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Weddings. An event to remember. An excuse to create. A reason to go overboard and indulge our cravings. Weddings. A reason to lose reason and be stubborn and get away with it. Rachel Wiles jumped on the bandwagon of detailed planning and sentimentality early on in the game, starting by her Save The Date mementos.

I wanted to create a keepsake, something beyond the usual Save the Dates. In fact, “Things We Keep,” was sort of the theme behind my wedding, and was carried through everything from the ceremony to the details. It was inspired by recurring thoughts of my deceased grandmothers and the things I keep that were theirs: a sewing kit from my Mamaw, bits of fabric and beads from my Granny’s nightgowns and old necklaces. I wanted everything to have a treasured feel — something cozy and warm that inspires memories. Fabric emerged as a common bond between them. The use of our silhouettes as a design element was inspired by these cheesy plastic courting couple silhouettes my Mamaw had on her guest bedroom walls. When I look at them now they’re pretty awful, but as a kid I found them fascinating and would lie in bed and stare at them until I fell asleep.

DIY projects usually take one of two paths: the uneventful, and the very eventful and challenging. The latter usually full of lessons and impromptu solutions…

The Yudu is a pretty cool home screen printing device, as long as you’re okay with less-than-perfect quality — I think it costs around $250 at Michaels. The main problem with the Yudu is that the necessary materials, such as the special screens and emulsion are reallly expensive, and it’s very difficult for a novice to burn a good screen. It took me three times to get something acceptable. I never got something I was completely satisfied with, but I was running out of time. The screens do not print type that is smaller than 18 points very well — or details, for that matter — which can be limiting. I realized this as I lost some info that I ended up stroking back in, very gently, with a Sharpie. For the amount of time I spent and the number of screens and emulsion I had to buy, I think it would have been cheaper to have the hankies professionally printed.

Perhaps cheaper outsorced, but the satisfaction of a completed hand-made Save The Date is hard to beat. One more detail future guests are sure to admire.

The Pilgrim Journal

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Loyola University SoE Viewbook

Rachel & Philip Save The Date Handkerchiefs

Production Method

Design

Rachel Wiles

Printing

Silkscreen: Rachel Wiles
Offset: Alphagraphics