. New products that are being offered by various brands, whatever new brands are coming onto the market, it basically keeps us up to date. So through that, I want to show you a report that they did. And this report was a pole of the stationary store owners and of the various questions they were asked. They were asked them this one question, what invitation lines are your best sellers of all the stationery stores in the United States. The answers to the best selling invitations for their stores for this nation were crane oddballs and William Arthur. Now, oddballs, I know a Him printable party and event invitation company, Crane and William Arthur, On the other hand, are wedding invitation brands and higher end stationary brands. However, their wedding invitations or their market leaders. So let's take a look at their offerings and see how they compare to the best-sellers that Carlson craft was showing us for their year. Are you noticing any similarities there? So Carlos and crafts, best-selling invitations for their entire year resemble white closely, the best-selling wetting invitation vendors nationally. And just to note, in 2011, William Arthur was purchased by Crane and their invitation are quite similar. And so what isn't common denominator? Again, neutrals and a very minimal use of color. And this ladies and gentlemen is one of the best kept secrets of wedding invitations. These are the types of invitations sell the most. So then do you think you figured out what cardinal rule number two is? It's a rule you've heard hundreds of times. And it really does apply for wedding invitations. As you can see with the lesson that we've just finished, carnal rule number two is less, is always more. So for project, what we're going to do is we're gonna take our three different trends that we identified with our previous lessons project. And what I'd like to do is take into consideration everything we've covered with this lesson. And look at each of those trends individually and kind of work out how you would see that element being able to be pared down a little bit so that it complies with that rule that less is more. How could you make that less? And even more than invitation because it's less for each of those individual elements that you identified last time. Just write a little bit of some sort of brainstorming that you go through or some way you're thinking that, hey, this is a way that this could really be used in invitation, but at the same time pared down a little bit. So it does not overshadow the bribe, and it's a lot less competition for The bride arrived and then come on and join me for our lesson number three, which is. 5. The Paradox of GOOD Design: Welcome back to lesson three. This is the paradox of design. So now in the class so far what recovered is lesson number one, the bride is the star. And then our lesson number two, we saw what was actually selling, what brides were purchasing. And as I mentioned before, it, this whole class is not a class to teach you how to design, but it's a class to reveal secrets to you. One of those secrets being this is what bribes or, or buying some things that are very neutral, very pared down. So now let's go further in our discussion about design. And I'm going to reveal another secret. And this secret has to do with good design. Because there is a paradox that happens with design in wedding invitations, even when it's fabulous design. Well, let me just explain what I mean by just going right into it. Do you remember this moment where I misspoke? And I said independent designers, what I meant to say, national vendors or national brands. I saw national chains begin to start creating products according to what they saw, independent designers creating. And at the same time I saw brides that were being affected very minimally by independent design. And not at all being interested in what independent designers were beginning to design for the wedding invitation industry. Well, let me show you specifically what I was referring to. These here are all designs that work by Carlson frack. These were designed during the print revolution and social media revolution that began to happen by Carlson craft in response to what they were seeing. They work looking at social media, as were all of us in wedding invitation design. And they were seeing the barrage of beautiful designs that were showing up daily designed by independent designers. And believing that this was what the market was demanding, they in turn began to produce these very trendy designs. They actually at 1 in time, began to distribute yearly albums that worked solely trend and all of them specifically for what was trending currently that year in social media. And guess what? We sold nothing from these albums. Now, what Paulson crafted know and what I took notice up because I was sitting in front of the bride's. Is that the Bryant's? We're not responding to these very trendy invitations that we're producing. That was another aha moment for me. Is that even though we had quite a revolution going on in social media, rights still weren't responding as it seemed like they were responding. And these beautiful designs are those designs at costs and craft created. And some of these designs are actually stunning thing itself. There was no demand for them. And this is why I wanted you to see they are some of them gorgeous design hitting on the trend so perfectly. And yet they did not sell. There was no demand for these very trendy products. So where was the disconnect? The disconnect was in perceiving that what was trending on social media was the market, or in other words, what brides were actually buying. But what wasn't taken into consideration was that on social media, it's not possible to differentiate between an invitation that's created on spec to play with a trend or two interests, somebody in your brand versus an invitation that's been created for a real bribe, for a real wedding. And it's also not possible to differentiate between an invitation I created for a photo shoot or in other words, created for a bribe, that doesn't even exist. So needless to say, Carl's Minecraft has discontinued their yearly trend albums. And their latest release is a collection of designs with a great blend of trendy elements on neutral pallets. So continuing on the paradox of design, let's look at the paradox of design that can happen with even really great design. So now here is the dilemma. It comes up when you're working on elements that are not necessarily evergreen elements, you can create populous designs. And I'm gonna give you a couple of examples from my favorite vendor of all time, my very weighing wedding invitations. Let me show you this gorgeous design she came out with when the dots were really, really in. And I think this design was fabulous. Not only did they have this really trending confetti foil design, but they paired this layout which was fantastic, this gorgeous invitation. We sold it one time and it's now a little dated. And it would have to fit perfectly with a wedding that had this particular theme going. That's a fantastic design, but it's not a design that can be sold multiple times. Now, another design that when it came out, I thought was fantastic, was this particular one because it was this combination of the gray. With this gold engraving and what I saw at the first time in the album, this isn't now what page? I fell in love with and I just thought it was stunning. And yet we never had any takers. But you would have to have somebody that's using a deep, deep gray and a lot of gray for their invitation to want to send this out. Now, my favorite design of all time, I'll have to show you was this dinner. I just loved this when I first saw it for the very first time. Gold engraving on a black and white striped invitation. Black and super, super into it however so wouldn't invitation. And again, no takers. Somebody would have had to really, really done something real specificly striped, but it didn't. So let me try to sum up what I've just covered by telling you a story, to share with you a story about a past life I had as a human resource administrator, and it was the HRA, a large department store, and was in charge of doing all the hiring. So I'm would have stacks of applications on my desk constantly. And there was one thing that I used to do when I was looking for employees. I would go through those stacks super super quickly doing one thing, looking to eliminate. I wasn't looking for a candidate. I was looking to eliminate and throw out the ones that I knew weren't going to match the particular department store that we worked for. Then I took what was left over and went through those and looked at them a little more closely. And what I've noticed with brides is that when they're shopping for wedding invitations, what they're doing is they're looking to eliminate your design. Your envelopes are the wrong color. I'm not interested. I'm not using those flowers. I'm not interested. Those are all elements that if you have incorporated them into a design that you're trying to sell, that a Brian is going to use to eliminate u. And that is why the designs that you are presenting for sale that you are posting to interests perspective brides needs to be as non-threatening. It's possible to keep some perspective when we're discussing designing what it invitations were discussing designing invitations that you are placing to attract a bribe in order to get her to purchase your creation were not particularly discussing wedding invitations that you are designing with a bride that you were working with. When you are designing for a particular Bryan who has already booked you, she will be the one to steer you into particular directions. But this whole class is geared mainly toward wanting invitation designers that are looking to break into the industry, or that have broken into the industry, but are looking to sell more of the invitations they design and place on their website. So we're, we're wanting our paradigm to shift is in designing these invitations on your own time. That our elimination proof, you're not putting in a color that a bridesmaids Satan. I'm not using it. You're not putting him in a large design element that she is not interested in when you're putting it flowers. If they're not the exact flowers she's using in her in her ceremony, in her reception. She doesn't want your design. We have a tendency to say, oh, gorgeous