The complete wedding stationery checklist

In order of when it is needed

Working backwards from the date.

• Save the dates — three to six months ahead.
• Main invitations — eight to ten weeks ahead, allowing time for addressing and posting.
• Ceremony-specific inserts — with the invitations.
• Menu cards, place cards and table numbers — two to three weeks ahead, once numbers are firm.
• Signage and welcome boards — one to two weeks ahead.
• Thank-you cards — after, but design them before, while you still have energy.

The proofreading rule

Have three people check names, dates and venue independently. A misprinted date on 500 invitations is the most expensive typo in printing, and the person who wrote it is the least likely to spot it.

Quantities, which everyone gets wrong

Count households, not people. A family of five receives one invitation, and ordering per guest is the most common way to end up with 300 spare cards.

Then add ten per cent. There are always late additions, spoiled envelopes, and two or three people who want one as a keepsake. Reordering a small top-up later costs more per card than the original run did, because setup is charged again.

• Invitations — households, plus 10%.
• Menu cards — one per cover, plus a few spares per table.
• Place cards — one per confirmed guest, printed as late as possible.

Paper and finish

Wedding cards are kept, handled and often photographed, which justifies spending on weight and finish in a way most printing does not. 350 gsm and above feels appropriate in the hand; below 300 does not.

Foil and embossing both carry a one-off die cost, which makes them reasonable on a run of several hundred and expensive on fifty.

Working backwards from the date

Anything tied to a date should be ordered from the date backwards, not from today forwards. Take the event, subtract transit for the destination, subtract production, then subtract a few days for the round of artwork correction that almost always happens.

That last allowance is the one people leave out, and it is the one that turns a comfortable schedule into a rushed one.