Real Wedding: Menus & Escort Cards

Thank you to Linda at Soco Events for sharing these photos of our work from a May 2009 wedding!

The elegantly designed menus were beautiful and looked amazing with the table arrangements.

The escort cards were simple yet elegant, delightfully arranged near the bar area with this gorgeous floral arrangement.

Calligraphy is Bickham Swash Caps.

Wedding Planning EBook

Liene Stevens, owner of Splendid Communications, recently created and published this adorable wedding guide on her blog, Blue Orchid Wedding. It was created to help brides in the process of interviewing and hiring vendors from venue to caterer to wedding planner to photographer. The ebook includes important questions for every bride to ask potential vendors in order to get the best services for their wedding. I also love the book because Liene has thoughtfully included some of my favorite custom icons!

You can view and print this ebook and other planning guides by visiting Liene's free wedding resource library. Happy planning!

Spotlight on The Flour Pot Cookies

When we received information on The Flour Pot Cookies, we knew we had to share this with our readers!

Based in Ambler, PA, The Flour Pot is a cookie decorating company created by mother-daughter team Margie and Abbey Greenberg. Margie's love for design and sweets, plus Abbey's stellar business skills have helped The Flour Pot grow into a thriving business with customers like Polo Ralph Lauren, Saks Fifth Avenue and of course brides and party hosts across the country.

We love their "Be My Bridesmaid?" line as a unique (and delicious!) way to ask your sisters, cousins and very best friends to be a part of your big day. The intricate details and precision are unmatched on these equisite cookies, perfect for bridal showers, baby showers, sporting events and more.

Visit their website for other bridal ideas as well as corporate gifts and gifts for a cause.

New Home Maps

Our custom maps can be perfect for more than just weddings...one example being as a housewarming gift for any friends or relatives! Here are three maps that we have done to commemorate these couples' new homes.

The new home maps are special because they are completely devoted to the couple's likes and interests. This map of Ventura was sent last year with the couple's Christmas cards a few months after the wedding to announce their new address.

This Fresno, CA map features the gym the couple frequents together, the local movie theater, both places of employment, favorite restaurants and hot spots, hometowns and, of course, their first home together.

This lovely Los Angeles, CA map includes the location of this couple's first "I Love You" which happened to be the exact spot where he proposed! It also includes arrows pointing to her hometown in Buffalo, NY as well as places they've visited together such as San Diego and San Francisco.

The personalization of new home maps is heartfelt and sure to create a piece that any couple (or single!) will treasure in their new home.

Connecticut Farm Map

This May 2009 wedding took place in the quaint town of Litchfield, Connecticut. The map features the reception venue, White Flower Farm, which as you can see has a farm home, horse basin and retail store. We were able to also incorporate the lovely nearby lake and of course the church were the ceremony was held.

Our custom maps can be created for any town or city in any country and will feature all of the locations that exemplify you as a couple! We can truly create any look to match your taste and overall wedding style.

Real Wedding: Ritz Carlton Laguna Niguel

We were so thrilled to receive gorgeous photos from Mary Jane Photography of a wedding we recently worked on - and we think their entire affair turned out beautifully!

Beth Helmstetter commissioned us to design and calligraph all of their invitations, and we created the reception materials to match along with this adorably rustic sign.

A hat box was converted into a sweet receptacle for notes and cards to the happy couple.

The place settings, as well as the entire suite, included our Ella calligraphy on thin strips of paper masterfully crafted to be wrapped around a lemon.

Congratulations to the bride and groom, and thank you Beth for bringing us in to collaborate on their wedding!

Florals by JL Designs and Events

The Perfect Palette

We were so thrilled to see yesterday's "The Perfect Palette" blog post with a Laura Hooper Calligraphy themed inspiration board! Chrissy from The Perfect Palette incorporates our Firenze script, sand dollar themed placecards, maps and totes to create the lovely seaside wedding palette - and we just love it!

The adorable color combination of slate blue, light blue, light green and light pink make for an airy casual chic wedding theme.

Texas Country Map

We were happy to find our Texas map posted last weekend on the KK Bloom blog! This simple yet chic map features the rehearsal dinner, hotel and of course ceremony location. You'll notice that, being from Texas, the groom even has a little cowboy hat on!

Click here to see the KK Bloom post!
We just love KK's work and are happy to be able to collaborate with her.

Spotlight on Stellina Events

After 10 years of working in communications consulting and marketing in London, Brussels and New York, Amanda Diamondstein-Cieplinska decided to open a wedding consultancy based in London and New York - Stellina Events. Amanda herself had an amazing experience planning her own weddings in Italy and New York, which turned into friends and friends-of-friends personally seeking her expertise in planning their weddings. As owner of Stellina Events, Amanda has already been involved with the planning and design of weddings in Copenhagen, Washington State and Brussels. You can visit her blog for wedding design inspiration as well as tips to cut the drama from the happiest day of your life! Stellina Events specializes in destination and cultural weddings, recommending unique and beautiful venues as well as fantastic vendors.

From the sophisticated to the sublime, Stellina Events can create weddings and events that capture the essence of you. Their focus is on making your vision a reality from scouting the location anywhere in the world to selecting the invitation style and overall design.

Stellina Events is a consultancy with truly global outreach welcoming couples from any location with events anywhere around the world. Let Stellina Events plan the perfect day that suits your style!

Real Wedding: Santa Barbara

One of our brides recently submitted these photos from her Santa Barbara wedding that were featured on this week's Style Me Pretty! We were excited to work on a variety of items for this wedding - escort cards, placecards, maps, totes and favor boxes.