flowers, Well, I'm using daisies in my wedding so I can substitute a daisy in that area. A bride doesn't do that. If she does, she's generally creative herself and she's creating your own invitation. So you're creating invitations for brides that are not designers themselves and that are looking for you to show them something that they could say, I want that I can use that. That is why best-selling whining invitations are simple, are very, very pared down and subtle. There's generally a very particular small element that the bride says, love it. So there you go. Another closely held secret by best-selling wedding invitation designers and brands. You want to make your invitations as elimination proof as possible. Right now on the topic of trends, national brands take an extreme amount of time to get a new album out in order to respond to something that they're seeing, the market began to do. Independent designers can immediately respond to trend. Trends are very fleeting. Yet, because you aren't independent designer, you can quickly jump on a trend and design a non-threatening invitation and quickly get it to market so that you can pursue and participate in that trend and then quickly move off of it when it is no longer a 20 millimeter. And so now a word about the importance of evergreen elements. As we were mentioning, because you aren't independent, you're able to move quickly on trend. However your desired won't last half the trend most likely. So an evergreen design is going to be a design that you create that is not trendy or has taken advantage of the more permanent trending elements such as your calligraphy fonts per se, that The design that you create will stand the test of time more likely. And that is the design that you will be able to sell over and over and over again because it's evergreen, because its current today, it's current next year. Little bit of tweaking here and there, and it's still current. So the amount of hours you put designing Intuit, brainstorming about how to set this just perfectly or that just perfectly will be much greater of a payoff. So there is a financial path when you hit a design just right. That is, evergreen, can continue to stay on the market and make more money for you with just those few hours at one time of designing. And that is what we're trying to get. We're trying to get you to design invitations that are marketable, that will sell, and that will be very, very profitable to you. So this brings us to our cardinal rule number three for this lesson, your cardinal rule number three is that you should always remember to design for the market and not for the trend. So there you have it. Even with fabulous, really great design, there still can be issues. If it's not evergreen, if it's a little too much of a good thing, it may not be marketable, it may not be profitable for you. And so now on the topic of too much of a good thing, let's take a look at a brand that has some really good products and some really great design, yet adds a little too much into the pot and really, really competes with the Bride. One of the mentors that I see very, very active online in the various social media groups is in invitation company from China called Janis paper. And I'm sure a lot of you have seen their invitations. They are doing quite a bit with laser cutting. We do have their samples and some other creations are actually quite lovely. And we have never really use them because they're, they're paper quality is not quite up to par, but something simple like those for a wedding invitation with just a very simple invitation on the inside would be lovely ever. They're not shown that he too often. So jhanas paper is another example of the paradox of good design. If you look at their laser cutting and their pockets, those designs are just beautiful. However, the company has a habit of pairing them with a design that's also very vibrant and unfortunately generally clashes with the invitation pocket. So not only are the invitation suites that they show competing with the bride for attention, they are competing with each other for attention. For instance. Who was the star of this invitation? Is it the gorgeous laser cut pocket, or is it this big bowl design underneath? And when both the bowl design and the beautiful pocket, or buying so much for your attention, is the bride getting ethnic tension at all? So that's the confusion. Who is the star? But again, this could easily be rectified by period one of these gorgeous pockets with a very elegant, simple layout and that combination would be absolutely stunning. So let's discuss this lesson's project. Now. As you already know, because you've been watching this class and I've said it a million times since I came into designing wedding invitations through my retail store. And when I first opened, I thought that every bride was my customer and I needed to mark it to every bride and I needed to try to hit every trend and go when every avenue that I saw opening up in order to gain business. Because as a retail store, you have an overhead that you have to pay for every single month. However, as I matured on my journey and as I became more involved in wedding invitations and met with more and more Brides, I begin to realize that I had my own design aesthetic. And as I began to focus on that aesthetic and focus on those things that weren't true to me. As a designer, I began to become more profitable because I somehow also began to attract that kind of brine. Once I became clear on the type of bride and I was very comfortable designing for. And so that's the project for this particular lesson. I want you to sit down with yourself and really, really think about what design stream you fit in. Where do you flow best? Gu flow in a real app on guard, trend setting type of space. Do you flow in a very conservative, traditional taylor type of space? I want you to consider your own design aesthetic. And I've placed a list of different possibilities of design style is design aesthetics in your project area. And I want you to select one and to write that in your project. And the reason I want you to do that is because we're going to start shifting now and taking those things that we've been picking a new, selecting and start melding them with this design aesthetic. That is, you kind of flow, that is within you, this taste that you have because you're gonna be more comfortable designing in that little stream, you're going to become happier actually designing in that level stream. And when those things start coming into play, and it starts melting with just who you are. You automatically begin to design out of the creative that is in you and that life force that is in you. That is that creative person, and that is where your productivity lies. That is where your blessings lie, let's say discovery mu. So I am asking you to sit down and discover yourself for this particular lesson and write that in where do you flow? Very simple, very easy. That's your project for this lesson. And that is the big step that when you take, you will find that you will become more productive and you will also become more profitable. And once you finish writing that in, join me for the following lesson, which is. 6. The Mystery of Color: Hey, welcome back. This is lesson four V, mystery of color. I want to express right now is that I'm not trying to get you to sterilize designs so entirely that you're not adding any creativity or any design influence for design trend even into the invitations that you will create in the future. I would say the main reason that I created this class to begin with was because I would see fabulous designs being offered. And I knew that they were designing for either a market that was minimal or for market that didn't exist. And I would find myself wanting to be able to go to these designers and tell them you are putting so much effort, you're putting so much talent, gil, into creating this beautiful piece of work and all the hours that I know it costs you may never be repaid. Why? Because brides are looking for something different. Your artist's fabulous. But to sell it, it needs to meet the market's demand. I also believe that independent designers have the ability to be much more flexible in the marketplace, the ability to respond much more quickly to demand. So my encouragement to you as an independent designer, from a retailer who was still to this day working face to face with brides. Is that I do believe there is an untapped market out there of brides looking to be on trend. Yet being the star. And I do believe that there is a great, great opportunity to design wedding invitations that are trending our clever and are subtle and will attract brides. Because of the artistic skill and because of the creative way of blending that trend in a very non-threatening way into a design. I sincerely believe there is a very, very, very large market out there for this particular skill. And I do believe there are many people that are watching me and have that ability. And that is what this whole class is about, is giving you the foundational understanding. Of what the market really is demanding as far as the customer, the bride herself, the bribe is still affected by trend. How ever you need to learn how to make yourself elimination improve. My job is to show you what it is that's actually selling. Show you how to change your mindset so that you can easily design and make a difference and make an impact in this industry that I believe is seriously, seriously open for on trend design that are subtle, Not necessarily, and you have to be neutrals. There's very clever way to play with color. And that's one of the things we're going to discuss in our class. I mentioned previously in lesson two the mystery of design, that when my bribes came in, I noticed that they were affected by Trend. However, the thing they were most effective by the trends were the trending colors. So color does have quite a lot to do with what brides are looking for. Help ever. That's what the mystery is. You have to use color and very, very creative ways so that your invitation can be elimination proof to various brides. So let's kinda investigate how then we would use color in wedding invitation designs. I'm going to use the blush and gray trend, and I'm going to show you various invitations from the real brides and how they took that trending color palette and interpreted it in their own way and came up with