A Spooky Halloween Wedding!

Firstly Happy Halloween to you all! Hopefully you have a suitably spooky day in store! I need to check my cupboards to make sure I've got plenty of sweet treats ready for any little callers this evening!

I've always thought it would be pretty amazing to have a halloween themed wedding ... you hear of quite a few people who have a Tim Burton Corpse Bride theme or Mexican Day of the Dead ... although incredibly none traditional it must be so much fun. I have several goth friends from my old college days who I'm sure would jump at the chance of a Halloween wedding!
Here's a few images I've put together of my favourite ideas ....

Corpse Bride

 

 

Mexican Day Of The Dead

 



General Halloween

Bespoke Autumnal Wedding Reception Stationery

I've been really enjoying this year on working on some gorgeous Autumnal stationery for one of my lovely brides.
You may remember me sharing their brown manilla style concertina style stationery earlier in the year ...

The couple decided for their reception they were going to go for a real harvest festival theme .. with the addition of apples and pine cones and so I designed their table plan and table names to reflect this.



I can't wait to see photos of this wedding ... I think its going to be amazing!

A Cosy Tartan Winter Wedding Theme

Woo Hoo Its Friday! I'm not normally this excited about Friday as I work most weekends ... but this weekend my family are coming down to Devon for a visit and I get to see my gorgeous niece and nephew (aswell as my Sister, Brother In Law & Mum of course!!) . I'm looking forward to a weekend of long walks on Dartmoor, wrapped up from the cold, a big Sunday Roast and finally getting some logs on our fire to snuggle up in the evening!

On this theme I started thinking about how lovely a winter wedding would be with elements of tartan and cosy blankets.
Here's some of the inspiration and ideas I came up with  ... rather than going for the obvious winter theme of a dark red tartan and going all christmassy, I've used pinks, blues and greens for a warm winter feel without the christmas overtones.

credits : www.bhldn.com ; www.heartloveweddings.com ; Poppies & Posies at www.oncewed.com ;

http://lovelyclusters.blogspot.com ; www.rusticweddingchic.com ; www.elizabethannedesigns.com ;

Alternatives To White & Ivory For Your Wedding Dress

I may have mentioned this before but a few years back I went to the wedding of one of my very good friends who had a fabulous wedding on stage in a theatre. She got married in a fabulous red dress with a matching red top hat and veil ... it was stunning! And totally her as she so wasn't the traditional white wedding dress type :)

So many brides want something that little bit different for their wedding dress and pale colours don't suit everyone. So I've been on the look out for some gorgeous colourful options for wedding dresses and these are my favourites! ...

Blush

One of my favourite wedding dress colours ... its so much more flattering than white and even ivory ... and it creates a beautiful vintage feel.

 www.bhldn.com

vivienne westwood bridal range

Blue

If you're having a beach or winter themed wedding you might want to consider a pale or silvery blue. Be careful though blue tones don't suit all skin colours.

www.bhldn.com

Vintage Dress via www.weddingchicks.com

Red

If you really want to stand out from the crowd a red wedding dress is perfect ... especially for a theatrical or winter wedding. Bridesmaids always seem to be an issue when picking a coloured dress ... my friend had her bridesmaids in gorgeous black lace which fitted the theatre them perfectly, but for a more classic look perhaps a pale gold or ivory would look wonderful.

images via www.pinterest.com

Black

Finally for a really dramatic look and to break with tradition why not consider a black wedding dress. Actually not as scary as it sounds .. especially if you are considering an elegant evening wedding or an art deco theme.





A Wedgewood Blue & Bicycle Wedding & Stationery

Welcome to a new week here at Knots & Kisses ... hopefully it will be better than last week when i was ill in bed!

Last week I finished working on a version of my Sketch range which I adapted using a bespoke Wedgewood blue colour and a Tandem Bicycle motif which I handdrew for the couple and then applied to the stationery.
I really love drawing out new motifs that are more representative of the couple getting married .. and Sketch is such a versatile range for doing this!

