Formal vs non Formal Invites

Knottie54727195

I am hoping to hear people's thoughts on the matter, my fiancé & I are getting married at Disney. It will be a formal event at the wedding pavilion for the ceremony, with cocktails at Epcot for fireworks & the reception will be at the American Rotunda(colonial styled building) with a plated meal. We are wanting all decorations to be formal etc.

However my fiancé wants our invitations to be light hearted & focus on Disney, since we both worked for Disney in the past. The invites are adorable(they look like the old ticket system that Disney used to use). However I read that the invitations are supposed to be an indicator of the dress of the event.  Aside from pics on our save the date, where we are dressed formally, there is no indication of a dress code. He has wanted those invitations from the very beginning, should I try and convince him to choose something else?

Granted yes, I will be fine if people show up wearing whatever they want, but I don't want people to feel under dressed. Friends and family have seen pics of where its going to be, should I assume that they will get that its an evening wedding and it will be more formal? Am I reading too much into the style of the invitation thing?

The pic posted isn't our, but its the exact one he wants. My original invitation style was more of a royal ball event, but once he showed me them, I thought they were adorable. It wasn't until I filled in the info on them that I saw the articles stating dress code indication from the invites & am now second guessing them.

Any thoughts/reassurance would be greatly appreciated

CMGragain

The invitation in your photo is definitely informal and non-traditional.  Given your plans, I think there are better choices.  How about one of these?


http://www.invitationsbydawn.com/Wedding-Invitations/Disney-Wedding-Invitations/index.cat

http://www.zazzle.com/cinderella+invitations

http://www.vistaprint.com/gallery/MEEAAAABADoAAAA=/invitations-announcements/cinderella.aspx?filter=9:10013||1%2c78%3a10467||1&xnav=search&rd=1





Your invitation needs to clearly state who, what, when and where.  There isn't enough room on that ticket to print this, and I question if they are mailable.  The wording in the picture is not for a wedding, either.  I vote no way!

lachattefatale

Can you get a more formal oblong invitation in a folder and use the ticket-book thing for the inserts? Or if you can find the right size folder for sale separately, just sticking the less formal invitation into some formal outerwear might dress it up enough.

labro

I love @lachattefatale's idea. I'm not a fan of Disney related stuff....so I'm all about going for a Disney-esque look without the obvious ears, castle, font, etc. You could have a very formal invitation with all the appropriate information and then your inserts (RSVP, hotel info, etc.) could have that ticket look.

Knottie54727195

those are very similar to ones I was looking at & like I found 2-4 on each of those pages that I would be happy with. Its funny as much as he doesn't mind the ceremony/reception being fancy, any card that leans toward that he finds terribly boring & says they look like every other wedding invite we get from people

to be fair though, on the ticket passport(above), each page A-E does give information about the wedding and one page separates to be the rsvp card. I believe the pages are: Ceremony, Reception, RSVP, Accommodations, Cocktail Party etc 

Plus the example in the picture is for a vow renewal, but the actual one for us says wedding. That was my fault that I didn't give a clear enough description. Each page is customizable to what you want them to be. The pics I posted are of course samples.

Jen4948

Knottie54727195 said:

those are very similar to ones I was looking at & like I found 2-4 on each of those pages that I would be happy with. Its funny as much as he doesn't mind the ceremony/reception being fancy, any card that leans toward that he finds terribly boring & says they look like every other wedding invite we get from people

to be fair though, on the ticket passport(above), each page A-E does give information about the wedding and one page separates to be the rsvp card. I believe the pages are: Ceremony, Reception, RSVP, Accommodations, Cocktail Party etc 

Plus the example in the picture is for a vow renewal, but the actual one for us says wedding. That was my fault that I didn't give a clear enough description. Each page is customizable to what you want them to be. The pics I posted are of course samples.

Thing is, Disney theme or no, wedding invitations are not about being "unique" or "special" or "different from what everyone else is doing."  They are meant to convey logistical information and the degree of formality of the wedding.  They can be as informal as you like in terms of graphics, fonts, colors, etc., but the wording still needs to convey the logistical information.  And if you're going to have a formal wedding, having a cutesy themed invitation doesn't do that job.  So I'd tell him that other aspects of the wedding can be as Disney-themed exciting as he likes, but the invitation wording needs to be "boring" because that's what people understand.

Sadly, there are real-life stories of people being sent "originally" sized and worded invitations who didn't receive them because the post office wouldn't deliver them and/or didn't understand what they were being invited to and failed to attend either the ceremony or the reception or both, dressed incorrectly, or otherwise didn't handle their invitation correctly because the invitations didn't convey the information they needed to properly respond to it, both at the time of receipt and on the wedding day.

CMGragain

I still think guests will be confused with those ticket invitations.  They could easily be mistaken for junk mail.  They just don't look like invitations.

sparklepants41

Could you use the ticket books in another way? Perhaps have them in a program basket and have one page include info about the ceremony, another about the members of the wedding party, another page could detail what is on the menu, and the last page could be a card people could fill out with written well wishes for you two?