The happy couple chose to turn the map into totes for all of their guests!

The printed materials included these elegant escort cards as well as placecards at each table setting.

You can see more pictures from this gorgeous wedding by visiting the Style Me Pretty blog.

Seating Charts

One of the most important (and often debated) aspects of any event is the seating! And while we can't help you decide which aunt will sit best with your crazy coworker, we can help you showcase your seating chart in an elegant and chic display. Here is a gorgeously matted and framed rehearsal dinner seating chart used recently at a client's wedding. In addition to their asthetic quality, these charts can be especially useful when there are many tables in a room and just knowing your table number isn't quite enough. Seating charts can also serve as an alternative to escort cards.

Charts can come in any shape, size and color that best suits your special day! Here are a couple other examples including an adorable baseball themed seating chart for a rehearsal dinner!

Two New Calligraphy Styles

We were happy to announce two new calligraphy styles last week through our July newsletter - Spencerian and Spencerian Swash Caps!

If you missed the July newsletter, just click here to view it, and be sure to sign up for our mailing list so you can receive the next one! Also, if you no longer wish to receive information from Laura Hooper Calligraphy, simply unsubscribe by clicking the link at the bottom of the newsletter - please don't report us as spam!

Our Compasses featured on Brides.com!

Our compass placecards were recently featured in a Brides.com story on summer/beach/nautical-themed weddings. The compasses actually work so they function as a favor, not just a placecard and also are available in larger sizes that you can use for table numbers (compasses shown here are 1.7" in diameter). We had matching menu cards used with these compasses as well.

The calligraphy shown is Bickham Swash Caps, but can be done in any color or style. However, we do recommend Tier 1 styles as they can be written the smallest.

We are currently offering 20% off the list price of $10 for our compasses during the month of July - be sure to reference JULYBLOG when placing your order to receive the discounted rate!

Last call for the July Mailing List!

Good Morning Happy Readers! I just found out we're launching our July newsletter this afternoon at 2pm (PST). So this is the last call to sign up for our Mailing List! I can tell you that the mailing list does have a promotion for a significant discount off 2 new styles of calligraphy we are offering, as well as a promotion for our designer maps.

If you're interested, please sign up, so we can make sure you get your newsletter!

{PS -- We do not sell our information, nor will we be sending out annoying spam-like emails every week, so rest assured if you decide to sign up your information is safe with us}

Maps as Itineraries

We often talk about our maps used as Save the Date cards and part of welcome gift bags, but another very popular use for our maps is as itineraries. Here you can see this adorable Philadelphia map, of course showing all of the couple's important places of interest (the church, their favorite Philly Cheesesteak locale {Yummy!}, the Liberty Bell) but it also features the "Weekend Activities" on the reverse side.

Our favorite thing about the itinerary sides of the map is that we are able to use the quaint icons from the front side of the map to maintain the continuity of the piece.

This particular map had only a couple events to mention, but you can see from the itineraries below that often couples have a lot of information to share!

Formal Invitation Connundrum: Love the Designer Maps, but....

I was recently alerted to this posting on the WeddingBee Message Boards

and wanted to share it with my readers:

At my meeting with the planner and invitation artist (what do you call them? Lol.) I mentioned that I really love a map, like those couture maps on that website, and that I'd like to include one that has different places - like our first date etc. pointed out on it. It would be so cute, have you seen that website? Anyway, she said that the map isn't at the level our invite is, I cannot include it.

I was really pleased to see everyone's reactions to the input the wedding planner gave in the initial posting. I do agree with what everyone has said and wanted to mention that my little maps have accompanied invitations by some of the biggest and most well-known designers such as CeciNY, Bella Figuera, and so many more. If those invitations are not formal than I don't know what is. Many of my clients tell me they are having formal events but they love the maps and see them as a way to incorporate their own personal style into an otherwise formal and traditional occasion. However, this is not everyone's cup of tea for their wedding invitations. If you have time and have not chosen your save the dates I do recommend doing a "fun" save the date and then formal invitation in a few months. Alternatively, as someone mentioned, you can use them in your welcome bags, or send them out early with itineraries. We frequently do maps for these purposes and many, many more. With the maps the possibilities are really endless {the map in question on the original posting is the one that we made matching t-shirts for the Fun Run before the wedding!} , and my clients often come back and tell me their maps and the production process of the maps were their favorite part of their wedding! I even had a client order a map of Maui for the wedding and then come back and order one

6 months later for her new home announcements.

Lastly, I truly believe that your wedding should be about you and your fiance, and your families celebrating together and that you should do the things that you like most and reflect your own style, rather than abiding by what is traditionally considered "proper" -- whether it means having 2 maid of honors and no bridesmaids, choosing bright orange and chartreuse for your wedding colors, or sending a fun map with your formal invitations!

Thank you so much to Heather at Sugar River Stationers for alerting me to this posting! Please send me the photos of the maps we did together so that I can post about them!

Hilton Head Island Map

What better way to welcome your out of town guests to your wedding weekend than with a custom map! This couple chose to create this adorable map with details on Hilton Head Island and provide it to all of their guests upon check-in at the hotel. The reverse side of the maps featured a message from the bride and groom as well as transportation details to the ceremony and reception site. The map was also used to create natural rope handle totes for the out of town guests.

The bride lives on the island, so you know all the map locations carry special meaning to the couple! They also chose a more playful calligraphy script, our own Ellington font. It looks great and showcases their fun attitudes!