Here's the invitation I came up with ...

Of the course the invitation was also tied with brown string as well like the rest of my Sketch range http://www.knotsandkisses.co.uk/sketch.html

I love this colour combination ... especially with the additional touches of brown kraft ... I can see it working for a wedding all year round.
I've created a moodboard below to inspire you to create your wedding in a Rustic Wedgewood blue colourscheme ...

Weekly Wedding Inspiration

Gosh its been such a mad week here at Knots & Kisses.
Not only has it been incredibly busy trying to get several orders finished and lots of lovely design work done for other wedding industry peeps, but I was also ill in bed for a while as well which didn't help. Feeling much better now though and have lots of lovely things lined up for you on the blog next week.
But for now here's some weekly wedding inspiration from the web .... this week I've been inspired by lovely shades of blue and teal ...

images from www.pinterest.com and via www.stylemepretty.com

Launching The 2012 Range of Christmas Card Packs!

Yes I'm afraid its that time of year again ... I for one have had Christmas on the brain for a few weeks now ... ever since I invited the whole family to mine for the festivities this year!
Several of the high street shops already have their Christmas departments going and today I'm launching my 2012 range of Christmas Card packs!

I've kept 2 of the most popular designs from last year and added 2 new designs which you can now buy direct from my website in packs of 5.
The packs are printed on a really nice high quality card with either matching white or brown kraft envelopes. The Vintage Rose and Rocking Horse Cards come on a lovely textured card and the Candy Canes and Circus ranges have a lovely laminated finish.

All you need to do is go to the Greetings Cards Sectionof my website http://www.knotsandkisses.co.uk/greeetings%20cards.html and you can purchase and pay via Paypal.

Wedding Inspiration Friday

Its amazing how quickly the weeks are going by at the moment! Before you know it it will be Christmas! Speaking of which I will be launching this years Knots & Kisses Christmas Card Packs for 2012 on the blog and website on Monday .. so make sure you check back for 2 new designs and all the details on how to order!

As its Friday I wanted to finish the week with a weekly round up of my favourite wedding inspiration from the web this week.
This week its all been about pretty florals and lace ... perfect for a vintage wedding!

all images from www.pinterest.com via ruffled blog and style me pretty.

A Pretty Floral & Tartan Wedding And Bespoke Stationery

Its so lovely when I hear back from clients who have got married recently .. when you work with them for so long on their stationery and the look for their wedding its really nice to get some feedback and especially some photos of the big day!

I recently had a lovely email from Sinead and John who got married this summer and had a range of bespoke stationery designed by me from their invitations right through to their Mass Booklets and placecards.

Here's what they said .... "We just wanted to send you a  little note to say thanks again so much for all the hard work and patience you put into our stationery- it made me smile on  the day every time I scanned the room and saw the bits and pieces around the place. To say our guests were blown away with the mass booklets and invites is an understatement… we're just so delighted we found you on the net!"

Their wedding looked so pretty that I just had to share their photos with you! I just love the mix of pretty pink florals with the grey tartan. ( I also loved their choice of table names ... especially Foo Fighters who are my favourite band :) )

Thanks again to John & Sinead for sharing their wedding photos! x

A Personal Post : Balancing Your Business & Your Life

Good Morning!
I hope you all had a fantastic weekend! Firstly I'd like to make a huge apology for the sporadic nature of blog posts over the last week. It has been an incredibly stressful week here and I'm afraid that the blog becomes unfortunately the last priority when I have clients orders to finish and get to them on schedule as well as personal stuff to deal with.

And that brings me onto today's post ...

