With themed and destination weddings so popular it is difficult to figure out how to apply the rules of wedding invitation wording etiquette.
Let’s go through the basics of traditional etiquette. There isn’t a lot of room for a creative example here.
The first thing is to know who is hosting (paying) the wedding. Generally this is the bride’s parents, although if the groom’s parents offer to host or co-host then their names should be listed also. The invitations might read like this:
Mr. and Mrs. James Kelley request the honor of your presence at the marriage of their daughter Meghan Ann to Thomas David Kingston venue time, day, date street city, state
Some other "rules" are:
Punctuation is only used after courtesy titles like Dr., Mrs., Rev.Numbers in a date are spelled out and go after the day: Saturday the first of October(the year need not be mentioned however if you use it spell it out) The invitation must be written in the third person:Mr. and Mrs. William Smith
If your wedding is held in a place other than a house of worship, this would be one way to word it acceptably:
Mr. and Mrs. Robert White request the pleasure of your company etc.
However families today are so varied with divorce and remarriage, widowed or single parents, that one might believe that the "old rules" no longer apply. This is not really so. If the parents are divorced but are both contributing to the wedding, the parent who raised her is listed first:
Mrs. Joan Harris Davies and Mr. Michael Davies or Mr. and Mrs. Michael Davies
When the parent is widowed but the bride wants to honor the deceased parent the card would read:
Mr. Patrick Murphy requests the pleasure of your company at the marriage of his daughter Fiona daughter of the late Kay Murphy to John Doe etc.
When both sets of parents are co-hosting the wedding:
Mr. and Mrs. William Brown and Mr. and Mrs. Henry Smith request the pleasure of your company at the marriage of their children Karen Brown and Charles Smith
If the couple is hosting the wedding themselves but wish to honor their parents:
Mary Ellen Quentin and Sean Stephen Williams together with their parents etc.
Now that you understand the norms of wedding invitation wording etiquette, why not make your own cheap invitations.
