I (Jono) am getting married this year (to Emily), and this is my wedding invitation, however I cannot take credit for it.

This was designed and made by my sister, Chloe.

She is currently studying 'textiles' at university.

You can check out some of her stuff on her website: www.chloehamill.co.uk

Step 1: The Brief

Our wedding is during the summertime and is in a marquee in a field/orchard, hence we are going for a country fete style. We asked my sister to design something to incorporate the orchard and encompass the style we were looking for.

(this image taken from innocentvillagefete.typepad.com under fair usage)

Step 2: Mock Up

This is what my sister first came up with.

She was unsure of whether the trees should have an outline or not hence why one side is different to the other.

We loved it. The only thing we were unsure about was the fold. We liked the idea of it folding but thought it would be better standing up straighter, So the wording was reduced to allow the fold to be half way down.

Step 3: Additional Infomation

To keep the invite 'clean' we put detailed infomation such as directions etc on a bespoke website that matched the invite - with the bunting being the menu buttons.

We still however had to create an RSVP card. Chloe came up a couple of ideas, but the one we liked was the ice lolly shape as it fit in with the fete theme.

Step 4: Final Invite / Process

These photos are the finished item.

The invites are made as you would expect, with lots of cutting and glueing!

The basic process my sister went through was as follows...

1. Do mock up by hand to find positions/sizes of everything
2. Write invite wording on an A5 piece of paper
3. Scan wording into computer and clear up using photoshop
4. Print wording 100 times on to A5 brown card
5. Draw the tree shape on A5 piece of paper
6. Scan tree shape and convert to laser cutter file format
7. Cut tree shape in each invite using a laser cutter
8. Fold in crease
9. Create template for grass in appropriate laser cutter file format (again Chloe drew this then scanned it)
10. Cut grass shape from wrapping paper 100 times using laser cutter
11. Glue grass on to each invite
12. Create template for bunting triangle in appropriate laser cutter file format
13. Cut out bunting (from coloured paper) using laser cutter
14. Write letters on bunting (you can print the letters first if you co-ordinate the print and the laser cutting, which is what Chloe did)
15. Cut string to length
16. Glue bunting together
17. Glue or tie bunting string to tree branch

Obviously if you have access to a laser cutter then the time to make your invites will be greatly reduced, however it can still be done without, it would just require a lot of time and patience.

My sister used the laser cutter at fab lab in Manchester (www.fablabmanchester.org) which is an epilog mini 24 laser cutter.

Note: make sure you do a mock up and check that it all works before making 100 copies!!!

Step 5: Why I'd Like to Win a Laser Cutter

I would love to win this laser cutter for my sister as she is very talented and has lots of great ideas.

She is finishing university soon; a laser cutter could be the start of a business for her, meaning that she could easily make multiple items to sell.

Please don't forget to vote!

(This image is taken from the front page of chloehamill.co.uk)