At the beginning of last week, on the last day of our holiday we received bad news from our letting agent to say that our landlord, after agreeing to let us have a long term contract on the house we had fallen in love with when looking for places to move to in Devon, had now decided to consider accepting an offer from a potential buyer on the property.
Now I know this isn't the worse news ever .. no one had died or was ill ... but it turned what would have been an exceptionally busy week anyway, catching up with work after a holiday and starting work on three new stationery orders which I had booked in and needed to complete by the end of the week, into a horrendous week in which I was trying to concentrate on work when all I could think about was where we were going to live next month! I was up until god knows what time in the morning most nights finishing off stationery orders because I had had to go and look at other houses in the evening, or needed to ring our letting agent during the day.
It got to the stage where on Thursday, during a driving lesson I had already got booked in and couldn't cancel, I broke down in tears on my poor driving instructor after failing miserably to parallel park!

Fortunately we had the really good news on Saturday that the offer our landlord was thinking about accepting had fallen through and the letting agent was definitely going to be drawing up a long term contract for us this week. To say I was relieved was an understatement!

This all got me thinking though about how I deal with pressure and stress and how, as someone running their own business, how not to let personal issues get in the way of work.
I think weeks like last week will always happen and in those sorts of situations the only thing to do is to do everything and stay up late till its done. However on a normal week to week basis I do think that the work / personal balance just isn't right sometimes and I need to set aside set times during the day to deal with any personal issues that might get in the way of work.
I'd love to hear about how any other small business owners out there deal with this and perhaps we can all help each other out in staying a little more relaxed!

Nikki x

My Favourite Wedding Dress Collections 2013

Wow what a week its prooving to be at Knots & Kisses! Thank you all for the incredibly positive response to the launch of the new 'Simply Knots & Kisses' Range of Wedding Stationery Packs on Monday!
I've also started 3 new orders of wedding stationery for lovely couples this week so its all go!

Today I wanted to share with you some of my favourites from the gorgeous wedding dress collections for 2013. I've really had to filter it down .. so many more I could show you I should probably dedicate another post to it! But anyway here are my favourites ....

Jenny Packham - www.jennypackham.com

David Fielden - www.davidfielden.co.uk

Yolan Cris - www.yolancris.es

Brand New Wedding Stationery Range : Simply Knots & Kisses

Today sees a new direction for Knots and Kisses! A brand new section for my website in fact!
In the new section you will find a new concept for Knots and Kisses ... http://knotsandkisses.co.uk

Since I launched the company I have always created, and will continue to create, stationery which is personalised to the couple and their vision for their wedding. However I've always wanted to create a 'simpler' concept for the website to run along side this which allows couples to buy packs of stationery that they could fill in themselves. Similar to the packs you can buy from many high street stores .. but hopefully with a more design edge and a Knots and Kisses vintage twist.
My thoughts .. why should Brides and Grooms who want to send out Wedding Stationery quickly and simply be limited in their choices?!
I wanted to create a range of stationery for those couples on a tight budget or a short time schedule, but that was still stylish and still embodied the design influences and philosophy behind Knots and Kisses. So here it is ... 'Simply Knots And Kisses' !

'Simply Knots And Kisses' allows you to buy blank invitations already laid out for you to just simply fill in the information relevant to your wedding.
Go onto the 'Simply' section of the website and you will be able to customise your design by picking from a selection of designs, colours and fonts to make the perfect stationery for your wedding.
You then simply place an order and you will receive your packs of wedding stationery in the post within 10 working days! All of this for only £12.00 for a pack of 10 invitations & envelopes.

Here are the motifs you can choose from. They are displayed here on a white background .. but when you click through to the Simply K And K section on the website you will be able to click on the various colours of card and see what your chosen motif will look like with your chosen colour of card.
(The coloured motifs will have a limited choice of background colour )

The card colours available are ...

You can also pick whether you want formal or informal wording templates on the back of the card and you will also have a choice of white, cream or brown kraft envelopes.

To start mixing and matching your own stationery packs just follow the links to the 'Simply K And K' range in the wedding stationery section of the website! http://knotsandkisses.co.uk