their particular invitations sweep. So let's take a look. Our first bride, using a blush and grey theme for her wedding, made this romantic choice. She chose to put her monogram names and additional accent text in the soft pink Schenck. She then completed her invitation with this beautiful laser cut, felling grab. Monica or next Brian actually chose a blushed peak current stock for her invitation. She then paired it with a charcoal pink and this deep, beautiful, sweet rhythm follow rain is my favorite caraway layout and also probably my favorite version of this invitation that recreate it many, many times, believe it or not, the groom was responsible for choosing the blushed liner and ribbon for this amazing invitation. They chose to mount on a dark grey backing Park. I loved the way the ribbon on this design serves to hold the insert cards in place on the back of the card. My next Brian showed her individuality by putting her wording in the blush pink and her design element, which matched liner in the dark gray. Now, Jennifer chose blush for their names and a dark grey for the rest of her wording on this perfect country, she invitation, complete with craft colored envelopes. Sarah was another bride who chose a blush in grey theme for her country sheet wedding, but she chose blush paper and printed her texts. And Greg, she also added a nod to greenery. Adding this lovely liner and beautiful light green ribbon. And then she emailed her invitation suite in air craft colored envelope to create the perfect country sheet presentation package. And now here is another romantic design using the laser cut belly rack. Michelle chose this emboss and true card for her invitation paper and then use blush IQ for renames and grey for the rest of the protected and last but definitely not least, Macy chose this gorgeous design twist on a traditional layout per gilt edged invitation was mounted to this flush card. So as you can see, that each bride chose the same trending color palette, the end results, whereas individual as each of the bride's themselves. So let's take a look at some additional non eliminating ways that you can add a color. You can show your invitations with colorful liner. And just a note that one of the things that differentiates a higher-end brand of invitations from a moderately priced one is their selection of quality minor, you can add color with a ribbon, or as we've seen previously, you can add color to your text or additional design elements. Then you can also display your invitation designs with different color back in cards. Another great way to add color is by adding a belly wrap or something similar like in this best-selling invitation. Take a look at various ways. This design was customized to match your brides color scheme for her wedding. And now, Janet, a little perspective to everything we've been discussing. I am by no means stating that trendy, colorful invitations will never sell or that dark colors also will never sell. By all means, they view cell, we're done some beautiful designs with dark colors and trending elements. But the point that we have been making is that your neutrals and you're less trendy items will be selling more often than a design that is very trendy or has dark colors. Why? Because your neutrals, your pared down invitations will fit many more brides. You're very, very on trend invitations will be fitting a specific bride and not too many of them the same with your darker colors. So by percentages, you're darker colors and you're very, very trendy type invitations will sell less because there's not that a market for them. The larger market were you will be selling one invitation possibly many, many times, is going to be in this area that we've been discussing with your evergreen elements, which are your neutrals and your very pared-down, very simplified, yet beautiful elements thrown in those types of invitations and all which now brings us to the cardinal rule for the mystery of color. Do you recall our cardinal rule for the mystery of design? That cardinal rule was less, more, well, this lesson's cardinal rule is similar, but different, yet extremely important. And the cardinal rule for the mystery of color is that less cells more. And now, let's continue our progress on our project. For lesson one, we hadn't you identify at least three different design elements that she saw trending. For lesson two, we asked you to start looking at those design elements. You could pair them down a little bit less than the paradox of design. We asked you to take a look at yourself and your interests and select a design style that you thought you fit right into and that you would be feeling more comfortable in designing. And so for this lesson's project, we're going to ask you to take that design style that you've selected. And in the mindset of that particular design style, select one of those elements that you identified. And by selecting that element, this is the you will then incorporate in your final wedding invitation design. So once you've selected that element, then begin to really start brainstorming and being creative. And beginning to think out how you would like to pull this design and that flavor into the format of your final design. And just let us know which one you've selected. So then we'll see you for our next lesson, which is. 7. The Mystery of Layout: Hello and welcome to the mystery of layout. In this lesson, we're going to take a MOOC and look at some good layouts and some not-so-good layout. So then what disgust your good design and how your good design can lead to multiple sales arriving. So let's get going. So let's begin this lesson with the anatomy, you might say, of what goes into an invitation design. Do you remember this design are bestseller in imitation of all time. I was kind of kidding about it, but it's serious. This is simply a piece of paper. And there's the two elements that go into a design for a wedding invitation. You have the actual paper that it's printed on. And then the layout that you're changing for each of your brides, you have to print somebody else's names on them. So you're always having to change your wording, correct. But it could be a base as simple as a plain piece of paper or as an example of what we had shown you previously, this gorgeous invite. It is the layout, but the paper has a design on it. So there are two elements to this invitation. There is the design of the paper, and then there is the design of the wording that is printed on this particular invitation. And it's the two of these in combination that make an invitation design just as simply as it is the paper and the invitation wording that creates the full invitation design as well as the technique of printing. This one in particular is foil. This one was engraved. So that is also part of the design of the invitation. So the Pretty process is not integral to the design, but it does come into play somewhat. And similarly, for this design, this design is the color of the paper, the Ribbon, and the accrue white invitation background paper that is the paper design or your foundation that you're printing your wording on. So this is the layout element, your design, but this bass paper, you're backing paper, your ribbon, or also design elements. So it is the hole that is your actual design. And we've discussed a lot about how that has to be pared down in order to not overshadow the bride. In previous lessons. So the majority of what we will be discussing is our layout with a wording that in combination with gorgeous elements or the simplicity of just a thin backing card frame and a ribbon mixed with your gorgeous layout, that it can be an an invitation that's just outstanding. So that is the one portion that I didn't want to differentiate between the Leo portion and then the paper design portion, just that we can distinguish between what we're speaking about specifically. But the entire hole is your invitation design as a whole. Okay, so now I want to tell your story. But seriously, this is the story of how I began to understand that invitation design wasn't something that you just simply through this so beautiful, trendy design on an invitation through some more wording on it with the right names, right spelling, and Pao, You had an invitation. This was how I learned that there was actually a skill, an extreme skill of beauty and aesthetic that went into designing wedding invitations. And the story is that as I've spoken many dimes before in this class, I did not start designing. By being a designer. I was very fortunate to be a retailer for William Arthur. Back in the day when William Arthur was William Arthur. And every year William Arthur would distribute these albums. And I would be in stunned fascination as I would look through the albums and see the new designs that they came up with. But there were still using for, I would say about 80% of them, the papers and paper designs and we just spoke about the papers of years previous and previous. But they were tweaking the wording layout, that type styles, and the text layouts. And they were adding just a smidge element of the trend to push them trend forward. Yet at the same time, Classic and elegant and gorgeous. And as I said, I would be stunned and amazed whenever he would open my invitation albums and it was such a delight for me each year when I got a new album. Then, very unfortunate for us, William Arthur was bought out by crane because of everything that was happening in the wedding invitation industry. And as Crane had been an industry leader in the upscale paper market for hundreds of years. They move on volume Arthur and purchase them. And it was quite a traumatic event for us and for my brides. But for us, we had done such exceptional business with William Arthur because they had produced such gorgeous, beautiful invitations that were so easy to sell that at the time they moved and were taken over to crane, We had become growth partners with them. Which was a designation that you're very, very high retelling locations we're we're getting. And for instance, here in Houston, there was a invitation company that had been here since the sixties and they were growth partners. So it was a super extreme privilege and honor for us. And then crane happened. And Crane has always been a more traditional business executive type company. And there is an executive formality to their invitations and the products that they were reproducing