Hire a calligrapher or address our own wedding invitations?

Both my fiancé and I have terrible handwriting so I'm having our addresses printed on the envelopes from our printer.

I handwrote all of our envelopes but I do have pretty & neat handwriting. I like how calligraphy looks but I personally wouldn't pay for it. Where did you order your save the dates? I know that some sites offers free address printing.

I bought invitations online from a place that included enveloping addressing. I don't have good handwriting either plus it took less time to type everything than write it.

We had our stationery vendor print the addresses directly on the envelope for an additional charge. If you are considering paying a calligrapher anyway, that is another option to look into; we were very happy with how ours looked!

I have horrible handwriting, but I hand addressed them to save money. As long as it's legible enough for the post office, it's fine in my opinion. People toss the envelope right away. I just took my time: addressed like 5, took a break, came back to it, etc. I spread it out over like 2 days so it didn't really take long at each sitting, especially since my husband and I split the invites.

We got our Save the Dates from Magnet Street, and they addressed the envelopes for us. I don't know if you have a Cricuit, but they have a handwriting function where you can put a pen in so it writes for you, that was my back up plan

For save the dates I am just doing address labels (some people might thinks it's tacky but I don't care). For invites I will order the envelopes with the addresses already printed on them. most sites do this for relatively low cost. We will most likely be using magnet street.

I'm hand writing mine, I might have my mom do my wedding invites since she has pretty handwriting but I'm doing my save the dates. People will think that it looks nice, but its not something they are going to keep

Paying an extra ~$50 to have the addresses printed on the envelopes by the company we ordered them from was one of the best decisions we made. It was such a relief to just be able to stuff, seal, and stamp them and then they were out the door.


But if that’s not an option for you, I don’t think anyone will judge you based on what the handwriting looks like. Most people will probably through the outer envelope out pretty quickly anyway. Just as long as the postal service can decipher it!

We've ordered all of our stationary from Minted, and they do free address printing! They have classic fonts to choose from, or you can select one of their All-Script options which looks like handwritten calligraphy, it adds a little more to your total, and you'll have to take them to the post office to see if they'll charge extra for that type of lettering, but it honestly adds so much to your wedding suite!

They also offer return address printing, and you can have it match the recipient address, or you can choose a cheaper option of sticker address labels which still look really nice!

My handwriting is neat, but not beautiful by any means lol, so Minted having these options is a life saver, but also worth every penny!

I have decent handwriting but I'm also overly critical of it, especially if I end up writing slanted lol. We ordered our invites from Minted, which has free recipient addressing, but so many of the names didn't fit because I wanted each person's name written out (not just Mr. & Mrs. Husband's Name). We ended up just having the return addresses printed and DIY-ing clear labels to stick on and they looked completely fine. We're not having a super formal wedding, so it's not like it didn't match the formality of the event. TL;DR team "anyone but me" lol

I have pretty good handwriting so I wrote them myself. A couple people asked if we hired someone so that made me feel we made the write choice (dad joke).


My husband has the penmanship of a second grader so he couldn’t help with that but everyone will tear the envelope and throw it away so as long as it’s neat and legible I think you should write your selves.

That’s something only you can decide. Everyone hates their handwriting but it’s so rare to get something that is handwritten in the mail and isn’t junk dressed up to be formal as is common now. As long as it gets to the destination, no one will be judging your writing. Honest.


Do you have a couple close relatives or bridesmaids with great handwriting? If so, have an invite assembly party one night where you put the invites together and address them in one swoop.

Totally do it yourself if you have the time. That's going to go straight into the recycling bin...promise!


We printed ours at home in this absolutely gorgeous calligraphy style font and literally NO ONE NOTICED. Lol

I bought custom labels off of Etsy because I didn't want to handwrite them and was willing to pay for the convenience within reason.

While I'm not sure how much calligraphy work would be, I'd imagine it would cost quite a bit more than labels or adding on address printing, and I personally don't think it's a worthwhile expense.

Unless stationery is important to you, this is an easy place to save money.

Another vote for stickers with the address details on, or printing directly onto the envelopes, but calligraphy here for the number of people we have invited would be prohibitively expensive.

I handwrote our save the dates. No one saves the envelopes lol

As for our invitations, I may type them myself, and print them on labels -again I am personally not concerned

I hand wrote ours even though my handwriting is AWFUL. But I’m with the others that if the post office can read it, it’s fine because it’s going in the trash anyway.


That said-check your spelling if you’re handwriting (and have your future spouse double check). I definitely misspelled my future mother in laws name on her envelope. 🤦‍♀️

If you do use labels, make sure they don’t look like a corporate mass mailing. Speaking from experience an a wedding guest, I have received invites that had addresses labels but they were so smeared by the elements that it was a wonder they got to the invited guests, and the couples mentioned that several no shows didn’t even get theirs for that reason. So make sure you a trial run in case.

I bought small letter stencils i was just gonna use those on the envelopes got it at the dollar stor youd be surprised how little you have to spend to have all the little details