Unique wedding invitations are just about the best possible gift I feel I can give to a family member about to get married. It's not something that I like to do for clients that often, but I love designing them for family members.

I guess you could say it's another hobby of mine, even though it's very much related to my business of teaching calligraphy to others. I love it so much.

My cousin Whitney is a very classic girl with a modern twist. I knew she and her mom would have very timeless decor at the wedding with simple elegance, so I conveyed that in a nearly all-calligraphed invitation.

The twist? Printing the names instead of lettering them. It sounds like a gimmick when I write it out like this, but it helps break up the blocks of calligraphy without making the invitation appear busy.

The ceremony invitations were done mostly in text with special little flourishes here and there.

It's hard to tell from the photos, but the invitation paper is off-white and the printed text is a dark olive green. A slight variation on the traditional black and white invitation.

I didn't know a whole lot about how the reception was going to go, but it turns out the invitations set the tone for the celebration perfectly. The venue was an old 1800s meeting hall with cream walls, white 10"+ moulding, original hardwood floors and stone masonry construction. The party was decorated wall to wall with garlands of doilies and large center-pieces of baby's breath. Simple, yet oh-so-elegant.