beautiful papers. However, the design aesthetic was not really. They're very, very formal. These would be the types of invitations and I would see distributed at Embassy residents occasions, which I did grow up in that sort of environment in Latin America. So I was very familiar with that tone of invitation, that formality that is required. However, it's a little too stale for your wedding invitation. So when they were purchased by crane, William Arthur had to be moved. So there were states apart and the majority of the employees did not move with William Arthur, the brand into the crane brand. So the following year, when I received my beautiful william Arthur owl bomb and opened debt. I was extremely surprised that there was no stunning, all in amazement. And it was rather stale and rather lifeless and very crane sprayC. So the same beautiful invitation as a, for instance that William Arthur had produced with this fantastic layout. Now had a different layout. And for example, let me show you how Crane is showing these on their website for sale. And so we look here in that invitation though, it's very cute because this is just a great design. It's just so, so scaled in its trendiness. And of course it's just simply a black, beautiful black piece of card stock, foil printed. And so whatever is printed here doesn't really exist with the paper design. This is a layout that William Arthur, or one of William Arthur's invitation designers came up with. So let's look at this invitation and kind of dissect what goes into it and makes it beautiful. Okay, first, let's try to dissect here what's going on. First of all, let's take a look at the design of the paper. The paper design that we're working with. Your design is on your top right-hand corner. Let's take a look at the direction of the design and the angles that this design fills out. Can you see kind of like an angle that this design is pointing in? And now let's look at the wording. In a sense, this wording coming in the opposite corner is also angle in this direction and it's taking up space pretty evenly. So you almost have a right top corner coming down, then a left bottom corner going up. So it's matching the design. So that's creating this beautiful open whitespace left space, if you will, on the invitation that allows invitation to breed and that allowed you to read and to take in what's going on in the invitation itself. Next, let's take a look here at the kilogram. The design element is kilogram because the full invitation wording is down below. So this piece here is their design element that is not conflicting with the design element of the paper. And it's gorgeously sized, gorgeously spaced. And checkout the layout of it. You've got it block font and the end is in the beautiful bird GAS script, creating this element of design that suppose chic and very modern, yet very elegant, come down further. Wonderful spacing between the design of the calibre and your wording. Your invitation, written in a very formal but non stuffing all caps text font. And it's juxtaposed against the names of the bride and groom again, and the beautiful Vergennes flocked. And now with the rest of the invitation, simply end the formal text font. It would be lovely. However, again, you're adding to the bottom and additional element of the beautiful bird guest font. So there is that text, script, text, script balance. And the kilogram is in text script tags per block script lock. And it's modern, formal, elegant with the invitation design that is modern yet formally elegant on the black. So that is why this as a whole is such an extremely well put together and beautifully laid out invitation as a whole. The wording layout with the invitation paper design is a perfect match. And if it's a thing of beauty, I'm sorry, ladies and gentlemen, I just they get video to follow the law. I think this is a absolutely beautiful design. Again, unfortunately, I always saw it once because that's the other case. It is. It does it doesn't fit and everybody's wedding. And then of course they did the liner, which I mean add this liner and you just have to have the liner. You can't have temptation without that layer. Alright? And so that is the basis of my story, is that when I started seeing the difference between the two brands, the William Arthur crane brand and the previous William Arthur brand, where someone was producing these beautiful designs. I started seeing it is the layout on top of that gorgeous paper design. That is the whole of the invitation. And the layout of the text has so much to do with the actual design and the whole the invitation paper and the fabulous layout that blends with the invitation is what makes an invitation fantastic. One without the other is not a beautiful invitation. It could be lovely. It could be, Oh, it's nice. But when the two of them are together and they pop, you have a fabulous design. And that's what we're looking to learn how to create and learn to think in that avenue, in that manner so that we can also create those designs that just go, wow, pop, Fantastic. I gotta have it says the bribe. Okay, so now let's take another look at another great design. And again, very weighing, we might vary wing design for Crane. And this design came out just as the country sheep trend was popping. So it was a response to country chic. And I think she did a really great job on this particular invitation. It again is a simple card. That's your card design part of invitation. There's nothing but the ink and the layout that you are working up to create the design. So one of the specific things before the obvious was the color of this ink. This color is, it was called mushroom, but it's just a, a kind of neutral that really, really works. It doesn't computer draw attention to itself and it kind of blends, but it's kind of like that perfect. Just country ish, but cheeky ish type of color. So let's take a look at what we see with the design layout of this invitation. First of all, looking at your whitespace, you've got a great balance. There is more text and ink on your top portion. However, if you look at the bottom on the wedding venue location. She's added these lovely swirls to give it a balance to the bottom so that it doesn't look so top heavy. Then you've got swirls rounding all over this invitation. The font again is your per guest with some little flourishes. And there's just lovely curves throughout this invitation. There's the circular motion. There's just that flowing, circular motion flowing throughout the invitation, giving it a very friendly, comforting feel, a very welcoming feel. So you're ready getting the idea that this will be a very welcoming, very formally, informal wedding, if you will, because it's still very elegant. Yet because of the layout, of the softness of the scrolls and of the flow of the invitation. You're feeling this very pleasant open below we invitation to an event that should in fact match this invitation which many of these countries Sheikh weddings were very welcoming, very relaxed, very friendly, but lovely, elegant wedding ceremonies. So that I thought was spectacular. But remember, yes, well, they came out with this imitation in white and we had an unfortunate incident. There are some, when you are, you have a store and you are working with many people who see things in a nobleman choose to turn things and pick from here to there and mix things up. Well, she loved this, but she also loved the country sheep design. So we came up with this, which conflicts and is Nutch as stunning as this, as clear as this. So there are complex in good design. And so there you go. Not home, good design belongs together, just like we covered in our last lesson. And just as not all good design belongs together, not all fonts belong together. So let's talk a little bit about fonts. Because next to your actual paper design and layout that you'll be creating, your fonts will play the next most important part, possibly a more important part in your wedding invitation design. And now there's so much more information to cover on layout and type styles. And because I couldn't put all of that information into this class, that's a trend rural about selling wedding invitations. I will be creating a class solely for layouts. So you'll want to make sure to follow me so that when that goes live, you'll be notified and be able to take that class as well. But in this class I wanted to cover just a few things about choosing your type styles. Type styles have personalities. And I have spent hours sometimes with one invitation just going through fonts and searching for fonts and letting font speak to me and tell me what they feel about my invitation and or what they think about the paper that I'm putting them on. I listened to my fonts. I look at their personalities and I make sure that their personalities, their styles, their aura that they give off, that we pick up some consciously matches the paper layout that I placed them on, and also that they match each other. For instance, if you're producing and laid out a gorgeous, very tailored invitation, you're going to want to select type styles that also match that flavor, if you will. You're not going to want very scripty, romantic kind of fonts. In a tailored Foundation. There's going to be a juxtaposition that just won't jive with someone's eye. That will look even if it's beautiful, we'll look kinda off. So you're, you're going to want to have a consistency through the paper, through your fonts and through the way they interact with each other. So to give a good example of what I'm referring to, let's look again at this invitation. And of course you'll remember how I fond over this mutation and how fabulous and fantastic I think it is as a whole, a design matching, a layout. And then we have this new version of this invitation. And so why am I so underwhelmed To say the least about this version of the invitation. It is a 100% having to do with the type style selection and usage. That type styles are informal and insignificant and on top of it there using the lower case. So it's even more underwhelming. It's drawing even less attention to itself. It's almost as if it's apologizing the paper is glorious. And then you kind of have. And then you can come to my website and if you want an apology, the wordiness center, so the whitespace is off balance and your eye kind of does it know where to go? It just doesn't work. It. There is so much