Jill & Rafael's Wedding Suite

We’d known Jill and Raphael for quite some time. They started off as our neighbors, just next door to our Cherokee Street location, and Jill eventually started working at The Firecracker Press as a typesetter and part-time shopkeeper. We hosted poetry readings for Raphael, along with a Saturday afternoon reading series. We collaborated on several musical performances combining traditional instruments and the sounds of printing presses pounding out percussive noise. Their presence flowed effortlessly in and out of our studio, through their living room, and along the sidewalk that joined our two spaces. Jill and Raphael eventually announced their engagement and asked if we’d design and print their wedding invitations. Jill gave us a tattered book that belonged to her grandfather, told us she’d be sourcing all of the wedding day needs from thrift shops and second-hand stores (including the wedding dress), and said they’d be getting married on her families property in rural Missouri. They needed a save-the-date, a proper invitation reflecting a wide variety of personal touches, and an RSVP card that spoke to the wedding couple’s love for reading. We knew exactly what to do. The first challenge was to incorporate Jill’s grandfather’s book into the design and production of the save-the-dates. We got permission to cut the spine off of the book and to print upon the individual pages, combining Jill’s family’s past with her own, future story. Since the pages were fragile we pasted each one to heavy chipboard and distressed the whole thing with a special, not so delicate, process that we keep top-secret (shh!). With the save-the-date cards in the mail we had some time to start developing the invitation and RSVP card. We didn’t have to go far to start gathering details about Jill and Raphael’s unique story, and over beers one afternoon a plan was hatched. Raphael was a writer and educator. Jill was a philosophy major, artist, and junk hound. Both grew up in small-town Missouri, had an appreciation for their roots, and liked objects that told stories. We started collecting ephemera from library books and gathering inspiration from everything from livestock to the Dewey Decimal System.

 Eventually we’d designed a wedding invitation that combined lots of special touches (book plates to bare feet), and a map with directions to the wedding location and hotel. When it came to the RSVP we thought back to the save-the-date cards using Jill’s grandfather’s book. This time we sourced vintage library cards of various colors and condition, printed the RSVP information directly onto them, and slipped them into a special pocket that we pasted onto the invitation. When the whole invitation folded together it was a self-contained story of Jill and Raphael’s unique personalities, and it set the tone for their fabulous wedding day to come.

Details: Save-the-Date Cards with custom distressing - 125 Qty. | Invitations w/RSVP Card and Envelope using sourced materials - 150 Qty. | Outer Envelope - 150 Qty.

Invitation Budget: $2800.00

Note: Our wedding invitations are custom designed and printed, by hand, at our studios. We think everyone has a unique story and the invitations we design and print reflect individual attention. If you’re interested in a once-in-a-lifetime experience, let us know!