Okay, hive! I’m about to unveil one of my favorite DIY projects to date. I can’t actually take the credit for imagining this idea up myself, but I can’t for the life of me remember where I’ve seen this before, aside from the fact that I know it was in an issue of either Brides or The Knot. ANYWAY, before I reveal it to the blogosphere, there’s something I need to do, because our guests might better appreciate it if they see it for the first time on the big day. So…
Whew! Okay, now that THAT’S all taken care of, let’s get back to the big reveal. (Man, I feel like I’m building this up way too much and you guys are all gonna be disappointed when you see it, but I’m proud of it, so whatevs. Sorry if this ends up being tragically anti-climactic!)
Anyway, due to budget restraints, there won’t be any linen or cloth dinner napkins of any sort at the Armadillo wedding (we’re going with paper, y’all!). When budgeting for different aspects of the reception, I just couldn’t justify spending 75 cents to a dollar per napkin on something that 250 people will literally just use to remove the nasty remnants of dinner from their hands and mouths. If I had a couple of extra hundred dollars to spend, sure, cloth napkins might have made an appearance…but that’s just now how things are gonna play out. That being said, I still wanted a way to distinguish the “place settings” at each table and to bring in a contrasting color to break up the green tablecloths we’ll be buying (yay!) And what better way to do that than with placemats, yes? (Just agree with me here, mmkay?)
My first paper placemat crush came from Cake Vintage, which sells pads of 50 placemats in really cool, vintage-inspired designs. See for yourself!
Perfect Setting Placemat Pad via Cake Vintage
Italian Scroll Placemat Pad via Cake Vintage
While they’re both super awesome and perfect for jazzing up place settings at reception tables, I came across a fun, totally personal, typography-inspired idea for placemats in a bridal magazine where the couple’s favorite things were listed alphabetically all across the paper. Not only is it super adorable, it also helps guests get to know fun little details about the couple (particularly family members and friends of either the bride or groom who don’t know the other person very well!) And so, I sat down for about an hour with my outdated 2000 version of Microsoft Word and came up with this little number:
I also made a version with the text in gray, and I can’t decide which I like better:
It’s formatted to be printed on legal size ( 8 1/2 inches by 14-inch paper) which we’ll totally be doing with our home printer. I think this is such a fun, CHEAP, personal way to jazz up the tables and visually break up the sea of green linens flooding the reception space, and I hope our guests appreciate them!
How are you adding personal touches to your reception tables? Are any of you using paper placemats to mark table settings? Should I go with the purple or gray font color for the final product? Anything else I should add to them to make them stand out more?
@TexasAggieMom: Aww, thanks! I agree that the purple definitely stands out more than the gray…and it would be a great way to incorporate the other color in our wedding palette!
I came across this exact same idea in a magazine (Martha Stewart Weddings, I think) and I REALLY wanted to do it for our wedding! We didn’t end up doing the placemats, but instead took the same basic “Favorite things” alphabet concept and created a little document that was housed on the backside of the table name frame. It was so much to make! I hope our guests enjoyed reading them!!!
Aww, I love them, what a cool idea! I vote for purple too: I think the bright will pop on your green linens better!
I saw these paper placements at The Bay in Canada…. and they are AMAZING! At $40 a pad I didn’t want to buy them (for the house), but they also had table runners and menu ones too. It was soo cool!
These are so cute, your guests are going to love these!
love love love! i thought about doing watercolor placemats (still might, i guess) but this is amazing! i vote purple too, why not use it as an easy way to incorporate your colors?
Love!! Would you consider doing a few of each color to mix things up?
Mrs. Armadillo, Houston, Texas Age and Occupation: 23, Graduate Student Fiance's Age and Occupation: 24, Armed Security Officer Engagement Date: September 28, 2011 Wedding Date: March 2013 Venue: First Presbyterian Church/Bay City Civic Center About Me: I’m an oldies-loving, board game-playing, coffee addicted fine arts junkie from Southeast Texas in pursuit of her master’s degree in communication studies who met the goofy, strong, artistic, and unexpected love of her life in the beautiful piney woods of East Texas. Serendipity threw us together again and again (and again) on our college campus before we eventually stuck, but when we finally did submit to destiny, we hit the ground running and never looked back! We’re planning a religious, small town, budget-friendly, DIY-infused “winter becomes springtime” ceremony and reception to celebrate the beginning of our lives together with the people we love the most, and are pouring our hearts and souls into making sure our wedding represents us as a couple down to the nitty gritty details and balances tradition with the quirky individuality that is uniquely and unequivocally “us”!
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