flipped in the spaces and the layout. There is no harmony in this design. But now, let's take a look at this same design on a different color paper. When I came upon this version of the design, I suddenly felt like, Okay, that works. That one pulls it off. What is the difference between the two? The differences in the color of the background. The green is a much more friendly color. It's a much more inviting. And if you notice, the design on top is not so stark in contrast with the background. So it doesn't draw too much attention to itself. And again, we're working with text that is centered on the page. And because there's not such a harsh contrast in the confetti dots on top. The center layout does not contrast so much as it does when it's on black. Again, you have the usage of more casual type styles, but the whole is more friendly, more inviting, doesn't speak to us of a very formal black tie events. It speaks to us. It's a little more, little more fun, more casual, more open. But then again, the names are in all caps now. So even though there is a little less formality, there's still importance placed on the names of the bride and the group. And this, I believe, does work. So as you can see, your type style choices had such a great impact on the layout of your invitation. And now let's shift gears a little bit. And let's talk about design elements and how some elements that you might choose or you might create for your designs and your invitations might evolve. So I want to show you how designs evolve when brides come in and select your particular element that you've created. Now are beautiful bride, Olivia, who you saw in the mystery of the bride, the princess. She selected a wedding invitation that is stunning and beautiful, and she chose the gold engraving as well as the engraving or her invitation. How ever we had a bride that took an element and use it on this design. So Carolyn took the same foundation as far as the invitation papers goes, but added the design element to frame. Her name's. Now, this gorgeous design didn't sell just once. It's sold again and again. And simply having these invitations on display would get you a rise. Creative juices flowing. We had keen says, use the same element, brides, using that element again and again. So let's discuss how a design can hop from one invitation to another invitation to another mutation. Used over and over again and kind of like morph into different things. So remember this invitation, this imitation was greater for a bride who came in looking for a foil design when coil had just begun to be used on wedding invitations, she warned coil and he wanted done right, and she wanted to fan monogram. So shortly after that, a friend of hers came in for her wedding invitations. And when is something completely different, but she was still in love with this one. So what did she do? She did, yes, for her invitation, again, foil printed, same font, same awesome monogram. And later on another bride solve this invitation and knew she had to have it. And did her own take on this invitation for her wedding. That's one way that an invitation element that you create can be turned into something new and how it rotates and hooves, invitation to another, to another. And your brides are coming in selecting something you've done. You can just put in a little twist on it. Let me show you another design that has evolved. This is one of my favorites because we actually created using Snapchat with the bride and the mother came in and we snapchat at her with the various colors that were available for her to use. And again, we created this when glitter was just beginning to be used in invitation. We wanted to do something that was beautiful and subtle, but yet still had some pizzazz. So this was the invitation we created for her with her insert cards and her gorgeous touch of gold. And she was also foil print it. Then we had another bribe cam in, fall in love with this, but she wasn't doing gold. She was doing rose gold. And she was doing something just a little more romantic. She used the same color. As far as your pocket went. Arose colour. Glitter, rat, rose colored foil. That just a little bit more romantic in her layout. And so that design element led to this morphing of the design and then lead to this interesting morph in a different wedding invitation. We've got again and with the pocket. And then lo and behold, our design element from our invitation before. A gorgeous touch. Glitter, very tastefully done with these wedding invitations. And that's how your design can be created in one place, can be used again and again and again. So now, this all brings us to our cardinal rule for this lesson. And our cardinal rule for this lesson is that though the brightest star, the layout is the throne that she sits on. So let's continue on with our project. So far we've chosen a one element that we want to explore for use on our final invitation design. And we've also selected our flavor, our design style that we want to pursue, and that we will be designing in for our final invitation design. So for this week, for your project, you're going to select your thoughts that you will be using in your final invitation. Now, the fonts that you're going to choose, you're going to want to remember that you've already chosen your flavor or your design style. So you want to make sure that they match and they meld and they work with that particular design style. You're also gonna wanna make sure that their work friendly and they're nice, and they go and blend with each other. So go ahead and select one if you're going to be very traditional. Or two, or at the most, read font styles that you would like to use and incorporate on your final invitation design. And when you've made your selection, place a small thumbnail image of the font you've chosen or the fonts you've chosen. And if you'd like, give us a little explanation of the reasons you thought that they worked well together. So then once you're done with that, come on back and join me for our next lesson, which is. 8. The Mystery of Protocol: I really want to congratulate you if you have stayed with this class thus far. I really believe that it means that you are seriously interested in a successful career as a wedding invitation designer. Now, designing an invitation is not the sole thing that creates success. I want to cover two areas that are vitally as important as designing, that go into establishing and creating a successful career and building up a reputation as being somebody who is trustworthy and produces a quality product in very many different ways. The first subject that we're going to discuss is protocol. Now, as a wedding invitation designer, it is essential that you learn wedding invitation protocol. Your job as a designer is not simply to create a beautiful looking wedding invitation, but it's also to know and understand the intricate details that are involved in included in wedding invitation protocol. And I'm going to discuss a few very cut and dry rules, but I can't stress enough how it is really as a designer of wedding invitations, it's your job to major on this particular subject. And even after this little bitty part of this class, I am going to suggest to you very strongly that you purchase this book by a crane and company. It is a full book on wedding invitations and the protocol that goes into them. The protocol of formatting your invitation, the protocol of addressing what invitations. And why do you say is that important? Because you are serving a bride. You're serving a bride who is coming to you with an event that is very likely at this time of her life, the most important event of her entire life. And you are creating what in some instances will actually become a historic document documenting this event of her life. One thing I like to think about as far as the importance of a wedding invitation is to understand the importance of an actual wedding. Since time and creation, Adam and Eve. There has been a family tree, a genealogical tree that continues to grow and grow and grow. Well, there are only three ways to edit the genealogical tree. One way is to be born. The second way is to be married. And the third way is to have a child. So of all those three, this is a one incident that is actually editing the worldwide family tree, which is why wedding invitations are so important. It's documenting that. So a bride is coming to you with this marvelous event that she has been planning and its changing all of the genealogical tree for all time. It will never be unchanged even if she gets divorced, it isn't edit in the genealogical tree. So you're being trusted with guiding your bride is through the process of wording this wedding invitation. It is not just your design, it is the words that go into creating this wedding invitation. So you, Brian is going to come to you a knowledgeable of how things are supposed to be laid out. So many times my Brides would come to me and say, I don't know how to word it, I need help. And I would tell them, well, you're not supposed to know how to word it because you've never done this before in your entire life, which was the majority of the time. And I would tell her that's my job. I do this every day. So I know how these things are supposed to be worded. I know what's supposed to go into what an invitation. I know the questions to ask you so that we properly right. This summons to your wonderful wedding. And I take it as my responsibility in taking her by the hand and guiding her through this. So wording is very, very important and I can't stress strongly enough how important it is for you to learn the proper protocol of wording a wedding invitation. So with that said, let's take a look at this one invitation and I'm going to go through it and I'm going to give you some bullet points of things that are very important for you to know and understand. As far as a protocol of wording and writing out a wedding invitation. First of all, I'd like to point out that the bride is the star and not the wedding of IC. That trend in a lot of wanting imitations posted online, but I have not had a bride that was interested in being overshadowed by her wedding as far as it being the star of her wedding invitation. So I would recommend very strongly against using that kind of wording as the design element and as the star. The very first thing that I want to point out is that, and I am specifically speaking to what