OBT member Angie is a self-described "brew goddess, and competent bride-to-be" and she has shown off both of these attributes by homebrewing her very own pumpkin porter beer for her fall wedding! And she got her "Woman of Awesome" to illustrate the custom labels. How awesome is this!?

Cheers to you Angie. I bet your beer is going to taste as great as it looks, have one (or several) for me.

OBT members can check out a close up of the custom beer label here and everyone can check out her "Woman of Awesome's" Etsy shop with more custom illustrations here.

Meet Stinkerpants Designs, where everything is insanely cute — even the name!

Stinkerpants founder, Sara, is an an illustrator from San Francisco who does custom drawings for wedding invitations, save the dates and thank you notes.

Sara does all kinds of personalized stationary and custom illustrations — you must go browse the cuteness of her work for prior wedding clients.

Although Stinkerpants is mostly focused on custom illustrations, Sara also has wedding greeting cards that are adorbs. I mean really: weren't we just talking about thank you cards?

To learn more about Sara's custom illustrations, head on over to stinkerpants.com, friend her on facebook, or follow @stinkerpants on twitter.

…And tell that cutie Sara that Ariel sentcha!

My friend and neighbor, Seattle cartoonist Ellen Forney, recently designed these sci-fi fabulous wedding invitations for a local couple, Michaela and Ryan.

See, when Ellen's not busy cranking out comics for award-winning books, she does these badass custom wedding invitations. I've liked lots of Ellen's invites in the past (and featured her before) but I'm COMPLETELY in love with Michaela and Ryan's zombie-themed invitation illustration, which reads "Earthquake? Hangover? Zombies? Nothing will stop … THE WEDDING."

You really must view it larger to see all the black-inked details.

And if you're curious about Ellen's non-zombie custom wedding invitations, watch this little video where she walks you through some of her work, including a great twist on using photobooth pictures in your invitation …

Continue reading "Nothing will stop … THE WEDDING" →

Katie Fischer is an artist and graphic designer who specializes in wedding invitations and custom illustrations, including beautiful designs for gay and lesbian couples, like this whimsical invitation featuring two brides. Be sure to check out the "Art & Illustration" section of her website to see more.

Katie's done lots of custom wedding designs, but when I asked her Katie about how she wanted to evolve her wedding invitation designs, she explained, "I'm dying to do invitations for clients who want something artistic — something a little less Martha Stewart and a little more Edward Gorey/Tim Burton."

To this end, she's offering a 10% discount to offbeat brides! Just mention that you found her on Offbeat Bride when you contact her about your, say, Nightmare Before Christmas-style custom illustration invites. Or whatever else your mind might be cooking up…

I officially launched Offbeatbride.com on January 1st, 2007, so it seems fitting to relaunch the site on its two year anniversary.

The design should feel pretty familiar. I'm keeping the general structure pretty much as its always been … the biggest change you'll notice is the addition of illustrations from Donna from Butterflies Kiss, who you may remember me featuring a couple months back.

I decided that Donna's images were so perfect for Offbeatbride.com that I had to get 'em on the site permanently, and Donna even made me a custom illustration — that's me on my wedding day up there on the "Author" button. Many thanks to Donna for her awesomeness … and she's doing that 10% discount for offbeat bride readers!

Another big change is that the tags for each post have been moved up to be front and center. The tags are those words off to the right of each post. If you see a subject that interests you, just go ahead and click the tag to see all the posts on Offbeat Bride that have been tagged with the same words.

I've also added a couple pages to help folks find their ways in the offbeat empire … a page for the newly engaged, and a Frequently Asked Questions page addressing Offbeat Bride, offbeatbride.com, and the Offbeat Bride Tribe.

There may be a few bugs here and there — lemme know if you come across anything on the site acting wonky!