The Complete Wedding Stationery Guide - Part 2
Wording Your Invitation
The content of a formal wedding invitation is fairly straightforward, albeit slightly more complicated these days due to changes in social attitudes and family structures. Regardless of your particular situation, the lines of your invitation should be in the following order:
- The hosts' names
- Invite your guests
- State the affair and relationship to the bride
- The bride's first and second name
- The connecting, "to"
- The groom's full name
- The day and month
- The year
- The time
- The location
- City and state
- Reception line
Formal invitations begin with the person or people involved with the hosting, using formal names and titles. For example:
-
Mr. and Mrs. Richard Johnson
request the honour of your presence
at the marriage of their daughter
If the bride and groom are hosting their own wedding the first lines would read:
-
Isabelle Marie Johnson
and
Jack Hamden Robert
request the honour of your presence
at their marriage
"requests the honour of your presence"
(use honour when the wedding is taking place in a house of worship; honor when the location is a hotel, club, etc.)
Casual: "requests the pleasure of your company"
"at the wedding of our daughter"
"Isabelle Marie"
If the bride's last name is different from the host's, it should also be included on this line, e.g.: "Isabelle Marie Johnson"
This always goes on its own line in a formal invitation.
If the bride is using a professional title, such as "Doctor Marie Ann Consalves," you should then also include the groom's personal title, "Mr.," "Dr.," or whatever the case may be.
In a formal invitation, spell out completely the date, time, and location of your wedding. Thus, the date would be:
-
"Saturday, the twentieth of June"
-
"Nineteen hundred and ninety-eight"
- "at two o'clock in the afternoon"
- "The Waybridge Country Club"
- "Waybridge, New Hampshire"
If you are planning to have your reception at the same location as the wedding, the line "and afterward at the reception" or "reception immediately following ceremony" should follow the city and state.