an invitation designers that are producing product for the United States. I am not aware of protocol for other countries. However, if you're designing for another country is very important that you learn the protocol of your own country. So the very first thing I want to point out is that the bride goes before the groom. Again, many designs that I see posted online have this reversed and this is an extreme fo Paul, you was never put your groom before your bride. A bride traditionally has been, the bride is being given away in the wedding. So the bride is always listed first in the list of bride and groom. Now, another question that comes up often is in the line requests the honor of your presence. The spelling of honor, American spelling is HON OR and british spelling is HON RUR. However, we have kept the tradition of using british spelling. The RUR in more formal invitations. So this is not a must, but this is a preference of the bribe. A lot of times the bride will ask for your suggestion. And it's kind of been a tradition that the British spelling of honor is just more indicative of a more formal event. So a lot of times the bride's, we'll choose to use the formal spelling to indicate a little bit more formality of her event. Neither way is incorrect. However, I would like to connect that now to the date because an additional question that often arises is about how to write the year. People ask whether it is 2 thousand and 16, as in this wedding invitation or 2016. And many times we hear well here in the United States, we don't say and 16, so this is incorrect as it is stated here. That's both correct and incorrect because in your wedding invitations, it's important for you to maintain consistency. So the rule actually is if you are going British With Your Honor, then your year should be British format as well. And the British format is 2016. So if this was American spelling, the honor HON, OR of your presence, then you would also keep 2016 as your year. Also, the same thing follows with your apply cards. Should you be asking for the favor of a reply, you would make sure the uniformity is consistent and favor is spelled with the RUR. If you're going the formal British way, or if you're not going to form a British way, that of course you would spell it in the American way, which is with the, OR. Now, let's look at the second line on this particular invitation, which is the request for you to come to the wedding or the invitation itself. The wording is request, the honor of your presence or the honor of your presence is requested. Either way, you are requesting the honor of someone's presence. This wording requesting the honor of your presence is actually a rule that must be followed for a church wedding. When a wedding ceremony takes place in some place of worship, you must use the wording requests, the honor of your presence. There are various other ways that you might be able to word this invitation line. However, for places of worship, this the proper wording and it must be used for your wedding invitation. Taking a step back, capitalisation on your wedding invitation is purely following the rule that your proper pronouns are capitalised. You're Mr. and Mrs. would be each capitalised. Saturday would be capitalised, april would be capitalised. Your name of your venue, your street name, city, state, et cetera. Because this is a separate line, the word reception is also capitalised. Yet interestingly enough, to, in 2 thousand is capitalised. Please do not ask me why. I don't know. But this is a rule of protocol for wedding invitations. Another question many brides have is, where do I put my registry information on my wedding invitation, entry on claims wetting and Blue Book. The wording they use for that is that it is poor form to request to give that the presence of the guess is gift enough. The registry information obviously does not belong anywhere in your wedding invitation. The way to look at this is if I was drawing a birthday party for myself and I had on the bottom of my invitation, this is where you can buy me a gift. What would be your reaction if you receive that from me? And that really is the reaction of many guests when they receive invitations with written out front and center where you can buy me a gift. It's a tradition here in the United States that when somebody has a wedding, we come with a gift or we send a gift, or we buy gifts because we're celebrating. But it is not a requirement. It is merely a tradition that we have in honoring the new couple. So this is a tricky thing that you need to express to your brides that adding registry and information to their wedding invitation is not appropriate. When working with My Brides, what I tell them is what they wanted to do was make sure that they set up their wedding website and on the website have that information. But what they do is add into their wedding invitations, sweet, a little card that says, for more information about my wedding, please visit. And as they go there, your registry is front and center, so you're able to give them that information, but not place it into a wedding invitation where it might be offensive to some of your guests. And yes, this has happened. So it is a very, very sticky situation because your guests can be very put off by your brides requesting Egypt. So tread on this topic very carefully with your brides and educate them. So again, very, very important as a wedding invitation designer and consultant that you hung up on these very important details that go into wedding invitations. I've been, I guess, lurking Sheehan Pinel, slightly active, but mostly just watching and listening on various groups online for wedding invitation designers. And I recall one day when somebody posted the question as to how do you work this specific situation in a wedding invitation and various people kind of came up with different things. And I was like, there's actually a specific way they are to be rewarded for the certain situation and posted that there there are actually these rules, the proper way that it is supposed to be written. And of course, with your thumbs up and yes, she's right, cetera. There was also the response. Well, we're creatives so we can decide how we want something worded. And my response to that was, yes, we're creatives so we can decide how to design a wedding invitation, but we don't get to decide how it's worded because there are specific, again, rules and their specific protocol of how it is supposed to be worded to make it proper, Just like a sentence, there is a proper grammatical procedure you follow. We don't get to be creative and invent a different way to write a sentence. And the key here is, and I explained this, that though you think it can be any different ways, the bride is sending out this wedding invitation to her guests. And they're going to be many of those guests that know that what she has written creatively is improper and sometimes bad taste and sometimes just a what the heck response from her guess. So we don't get to create new ways of writing wedding invitations there. So people out there receiving them, knowing the proper way that something is to be written and formatted and invited. So creativity, yes, in your design and that is what we've been discussing. Do you want to sell more and well, let's follow what the market is doing and what the prion squat. But wording, wording is still buy the book and by the certain rules. And the rules are there for a reason. There are guests that are receiving this prize invitation that will be embarrassed for the bride. That will maybe possibly have a little bit of a whom thought toward the bright. So you don't want to embarrass your bride. You want her to look good. You are working for your bribe and making her not just the star of the imitation itself, but making her shine in front of her guests by following the rules, by doing things properly, and by causing her no embarrassment for having made a very obvious mistake. Which now brings us to our cardinal rule for this lesson. And the cardinal rule for this lesson is that quality attracts quality. So you tend to focus on attracting quality bride. Your product must be a quality product. And quality begins with knowing and having a very, very clear understanding. Wedding invitation protocol so that you can steer your bride in the proper and correct direction. And now in our next lesson, we will further investigate this topic of quality. But before we get there, do you know what time it is for your project? For this lesson, we're going to have you do just a little bit more work than you've done in your past lessons. Now, last project, you selected your fonts. So what I want you to do is kind of play around with fonts. We have placed invitation wording down in your project area. So I want you to take that wording and do three separate tapes on laying out that wording with your faucet, you select it. Now don't do any sort of design at this moment. That right now, I want you to first to kind of go what you would have thought. Essentially, you know, this is kind of traditional. We can lay it out this way with choosing fonts here or there, and laying out a invitation that you would feel kind of comfortable doing. The next thing I want to do is on the next invitation and same wording, same fonts. Just change your colors up a little bit and kind of get creative and a visit to produce anything that is a what you're thinking of that you're going to try to mark it, but this is just kinda trying to play and just feel free to be creative and playful and change up your colors a little bit. Select any colors you want. Select as many colors if you want. Just play around with it so that you just kind of get comfortable with working with fonts and, and just, just enjoying them. And then on your third layout, what I want you to do is be really adventurous and do something with the words that you wouldn't think of doing or daring to do. In a typical situation where you're actually working with the bride and just see what you come up with. And these are all exercises just to play around with your words, with your text, with your layouts, and with your font styles. Just to kind of get your creative juices going. And just also to open up a free yourself to be more adventurous and to just be more open to see how things could end up becoming and looking. Because sometimes playing around with pawns helps you to discover things that you