From homemade favors and centerpieces to a beautifully-styled candy display surrounding the cake, some couples take pride in executing some (or many) of their wedding details. These DIY’ers often have a clear vision and the creative know-how to pull it off.
Many brides and grooms opt to take care of some of the details themselves, and, in the name of efficiency and sanity, hire someone to handle the rest. The best way to figure out which parts to DIY and which parts to delegate is to get organized early on in the wedding planning process. Here are some tips and resources to help you on your journey.
1. Use Pinterest to Brainstorm Ideas
Before you sit down and commit to anything, a great first step is to create an inspiration board where you pin everything from colors and gowns to catering option and venues. Brainstorming is not only completely free; it is also pretty revealing. Clear preferences will emerge as some areas start to dominate over others. Knowing what is most important to you can help you determine where you’d like to dedicate your time, and what you’d like to hire a professional to tackle..
2. Browse WeddingWire and Get Inspired
There are a lot of great wedding websites out there, but WeddingWire is definitely among the best. Its intuitive platform contains a number of valuable features, including a registry section, an active community forum where you can vent and ask questions, loads of venue information and a large photo gallery. The best thing about this resource, though, is the directory of individual wedding websites. Browse it to find out how hundreds of couples have put portions of their own events together.
3. Put Everything in One Place Using The Knot Wedding Planner and Organizer
This fabulous planner put out by the famous blog and website lets you tabulate everything from timeline to budget through wedding outfits, venue and entertainment. Its binder format gives you room to save receipts and notes, and makes it easy to remove preformatted pages that aren’t relevant. The best thing is you can take it everywhere you go.
4. Shop for Decor with Save on Crafts
If you love decorating and want to take care of some of these details yourself, this website offers options in almost every wedding decor category imaginable. Browsing through the sections alone will help inspire you and help you get a feel for cost.
5. Design Your Own Fabric at Spoonflower
Spoonflower gives a 10 percent discount to customers who provide their own fabric design pattern, or you can choose one of theirs. They have canvas-weight fabrics that are perfect for gift bags, for instance. Like custom cake monograms and wedding invitations, individualized fabric can help to bring your theme together or add a touch of whimsy to a rustic venue.
6. Let Brides.com Help You Find a Vendor
The premier wedding magazine has a great feature that lets you browse real wedding venues by locale, variety or style. Want to see how that couple in Denver pulled off a barn wedding? Want to see what it’s like to have an elegant wedding in a French chateau? It’s the perfect place both to browse local vendors and to see how it would actually look to have your event hosted there.
7. Get a Handle on those Tiny, All-Important Details with Martha Stewart Weddings
This website is full of practical advice for the bride-to-be who wants to put some of her proven DIY skills to use in planning her wedding. There is everything from beauty and hashtag creation tips to professional information about how to create impact on a budget. The beauty of Martha Stewart’s website is it tackles small details that really make a big difference..
8. Use Pink Monkey Products, to Source Everything From Furniture to Lanterns
While Pink Monkey Solutions is geared to provide full service custom event design and execution, Pink Monkey Products offers rental opportunities to the DIY bride/groom who would like to organize and execute the decor for their wedding. Choose from a wide array of sofas, chairs, side tables and coffee tables to style the intimate seating area you’ve envisioned. Need help with tabletop decor? From candles that look like aspen tree branches or mercury glass votives ala West Elm or Pottery Barn, you can rent accessories that embody the aesthetic you’re after for a fraction of the price of buying it outright.
Download the Pink Monkey products catalog to see the full scope of what we offer.
The Bottom Line
Your wedding is the biggest and most important party you’ll likely ever host. You want every detail to be perfect, but sometimes even the craftiest people get overwhelmed at the prospect of so many different moving parts at once.
So DIY smart and throw your best efforts into making a realistic to-do list you can stick to. At the same time, keep in mind that often the best decision you might make is to work with a pro. That’s where the experts at Pink Monkey Solutions can assist. Feel free to reach out to us; we’d love to help you pull off your perfect day, whether it’s through a full, customized production or with help from the rental arm of our business. Happy planning!