Ashley and James are two mechanical engineers whose citrus and chambray wedding invitations reflected a modern design sensibility for their Wild Onion Ranch wedding here in Austin, Texas. They were both actively involved in the design process, and wanted their invitation to reflect a masculine and feminine sensibility – while also incorporating gears, if at all possible.

For their save-the-date, we went the postcard route. Something simple and quirky with two vintage Austin postcards and a welcome note on the front, and Ashley‘s handwriting scanned in as the back. I love the 5″x7″ size as, while it’s more postage, definitely has an impact!

We opted for an unusual shape in the long and narrow, as well as an off-centered assembly. As guests opened the kraft envelopes, they were greeted with a blind printed main invitation texture and the front of the RSVP postcard that had the couple’s separate “venn diagrams” with appropriate descriptions of each of their personalities. As you unwrapped the chambray band and wax seal, you revealed the shared qualities of the couple as the “overlap” in their diagram. I loved the texture in the large swaths of ink via the two color letterpress as it’s perfectly imperfect and gives a really big graphic impact. Underneath the Venn Diagram postcard was their info card and finally the invitation. The latter was at two sided effort who’s back was a large ink swath again in a medium blue, with a darker blue outline a technical sketch of a complex gear-oriented machine. Pretty perfect! The front of the invitation was a mix of blind printing and grey ink for the invitation wording, while the machine drawing was blind printed to the left hand side.

The rest of the couple’s day-of paper goods incorporated the same quality of modern fonts in a range of greys, blues and chambray to create the perfect mix of modern and mechanical for these two!

Photos by the ever-so-talented Heather Curiel.
Letterpress Printing by Thomas Printers.

Also featured here on Oh So Beautiful Paper.