otherwise would never, ever have imagined doing and may actually and work. So that's what you're supposed to do for this project. Just play around with three different layouts and then take a screenshot of them and put them up on your project area so that we can see what you're doing and people can even comment is c, l Either suddenly looks really great and something was really funny. And maybe that's what you wanted to, but just have fun. Rid. And then once you do that, come back and join us for our next lesson, which is. 9. The Mystery Of Quality: So now on the topic of quality, let's discuss the subject of actual product quality, the quality of your end result. There's so many things that go into making a physical product, a quality product. One of the first things that goes into creating a quality product will be the actual quality of the paper that you use to print your invitation on. There is definitely a wonderful luxury and a very good card stock. And it shows up in the final quality of your invitation. And again, one of the reasons I explained we did not use Janice paper was that physical quality difference in jazz paper besides that they are in China. So very hard to communicate with them and completely different situation working with somebody in a country that far away. The next thing that ads quality to your invitation is again, a paper of your envelope. This would be a very good can you here's the feel of that envelope quality. Envelope. As opposed to a thinner, lighter. As you can see, thinner, lighter, almost transparent envelope. Another thing that's going to add to the quality of your product is when you're putting a invitation together that has a vacuum card on it, the quality of the mountain that you do, the assembly of your product. This would be a more moderately priced invitation as opposed to a quality invitation. And what would be expected of a quality invitation. Those are some things that are so very important and they are understood sometimes subconsciously when you're receiving a product. Another thing that can really add to the lecture in the sense of a real quality product is the type of ribbon that you choose. So when you're selecting ribbon, you wanna make sure that you're not selecting your generic type of one-sided, you know, ribbon, you can find it Michael's, but you want to go with a much better quality ribbon. Just look at the shame in a ribbon quality that this particular brand holds. So that just adds so much luxury to the actual product. The next subject I'd like to talk about is the question of marketing to a discount bride versus marketing to a higher end broad. So now this entire class I had geared toward steering you as a graphic designer, toward designing for a higher end bride. And if you come with me this far and you're still not convinced and you think you would like to continue to design invitations that can be digitally printed by the bride herself or sold as a design or continuing to only create digitally printed products. Let me explain my reasoning behind why I have geared this class in that direction. And to do so, I'd like to tell you a story again about my experience. As a retailer, and as I had mentioned before, we opened our store and we were available and open to everyone and was wanting anyone and everyone to come into the store. Because when you're having to pay rent and you're having to pay electricity, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. You need as much business turning around in order to be able to pay your bills and to continue on to the following month. So it didn't matter who came through the door is you wanted their business. So I learned early on that there a distinct difference between a discount bride and a higher-end bride? And it was a surprising difference. I was first startled by my first encounters with a discount bride as I would sit down with them and I would spend the hours necessary to go through and put together their wedding invitation, design and wording, et cetera, and have that basically that whole sale under my belt shortly thereafter, they would then counter me with Oh, I've found it somewhere else less expensive. Will you meet that price? The first time that happened to me, I was startled, offended as they had done all the shopping with me. We had gone through so many different ways of looking at things. Am I helped them to design and to develop their final outcome of what this invitation was going to be, tweaked it and worked with them to make it something that was going to be spectacular. So then they turned around and looked for somebody selling the same vendor, but somebody that was offering a discount and then push that discount on me. Because if I didn't also offer them that discount, they would go and turn around and give it to this other person who was not doing any sort of designing with them. They just had a website up. You could put your information in and buy the same product, but not with all the different tweaks that this Brian can now take from what we had done and put them into this other Portal. So not wanting to lose my time, I agreed, though I was not happy about having to do so. And then I learned that that was not the only thing this person wanted. And then the next thing was not the only thing this person wanted. And I begin to see with a few other incidences of different things that we have in the store when we had people shopping for the bottom line price point, they were increasingly and increasingly more difficult to deal with. And then what was surprising that, on the other hand, when I had a bride coming in and interested in equality invitation and a quality product that bride expected to pay more. But she also expected better product, a higher quality product, and that bride was the easiest, bright I had ever worked with. And consistently, my higher end brides. We're more friendly, more willing to spend money, more willing to buy a higher product in order to get a higher quality of product. And just very easy and open to work with and so pleasant. So I started putting 22 together, thinking that as a retailer, you are making the same percentage profit on each of your products, whether it's a discount product or whether it's a higher end product. So your work, you basically the same amount of time with each bride. You don't work less time with a discount bride. You don't work more time with higher Eventbrite, we're equally the same amount of time to produce the same product, a wedding invitation. However, if you're selling a discount product, the percentage of a discount product is the same as a percentage of a higher end product. But since this one costs more, that same percentage nets you a higher dollar amount. So literally, you're making a higher amount of return by working with higher end Brides, as opposed to working the same amount of hours and making a lower dollar figure amount with a discount bright. So I quickly learned that though this was pleasant, working with a higher return, the unpleasantness of the personnel. And he said, I would come into contact with with bribes that were discount chopping was pretty much a thing that turned me to focus more on a higher end bright. And that is what I want to relate to you. The bride that's coming to you for quality product will be very pleasant to work with. And if she's trying to nitpick about pricing, generally shoe shopping for the bottom line, as she will be willing to walk away. And if you're in a situation where you're not trying to pay some bills in order to keep your doors open. It behooves you to learn to let that bride go and learn to let her take that little headache to someplace else, hopefully to vista print or something like that. And now on the topic of vista print, that's the other side of working with your discount bride. And this was also something that I've found as we were opening our store and we were beginning to work in the business of wedding invitations at the time that we were really starting to move into specializing and wedding invitations, there was a company called wetting papered devices. And what they did was they were buying up millions and millions of dollars worth of ads so that anytime anyone search for wedding invitations, there was what he paper Diva is front and center. And their model was this digital design, quick printing of invitation. So they had a whole catalog of all kinds of different digital designs that you can purchase and you put your information in and set for it, and then it came and walleye, You had a wedding invitation. You no longer needed a wedding invitation consultant. And what do you paper diva has perplexed me to no end because there was no place that I could find where I could advertise without being overshadowed by the multimillion dollar advertising budget that they had. And so it made my life very unpleasant and very difficult. However, what in paper give us essentially no longer access. They were a part of the Shutterfly family. So if you go to Shutterfly, you can now find them within Shutterfly. But as a much more reduced level and they're not advertising the way they used to. Basically, the lesson learned is that this business model does not work. This business model is not sustainable. When in paper, Devos was doing everything they could spending all the money they could to get the bride to their website. And as successful as they seemed to be, they could not sustain that model. They are no longer essentially in existence because the model doesn't work. The model that does work is the longstanding model of your wedding invitation consultant that is working with you. Hopefully, face to face, even if it's Skype to Skype, zoom to zoom. Working with you individually and producing a product for the bribe, even when you have invitations posted on your website to sell, you're still going to be personally in contact with that Brian. You're still going to give them personal service. You're still gonna hear them, you're still going to work with them. So that's another reason to steer yourself away from solely that digital design model. It doesn't pulled up in the long term as far as creating a sustainable livelihood. And to give you an example, these are by no means we're outward numbers, however, our numbers were substantially enough that it carried us for over 12 years. And just to note on that, because we did open exactly during the time that the economy crashed within our