We cordially invite you…
Well not quite yet! They are still in the process of being made, but the story leading up to the final sign off is enjoyable – for all those at a great distance from Zilla (that’s my inner-Bridezilla, flattering name I know!).
As you all know, I’m in the magazine industry, and from time to time, we do get those amazing invitations landing on our desks – launches, lunches, dinners, and of course FASHION WEEK. For many years now I have kept a log (not in alphabetical order or anything) of all my favourite invites. Paper stock. Fonts. Size. Envelope. And the X-Factor.
This year’s fashion week – only one invite stood out from the rest. I won’t say who, but they have been around for a few years now, and they know what’s hot. They had the invite I was looking for – filed!
My mum, who has an inner-Zilla of her own, had come across a catalogue, the cover, a very similar design to said designer. So as we started to discuss what invite vision we had, we drew out our highest card – “they’re the same!” – we might not look the same, but we’re definitely related. I knew it would be hard to convince M-I-L and Mr Finance – he’s pretty on the pulse and loves all things modern. So I put on my design hat and attempted a mock up. To give it to you in context – there are many fonts, but still structured.
D-day: showing M-I-L.
I was tense, I knew I had a back-up, but my heart was in the Fashion Week design. Before showing her the mock-up, she wanted to show off her ‘ideal’ invite. Insert confused face here.
“It’s so plain?!?”
“Yes! It’s beautiful isn’t it…”
“Well, this is what I had in mind…”
Insert M-I-L confused face here.
Luckily for me Mr Finance had spoken to his mum prior to the meeting reminding her that it was our day and he was on board with the design…so she should be too.
Design, check!
Designer, check! (and briefed that M-I-L might have an aversion to the design)
Paper stock, check!
Envelope, check!
Text…I really want to say check, but there’s another little story.
Given that writing is my 9-5, I was put in charge of writing the invitation. And given my access to sub-editors, I could get it checked.
Off I go, I’ll admit there’s a lot of pressure in writing an invitation, you don’t want to offend, ‘whose name goes first’, ‘write out the numbers’, ‘RSVP card vs email’… but I managed to pull it all together and with the dates TRIPLE CHECKED! Let’s be honest, people know our names, they might not know the date!
I hit send…
MUM: “Great darl, love it”
MR FINANCE: “Let’s change parents to family names” (good suggestion: text change)
M-I-L: waiting, waiting – have now left the office.
Phone call: I’ll cut that bit out – but what I can say – it involved an almighty roar from Zilla. (I think she just needed to say hi, she’s back in her cage now, call off the Special Forces.)
M-I-L wanted to remove the street numbers from the Church and hotel address. That would work if every single person attended this particular Church, and also lived in Sydney and knew the hotel. If you remove the numbers, you might as well not have the address at all and have “google” in its place.
I explained this calmly and politely. And before any more changes could be made, I sent it to the invitation designer to start.
“You have mail.”
M-I-L: “We’ll see after the design!”
Ohhh, Zilla will surely be seeing the light of day soon…
Until next time,
Bride in the City xx
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