When it came time in the wedding planning process to order my invitation suite, I was immediately drawn to the calligraphy handwritten addressing on beautiful shiny gold envelopes. I was also immediately discouraged when I saw the price these beautiful envelopes.
Of course I was determined to figure out a way to have this type of envelope as part of my invitation suite. Addressing them by hand would have been the cheapest route but I have horrendous handwriting so that wasn't an option for me. I could pay to have Shutterfly, where I purchased my invitations, address them for me but that wasn't an expense I was willing to spend. My alternative? My Silhouette Cameo 3!
Here are the steps I took to my DIY Wedding Invitation Envelope Addressing:
Open up your Silhouette Studio. Go to page set up and make your page 5x7 which is the generic size of a wedding invitation envelope. If you're using a bigger or small envelope, just make your page the size of your envelope.
Type the name and address in the font of your choice. Center all of your text so it is aligned center in your envelope.
Measure where you want the addressee name to be. I chose 2" down from the top (starting on the 3" march). This position will very depending on which font and size of font you decide to go with. This gave me enough space on the top right corner for the postage stamp.
Center the address beneath the name to your liking.
Notice I didn't leave space for a return address at the top left corner. I chose to have my return address on the back flap of the envelope.
Here's how I measured our address on the same page in Silhouette Studio as the guests name and address: return address is represented in black font in the photo
Measure the height and width of the envelope flap. This will vary if you chose to get a square or triangle flap. Mine were triangle shaped making the top wider than the bottom.
Type your name(s) and address and center them to the flap according to your height and width.
NOTE: it's okay if the black font overlaps with the red. I'll explain below in the sketch settings.
Now that you're design is created, it's time to send to sketch! For this process you'll use the
Silhouette Pen feature.
Choose a pen and ink that you like best. I took an extra envelope and doodled on it to get the right pen. I chose a white pen to compliment the gold envelope. I needed something bright enough so it could be read (I apologize but I'm unsure of the exact pen I used).
Insert your pen into your cutting machine and change your cut settings to "card stock plain" and "sketch". This is where it's important to have the two different color designs because you only want one design to sketch at a time. You don't want your return address to accidentally sketch on the front on top of your guests name! So check only the red design to "send" to your cutting machine. This is also why the overlapping during the design process doesn't matter.
Place your envelope on your cutting mat in the top left corner (as usual per cutting instructions).
Send and watch your design take place! Once completed, repeat this process for all your guests.
For return address:
Follow the same procedures as above but place your envelope guests name side down (flap facing up).
Uncheck the red design and click on the black design (your address design).
Send and watch your design take place!
A few things to note:
I chose to have the guests name and address in red in Silhouette Studio because that's the text that I'll be changing per envelope. I made the return address in black because that stays the same. I never have to touch that design since it's the return address.
For the guests name and address, the font size will vary depending on how long their name and address is so you'll have to play around with each guests information to be sure it's centered in the envelope.
After your designs are sketched, do not stack envelopes on top of each other and let them air dry before sketching the return address. You don't want any smudging. This could be skipped depending on the type of pen you use.
I hope you found this helpful in making your wedding invitation suite dreams come to life!
