Our new ribbon gate-fold invitations will be launched soon but we are so excited about the range that we couldn’t wait to give you a sneak preview.  I quickly snapped these shots outside our studio before the professional photos are taken next week.  It will probably take a couple of weeks to get this range online because it will be available in a total of 37 different colours and, as with all our designs, we do our best to coordinate the whole range of products.  This means that with so many colours and so many coordinating items there will be a lot of photography to process.

The gentle floral pattern is another feature that coordinates on all the items in this range; its delicate emboss and pealescent reflection catches the light beautifully with understated sophistication.  The texture of the emboss is best seen in the flesh and you can do this by requesting a free sample when the range is online but this is one important element that we hope to capture with the photography.

I have a list of available colours to share with you and these will all be available to view online soon.

• Black
• Silver Grey
• Navy
• Dusky Blue
• Cornflower
• New Tuquoise
• Aqua
• Petrol
• Peacock
• Orchid
• Helio
• Dusky Pink
• Shocking Pink
• Pink Azalea
• Pale Pink
• Red
• Scarlet Berry
• Burgundy
• Plum
• Blackberry
• Purple
• Moss
• Khaki
• Hunter Green
• Jade
• Cuban
• Dark Brown
• Marigold
• Gold
• Yellow
• Lemon
• Orange Delight
• Rust
• Sable
• Honey Gold
• Cream
• White

Pure Rose in Sage Green

We get a lot of requests to customise our Pure Collection and the most popular is a colour change of the Rose or Lily.  We will be introducing some of the more popular colour requests to our website soon.   Bespoke colour matching is always a challenge because the clays often dry a slightly different colour when baked so we often have to test a number of times.  We were particularly pleased with the colour match of our latest creation.  I do not recall having created a green rose before and it was quite a challenge to get the right colour rose to match a swatch of fabric from the customer’s dress.  We mixed two clays (English Garden Green and Avocado) in 50 /50 proportions to get the gorgeous sage green colour pictured here.  We do not charge extra for the colour matching service and we always send free samples for approval before we proceed with an order.  If you would like a lily or rose in a particular then please give us a call or email us and we will be happy to oblige.

Empire Raised Ink Wedding Invitation

Raised ink is a clever effect that is produced by adding an extra step into the traditional printing press process.  Rather than let the ink dry on to the card or insert the freshly printed material is fed through a machine that sprinkles fine powder on to the wet ink.  Excess powder is shaken off and then the cards are then fed through a heater that fuses the powder granules with the ink to create a raised effect to the text. Raised ink wedding invitations are cheaper than letterpress wedding invitations because the latter involves producing a special impression plate and a more skilled printing operation.   Many of our customers even prefer raised printing over letterpress because the cards have a luxurious feel afterwards.  The raised ink is silky smooth and is a joy to touch as well as admire. 

Sorrento Raised Wedding Invitation

Whilst we have taken time to categorise designs that are printed in raised ink as standard it is worth pointing out that many of our other designs can also be printed in raised ink as an optional extra.  This is true of many of the designs in the CCA Occasions selection.  When applicable the cost is only an extra £15 and is well worth the extra.  The finish is something that simply cannot be achieved in even the most expensive laser or inkjet printers so you can be sure that your wedding invitations will have a truly professional look.

Pure Lily White Wedding Invitation

If you have a particular colour theme in mind then when we provide a custom service whereby they will try to colour match the lily to a bridal fabric or colour swatch that you send them. We will send you a sample wedding invitation with the customised lily. The best thing about this service is that there is no extra cost.

Dusk Pink Calla Lily Tray ready for baking

Each lily is carefully made by hand and has a hole directly through the middle to hold the silver wire stem of the flower. Rather than the brash yellow stamen of a real calla lily Chapter One have chosen a contemporary approach that works perfectly. The silver wire is twisted at the top to create a beautiful flourish and the sharp bends beneath are shaped to form the leaves. The silver wire works perfectly against the crisp 300gsm white Accent board of the card.

There are many items in the Pure Lily range and no attention to detail has been spared. This is especially the case with the invitations that have a silk paper mount on which the wire lily is attached. The silk paper has 4 white pearl beads hand sewed into the 4 corners to frame the lily in a simple border that is delicate but not too flouncy or ostentatious.

