Category Archives: The Lettered Olive

May 02, 2017

Of course, when you get married you want it to be the best day of your life. And, you want your guests to have an amazing time that they will be talking about for years. Our job as a planner and designer is to suggest a flow of both the timeline and space so that everything works and has maximum impact. But, there are also very easy ways to leave your mark with little details- here starting with your printed materials. Lettered Olive started by combining all elements of design for us to pull out and use throughout the wedding decor- lace pattern from the brides’ dress, a custom monogram (this is what we really focused on as you will see), the color palette, and scenery from the wedding venue.

Coordinating the presentation and items in your wedding guest welcome bags is a great way to brand your wedding and leave guests with lasting takeaways. Baseball hats and frosted cups (everyone loves a frosted cup!) emblazoned with the couple’s monogram were treasured treats. Even the snacks and information were branded by stickers carrying the colors and monogram.

To formalize the monogram in places like the ceremony and wedding dinner, the monogram received a formal border and was changed to a more neutral color.

Guests love sitting down to a beautiful setting… This is always a great area to bring in pretty design pieces. The bordered monogram and calligraphy used in the early printed items are brought back on the menus.

It’s easy to loose sight of places to brand your self later into the event, but printing pillows or fabric to use as a photo booth backdrop, etc is easy on websites like Spoonflower. Or at For Your Party.com print cocktail napkins or drink stirrers with a simple element to have at the bar. Favors and send offs are other areas to consider- we’ve printed custom lighters or matches for a sparkler send off. All photos by Corbin Gurkin.

5.02.17 | TARA GUÉRARD
Bridal Style, Entertaining, Event Design, Event Planning, Parties, Reception, Stationery, Invitations and Pretty Papers, The Lettered Olive, Uncategorized, Weddings | Comments >>

Mar 21, 2017

Welcome to Our Wedding

Today, we’re going to help you with ideas for the perfect wedding welcome favors based on the type/location of your big day. Of course with Charleston being our backyard, we try to find ways to switch it up a bit, but still representing both the city location and the clients marrying here. For a formal destination wedding downtown, bags custom printed with the couple’s printing motif are filled with upscale goodies like champagne splits, custom Candlefish scented candles, and favorite treats of the bride and groom. Another Charleston wedding features canvas totes printed with an illustrated map of the weekend locales, locally made cheese wafers and local chocolate. Of course, providing guests with all of the pertinent information- transportation schedule, addresses of event locations, and things to do in the surrounding areas are all necessities.

Since we do do a lot of destination weddings, we like creating fun and new ways to customize the favors that greet guests upon arrival, perhaps to a location they have never been before. For this Colorado weekend, leather trimmed totes were filled with thoughtful details like wood grain S’well bottles (tote along on your hikes), “trail” mix, and kit full of sunscreen, mini O2 bottles to battle any elevation issues, and fly fishing embroidered caps.

For a Southern beach wedding, jute beach bags are stocked with printed koozies, ER kits (bandaids, tums, aspirin, sunscreen, and chapstick), lots of beach worthy snacks and magazines for guests to enjoy while soaking up the sun, and printed water bottles. Other items to include are printed beach towels, flip flips, and printed toss away sunglasses.

For this intimate destination wedding at the Montage Palmetto Bluff, the venue provided home made biscuits and locally made jam, which Lettered Olive created custom packaging for and delivered to each guest cottage the morning of the big day… Talk about leaving a lasting impression!

3.21.17 | TARA GUÉRARD
Bridal Style, Charleston, Event Design, Event Planning, Food and Drink, Gifts, Shopping, Stationery, Invitations and Pretty Papers, The Lettered Olive, Uncategorized, Weddings | 1 Comment

Mar 06, 2017

Pretty Papers

photo by Corbin Gurkin

For today’s Monday round up, I wanted to share some of the lovely work our letterpress printing company, Lettered Olive has done for some of our clients in the past year. They are always able to work with us and our brides to find the perfect marriage of pattern, color, and printing process. Die cut shapes or edges are always a lovely way to give your printing some personality and playing with different paper and ink colors.

photo by Corbin Gurkin

For our couple marrying at the bride’s family home, a letterpressed illustration of the landscape on the save the dates helped set the tone for the event. A lace die cut belly band gave a nod to the bride’s gown.

photo by Liz Banfield

For this bride, keeping her printing slightly more traditional- we did a simple look but letterpressing it gives it a bit more of a surprising touch. Also, the envelope liner printed with an intricate floral design gives some lovely and unexpected eye candy. We also try to bring in our client’s personality when we can, and for this bride, originally from Memphis, TN, a little Elvis was perfect for the return envelopes.

photo by Corbin Gurkin

Having the calligrapher address the outer envelopes in the same ink color as the printing completes the thoughtful but simple design.

photo by Corbin Gurkin

Letterpressing a mountain scene on the outer envelope for a Colorado wedding’s save the dates gets guests excited for the destination wedding.

photo by Liz Banfield

Lettered Olive is always able to create custom monograms or emblems for our couples. This one for a couple who spent much of their relationship on the groom’s ranch – combines their initials and an antler design.

photo by Liz Banfield

Often times ceremony programs can be the most simple and functional of the wedding materials, but doing a different shape, or here, we bound them with the same botanical pattern from the invitation envelope liner makes them lovely enough for guests to want to keep.

photo by Liz Banfield

3.06.17 | TARA GUÉRARD
Event Planning, Photographers, Stationery, Invitations and Pretty Papers, The Lettered Olive, Uncategorized, Weddings | Comments >>