Small DIY & Crafts

DIY Wedding Programs

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding. I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

As this is the last weekend in June, it will also be the last special feature about our wedding (cue sad music).  This post is all about our wedding programs, which as I mentioned in the list of things I wished I had done differently, the ladies and I painstakingly laboured over, only to have a lot leftover.  Either way, I’ll let you in on a little secret… I actually recycled/repurposed our wedding invitations to use for the programs!  Read on for all the details :)

A bit of a back story on the invitations: I designed them myself and had 250 printed (even though we did not need that much), they were a 5″x7″ folded card with loose 4″x6″ cards inside held in with a belly band, and they were of course in our wedding colours of black, white, silver and process cyan.  I just happen to have a write-up about the wedding invitations on my personal blog here.

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

So now let’s see what was reused, shall we?

  • The outer/main invitation (the folded 5″x7″)
  • The inner “schedule” 4″x6″ card

The outer part was the main section of both the invites and the programs.

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

But wait!?  How was the inside of the program white, but there was actually print on the invitation before?  Oh the magic of spray paint :) Yes, that’s right; I had placed out all the invitations and spray painted them to “erase” the invitation text.  This actually took a long time, because I could only spray paint so many cards at once, and I’d have to wait a while for them to dry, then would do the next batch.

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

When you first opened the program, the schedule of events for the evening was on the left.  On the back page (the right side of the invite) we cut out and glued a Sudoku puzzle for the guests to do while they were waiting.

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

I designed an inner section, which I had printed locally a few days before the wedding.  The first page had an image of us from our engagement photos, and the diagram of how we would be placing our wedding picture frames (aka the alternative guest book, which you can read about here).

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

When you opened the program to the middle, there were a few sections that I included.

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

On the left I had details about our wedding vendors, the “kissing game” and the shuttle bus times.

program-13 program-01

For our wedding, we gave each guest a custom deck of cards with our wedding info on it as their gift.  To match the card theme, their place “cards” were actual cards as well, and they had to find their match among the guest.  We did have more than 104 guests (2 full decks of cards), so there were some duplicates, so hopefully it was a bit easier!

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

On the right, was my favourite part!  I had actual silhouettes for all the members of the wedding party – and to do this I had them send me pictures of them standing in a standard sized doorway (that way I would get the size correct between each person) with the outfit they would be wearing that day.

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

On the back, I had a reminder to try the signature drinks (with an image of each – one for the Husband and one for me), details about the open house/luncheon the following day and a thank you message too.

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

The inner and outer sections of the programs were affixed together with a ribbon, and we twirled the ends as a cute detail :)

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

My vision was that each guest would have received a copy of the program to refer to throughout the evening (yes, we had enough for everyone).  But as we know, that was not the case and I had extras :(

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

Nevertheless, the DIY wedding programs (made from leftover invitation pieces) were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly!

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

What do you think?  Was it a good idea to re-use the leftover invitations as the base of the wedding programs?  I was able to cut costs by not having to order more printing, but at the same time, it was a bit more work having to spray paint them all.

The DIY wedding programs were a lovely addition to our wedding, and matched our wedding branding perfectly. But I'll let you in on a little secret... I actually recycled/re-purposed our wedding invitations to use for the wedding programs!

I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments!

Disclaimer: All photos from our wedding day were taken from our great photographers Rosie and Jamie of Photo Captiva.

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