The invitations in this range are individually boxed which are perfect for two reasons. There is a protective cover in the lid  which protects the delicate lily in the post. The box is also a treat for your guests making it more like opening a gift than an invitation and providing them with a box to keep the invitation for years to come.

Calla Lily Place Cards from Olivia Samuel

As well as the beautiful wedding and evening invitations there are a further 11 items in the range so that you can create a truly coordinated look throughout the whole wedding.

The full range includes :-
Wedding Invitation, Evening Invitation, Order of Service, Order of the Day,
Menu, Table Plan, Table Name Cards, Place Cards, Napkin Rings, Favour Boxes, Guest Book, Thank You Cards, and Save the Date Cards.
You can pick and choose which items you require depending on the level of coordination you wish to achieve.

A favourite of mine is the Negative Strip design from CCA which was added this morning.  This design stands out from the others in that it allows 5 photos to feature on the front of the card.  Most of the other designs just feature a single image or two (one each of bride and groom).  With the 5 photo negative strip design many of our customers choose to feature photos of themselves as children and then an up to date photo of each of them.  The 5th photo then completes the set with a close up picture of the happy couple cheek to cheek.  It creates a simple, short romantic storyboard.  This is just one example of course and the choice of photos is entirely yours.  A photo of the church or venue is another popular choice, or photos of your children or pets. 

CCA Negative Strip in White or Cream

The great thing about all the own photo designs is that it allows the customer to be a little creative with their invitations whilst still keeping a professional overall design and finish.  Most of the invites in this section are printed on a high end digital press and surpass anything that can be achieved on a home color inkjet or laser printer.  When supplying digital images it is important to remember that they can only be reproduced at the quality provided and we recommend a minimum resolution of 300 dpi.  We can always help and advise with the choice of quality of image so don’t worry if you are unsure your pictures will make the grade, we will soon let you know.  If you do not have digital images then you can send us original photos for us to scan for you.  We always worry about precious photos being sent in the post so whenever possible send a reprint  and use Registered or Special Delivery post for peace of mind.  We do not charge any extra for reproducing your photo digitally and we usually target a 600 dpi output scan for best quality.  We will return any photos to you on request.

Chocolate 8XP150 and Vanilla 8XP470

 We are pleased to announce that the Chocolate Brown design now has a new colourway.  Like a dollop of refreshing finest vanilla pod infused Italian Ice cream the Vanilla design above is a worthy partner to the finest Chocolate  Fudge cake in the restaurant.  The vanilla cream design is more subtle than the deep chocolate brown colour of the original and will serve most colour schemes very well.  The same gold foil personalisation is retained and looks beautiful against the cream card. 

Gold Foil Personalised Insert

When you order this invitation in either the Chocolate or Vanilla designs you will receive a pdf proof of your personalised wording in your chosen typeface (we think Typeface 419 pictured above works best for this design) .  You can make as many changes to the proof as you like and on each change a new proof will be sent.  When you approve the proof a special polymer impression plate is made which is used to press the gold foil on to the card insert.  This is gold foiling at its best and beats many of the toner foiling wedding designs that we are starting to see enter the wedding stationery market with the advent of cheaper technology.  To see for yourself visit our site for a free sample.

8XP000 Butterfly Invitation Detail

The other element that is quite unique for this design is the beautiful textured coral insert.  It matches the front of the design perfectly and has a butterfly print that whisps across both sides of the insert.  It looks stunning when printed in deep pink ink (included as standard in the personalisation).  We thought it was so important to show this detail so we added the two shots in this blog post to our website as supplementary images to the day invitation picture.  No amount of photographic detail can take away from the look and feel of a posted sample which is why we provide them for free at Olivia Samuel but it can help a customer when narrowing down their choice of design. 

