Bespoke Vs. Personalised Invitations and Stationery

If you are using the internet to research and source your wedding invitations and stationery, then you will see many, many websites offering 'Personalised' invitations and stationery.  At the same time the word 'Bespoke' is being bandied about quite freely.  Are these two terms just different ways to express the same thing?

The answer is, 'well, yes and no but mainly no'.  The term 'Personalised' really means that the invitations have been personalised with regard to the text that appears on it, and maybe a few of the design elements have some options, such as colour or font.

Invitations can essentially be bought in one of three ways.  You can buy it as is, with no option to change anything.  This type of stationery comes with a set invitation 'wording' and with spaces for you to fill in the relevant information about your wedding by hand.  Because these invitations are pre-designed and are not altered (personalised) in anyway, they are generally the cheapest way to purchase your stationery and because of the plethora of designs available, you will usually be able to find something that suits.

Personalised stationery stands apart from this in that you can specify the text that appears, and this is printed onto the pre-designed invitation.  Usually you can choose from a list of available fonts and you may also be able to choose a colour, or ink type/metallic foil, depending on the original design of the stationery.  Because there is this additional element of 'work' involved for the manufacturer, personalised stationery carries an extra charge, however this is offset by saving you time at home filling in all the details by hand into each invitation.  Some personalised stationery providers will also offer services such as guest name printing, but not all. 

Bespoke stationery is not only personalised with your text and font but every other element of the design, including the images, materials and finishes are open to being changed to meet specific requirements.  With bespoke invitations you can have something designed entirely from scratch, or you could pick and mix elements from several different stationery designs.  Most wedding stationers have a huge range of fonts available to them, and it's possible to precisely colour match your stationery to other elements of your wedding that you have already chosen, such as bridesmaids dresses etc. Generally, the cost of bespoke wedding stationery is not as high as you might imagine it would be.  Most of the time you will find that it in line with, or not far from, the cost of personalised stationery.  Of course, there are always going to be exceptions, for instance if you were having large Swarovski elements or the design called for hand painting etc.

It's important to remember that when you are ordering 'Personalised' stationery, it is still manufactured by an automated, machine based system (with the exception of stationers like me who offer a range of pre-designed stationery that can be simply personalised, as well as bespoke work).  You should be sent a 'Proof' of your text before your stationery is printed and it's very important to check this for any errors, because the machines just print what exactly what you tell them to.

Wedding stationers producing 'Bespoke' work are generally working in a much more hands on way.  Not only are bespoke invitations designed for you but many aspects of bespoke stationery are hand done, although we do of course use machines for printing, foiling, embossing etc.  The 'Proofing' process still exists for bespoke work, and is still very important, however it's a person, rather than a machine, creating your stationery and I know that most good stationers do there utmost to check spelling and grammar as they work.  With a bespoke wedding stationer, any design, even one that is an existing design within their portfolio, remains flexible.  This flexibility allows a bespoke wedding stationer to create a truly unique design for each and every client.