It is not an uncommon occurrence for the design directive to be, “Do something completely different.” Blazing new trails takes a confident designer and a courageous client. Most essential is open, honest, and effective communication between the two.
It was in the spirit of honesty that this particular client requested a truly unique wedding invite but had a budget of less than $400 for over two hundred invites. This included RSVPs and postage. No worries. Working at a small printer often means even smaller budgets.
I utilized a number of tricks to make this project a success. First I nixed the envelopes from both the invite and RSVP. Custom envelopes are very costly and stock envelopes always look … well, stock. This cost could easily be avoided by creating the invite as a self-mailer and the RSVP as a postcard. The bindery cost of a few scores being far less than even stock envelopes. This plan kept the look of a custom invite while minimizing cost.
I determined that the only way this project could be produced was on overstock paper and only in a single color. These restrictions threatened to push the classy meter down into seriously lame. Thankfully there was some nice, card weight linen in the warehouse to solve the first problem.
The single color restriction was a bit trickier. I was able to talk the client into a slight budget increase ($20) for a metallic ink. Coupled with some free illustration (I created the calla lilies artwork for a project months before) I was certain that we would have a bargain-basement, without-looking-cheap, one-of-a-kind wedding invite.
The project was a success. The couple got married and, thanks to my design, there were people there to witness it. Always take credit, right?