first year, I believe it was every single line of credit, every single credit card, every single option of financing. My business dried up completely. So from the point I believe it was 2009 and from the point on until the end of by physical brick and mortar, we were on a cash basis. We never had line we never had credit cards that we put anything on. It was solely cash. And that cash came from our wedding invitation designs. So being a designer and a provider of high-quality wedding invitations is a very viable business. It's such a viable business. There is someone who has their own Facebook group who the last I heard made $75 thousand a month regularly. So we're talking about a business that can very, very certainly sustain you. But it's that business to the high-end bright. So that's another thing to consider. But then of course the option is yours. And as long as you're learning to use the Kernel roles that we have been talking about. I'm sure that adding those two digital designs will also help you immensely. So everybody is on a different path. And so the next subject I'd like to discuss under the topic of quality in my mind, is the myth of the entrepreneur being your own boss, the Girl Boss. Lately, I have been seen pose and little blurbs and even products and things and even stores about the Girl Boss and just this fantasizing about being your own boss world. And I want to tell you, being your own boss is not all that it's chalked up to be. When you are a wedding invitation designer. You might be able to tell yourself when you get to sit down and design and when you get to talk to your vendors and things like that. But essentially, you're really not your own boss. Every bride that books you becomes your boss. Your responsibility is to her, as we've already discussed, this is a super, super important event in this brides life. And you delivering a quality product on time and perfectly is a job that takes a whole lot of discipline and a whole lot of stress. Unfortunately, sometimes when you're dealing with mistakes, some of your vendors or some of your providers might make you, or the person that's responsible to providing your bride a quality product. And now your job, once you book that Brian does not end until you have delivered the final invitation, sweet, and your bride is happy, then you can close off that particular bribe chapter and she is no longer your boss. But you are not your own boss. When you provide a service that you are working for someone else, you are following their instructions, you are following their taste. Sometimes abroad will like something that you specifically aren't really happy with. But it is her invitation and you obey the bright, you'll pay your boss. So there's kind of like a mindset that you need to have. You need to be self-disciplined and you need to be responsible for moving your own career forward. But you also need to understand that you are providing a service and you are serving your client. And at this point in time, your client is either either your bride or the bride's parents. So you are providing a service for them. See, you're working for them. So I just wanted to clarify that there's a lot of, you know, all this fantasy world thing about being your own woman. But when you're running a business, many times, you're still working for someone else and sometimes it's a little more stressful because everything that you do reflects back on your business and the reputation that your business has. So in that sense, also, you producing a quality product, you working efficiently and effectively and in a very friendly manner with a bright even when you have, you know, disputes or, or things that just like you really kinda don't agree with, you need to maintain a very professional demeanor. And there's one thing that you need to understand is that your business future is your reputation. And a lot of times we see things going on about reviews here, reviews there. One thing to know is that there are statistics that a negative response to you or your business will be broadcast whether verbally or online. At least seven times, more often than a positive response. So you can't just, you know, oh, I gotta bribe and just, you know, chalk it off to well, you do whatever you want. You're creating a business, you're creating a future for your business and you're creating a reputation. So all of these things and the integrity of your reputation is important. You serving your bryan promptly and courteously is important. It's important for you and for the future of this career that you are developing as a wedding invitation designer. So those are serious things to consider. Those are serious things to away. And that's a balanced to remember that these are the responsibilities that come with becoming your own boss. No, they don't own you, but in essence, they kind of own a little bit of your time while they are your client. Though, they can't tell you what to say. They kinda can't tell you what to do because it's their invitation and you are doing this for them. So there's your Myth of the Girl Boss and being your own boss. But now, as this is our last class, I want to leave you with one saying that as a wedding invitation retailer or this one thing that would particularly irk me when brides would first come in and begin looking for wedding invitations. One of the things I've heard very often was casually throwing this out. Well, they're only going to be thrown away. So now, before we discuss your final project, I want to leave you with the answers that I would give my bride so that you can arm yourself with the same answers. My answer to the bride's would essentially be yes. Many of your guests will eventually throw these away. And your flowers will also be thrown away. Whatever is not eaten at the reception is thrown away. You'll be wearing your dress Only one time, and the music will be a onetime thing. Ever. The wedding invitation is the one thing that your guess will have a personal relationship with. It is the one thing that they will have in their hand at their home for probably two months. They will be seen at daily. And I can guarantee you that there's gonna be more of your guess that we'll remember what your wedding invitation look like and what your dress look like because that's what they have contact with personally. And another thing I like to tell them is that yes, even though some of your guests will throw these away, q will not be throwing yours away. Your parents will be throwing years away. Your grandmother won't be throwing that away. And essentially, a wedding invitation serves as a historic document. And your children are going to see your wedding invitation. Your grandchildren are gonna see your wedding invitations. Your wedding invitation is something that stays with you. Your KC gets eaten, you dress gets put away. You don't go back to the venue. But your wedding invitation is in your home and it serves as a reminder of this amazing. And with that, I'd like to share with you my grandparents wedding invitation to kinda give you a framework to put this. And this is my grandmother and my grandfather on my father's side. And they're winning in partition. And I believe possibly somehow the value that I feel that needs to be placed on a wedding invitation is because my parents don't have a wedding invitation. My parents below, and it's a really wonderful story of the reason why they load. But as I was a child, I would look through my grandmother's photo album and I would see every one of my very many aunts and uncles in their wedding dresses or wedding garb. And alongside of it was a wedding invitation. And then when it got to my father's page, there was no What, an invitation. There was no picture, no record of the event. So the event to happen, they were married on the courtyard steps and I think ever since those days as a child, I would see this historic record and long to have the same historic record from my parents. So it's possibly my life quest to bring wedding invitations back to value and importance in our culture. It shows the reason that I decided to create this class. My heart is to see phenomenal designers rise up and create phenomenal wedding designs. These records of this wonderful and generational treat editing event. And so by possibly with training and with classes, we can raise up a generation of phenomenal wedding invitation designers that bring back that honor to the wedding, the patient, so that a bribe will never again save, that, just can throw it away. She will understand the value of it. But at a cheeky side, I have also let out two brides who say that in a really fancy way that we do have brides come in here and make fun of what another bright sent out for her wedding invitation. So even if somebody doesn't keep it, it still doesn't matter. It's still important. It is you and your wedding and the representation it is to your guests that you are sending it out to. Then gradually you arrive to your final projects. Okay? So we picked our trends were centered on a particular flavor, a particular style that you would like to focus on as a designer. Or for this particular, what an invitation design. You brainstormed various different ways you might implement that particular trend or that particular style. Then we picked our type styles and the fonts that we'd like to use for a particular wedding invitations that we're designing. Now, this final project, what you're going to do is take the wording that we've provided and begin to lay out and flesh out your wedding invitation using all of the cardinal rules that we've been sharing with you. Now you're welcome to post your final design. But granted, some people may feel uncomfortable with sharing something that they're wanting to sell and to display as their own product. So Granted, that's very understandable. So feel free to also describe what it is that you're planning to do or how your plan to implement that. And finally, do make sure that you come back to your project and update us when you and to have success by implementing all of these cardinal rules we've been sharing and all the information we've been sharing on a little journey. So that is it. My Ladies and gentlemen. I thank you so much for sharing this time with me, giving me a listening ear. And I hope that we will be sharing some time again in the future. So until then, goodbye and phenomenal luck in your career as a wedding invitation designer.