We recently imported this design from old website to our new site and we also copied over the reviews from previous customers who had ordered it.  Not one reviewer gave the design less than 5 out of 5 stars.  Its a winner in our view too but that is not say we don’t have any other excellent butterfly wedding invitations on show.  We are in the process of setting up a themes section on our site.  The butterfly wedding invitation theme is the first to be categorised and you won’t fail to spot the new Pure Butterfly design from Chapter One or indeed the Butterfly Style design from The Letter Press of Cirencester, both of which will feature on this blog very soon.

8XP000 Butterflies Unique Insert

I am not sure where this is going and I am hardly one to preach about community spirit.  My wife went on to remind me that I hardly even talk to the neighbours when mowing the lawn so I am not likely to be getting my ladder out to hang bunting from the lampposts.  Anyway on to those St George’s Cross wedding invitations…..

Only joking.  I am not ensure even the most fervent England supporter who is getting married on World Cup final day this year would sanction a red cross on the front of their wedding invites but they may be interested in restoring a little national pride with the Emblems range of wedding stationery from CCA.  It was by coincidence that I was adding the Emblems range to our site on St George’s day without realising what day it was.  The Emblems range does not exclude our fellow islanders and the designs feature a national symbol for England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland by way of rose, thistle, daffodil and shamrock respectively.  You can find the Emblems range of stationery on our site in the Name the Day collection.  Personalised wording is printed on a white insert and invitations come with white envelopes as standard.

PS.  If anyone is interested in arranging their own street party for the World Cup, Queen’s jubilee, their wedding, their cat’s birthday or any other excuse for a good knees up then these websites are a good place to start.  The Big Lunch website (a heroic attempt to revive street party atmosphere was organised by the Eden Project last year) and Street Party (a charitable organisation who promote small scale community street parties)

Strawberry Twist

Simple and stunning with a slightly retro twist is the best way I can describe the Calladream wedding stationery range from Strawberry Twist.  The semi gloss card features a posterized print of a simple bouquet of calla lilies giving a slightly ‘Andy Warhol’ retro feel.  The bride and grooms names and wedding date are printed in the same colour ink and this can be changed to match your theme.  At £2.00 each these invitations are a great price and there is a full set of matching stationery and reception items available.

Pure Sunflower Invitation

We have recently launched the latest addition to our Pure Collection with Pure Sunflower.  As with other designs in our Pure range the attention to detail is key.  Each sunflower is formed by hand from the painted clay baked flower head through to the twisted silver wire stem and leaf and this is then mounted on to a beaded silk paper.  Any item that is posted (i.e invites, save the dates and Thank You cards) are provided with postal boxes to send to your guests. 

With 14 items in the range you can also coordinate the theme as much or as little as you like.  If you are just looking for a sunflower themed table setting then we have Favour Boxes, Menus, Place Cards, Napkin Rings and Table Plan to choose from.  To help spread the budget we also have a limited time offer that saves you up to 20% when you buy certain reception stationery at the same time. 

FB56 Sunflowers from Millbank and Kent

Millbank and Kent have every possible wedding flower covered that we can think of in their Fresh Blooms collection and their Sunflower design (FB56) is one of the most striking.  There is a good selection of items in the range, which even includes a personalised website to match your stationery.  I also like to see Table Plans of a decent size and Millbank and Kent with Table Plans available up to A1 size on request.  Millbank and Kent currently have a 25% discount off wedding invitations so it is a good time to take a look.

Wickedly Innocent Sunflower Designs

Wickedly innocent has some pretty nifty Sunflower Postcard style invitations.  These A6 invitations are printed both sides so with the invite wording and sunflower image on one side you are free to have a photo on the reverve.  A good opportunity to embarrass yourselves with baby snaps of the bride and groom.  Or you may stick to tradition and have a map of the venue or Guest information list.

Paper Passion Sunflower Scroll Invitation

For something a little different Paper Passion design have some stunning Scroll Invitations which has a tied clusted of three sunflowers.  The sunflower yellow postal box really sets this design off and for hand delivered invitations you can choose to have a sumptious large chocolate brown satin ribbon.

English Folly Sunflower Invite

I wrote about these art deco style Sunflower Invitations  on our sister site Weddingo over 2 years ago and their subtely makes them beautifully different.  I think they have been in the English Folly portfolio for ever longer.  This matters little however because a timeless design such as this has no shelf life.