The Artful Bride: Simple, Handmade Wedding Projects [Paperback]

April Paffrath (Author), Laura McFadden (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 2003

Every bride-to-be wants her wedding to be unique and spectacular. Savvy, stylish brides are looking for ways to add their own style and sophistication to their wedding without relying on tradition-heavy standards. This idea-packed guide contains everything you need to personalize a wedding beautifully and elegantly—but also simply and inexpensively. The Artful Bride includes more than 30 fashionable and fun-to-make projects, from novel wedding invitations to cool gifts for the wedding party, and from playful seating cards to a glamorous tiara. For those of you short on time but high on style, this guide will help you create a wedding that reflects you and your fiance exactly.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Freelance art director McFadden and how-to writer Paffrath combine their design talents in this lighthearted, useful guide to creating wedding paraphernalia at home. "Handmade wedding elements are fun to make," they declare in the book’s preface; "they give you greater control over the feel of your wedding, and they even provide you with some quality downtime during the preparation for the big day." Not to mention that they can save couples loads money that might otherwise go to printers, decorators and jewelers. The authors cover all aspects of wedding design, from invitations and thank you notes to party gifts and ceremony details. Some of their ideas, like their paper and moonstone picture frame, are elegant and professional looking. Others, like their wind-up monkey and penguin name cards, are deliberately humorous—and, some might argue, a bit corny. Large color photographs help readers evaluate each project before they decide to start it, and allow them to separate the few duds from the winners.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author

April L. Paffrath is a freelance editor and writer in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In addition to book and magazine editing, she has written architecture profiles, travel pieces, cooking articles, and craft how-to's, for magazines such as Scientific American Explorations and Martha Stewart Living. She is coauthor with Laura McFadden of The Artful Bride: Simple, Handmade Wedding Projects (Rockport, 2003).

Laura McFadden is a freelance art director living in Somerville, Massachusetts. She is a former design director for Inc. magazine. She currently runs her own graphic design studio, called Laura McFadden Design, Inc., and has contributed to various craft books and magazines for publishers such as Rockport Publishers, Martingale & Company, and Handcraft Illustrated

Product Details

• Paperback: 128 pages
• Publisher: Quarry Books (February 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1564969614
• ISBN-13: 978-1564969613
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 9.3 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #721,894 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A so-so book on cheap-looking crafts for a wedding, October 23, 2006

By 

MsJoie "MsJoie" (Washington, DC United States) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Artful Bride: Simple, Handmade Wedding Projects (Paperback)

I couldn't decide if this book merited 2 or 3 stars, so I rounded up. I was disappointed by this book; there are not tons of ideas in it, and I thought most of them look "handmade" in a cheap way, not in a cool way. There are a few funny ideas for table placecards, although they definitely look cheap, too. I hadn't thought about this before, but I think this book taught me that if you want truly elegant invitations and decorations, you can't glue them together yourself or create them based on plastic toys from the dollar store. All in all, the book is worth leafing through, but really not worth purchasing. And I am sure I won't actually try any of these ideas.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Has several worth-trying projects, February 12, 2011

By 

sallybrarian (Columbus, OH) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Artful Bride: Simple, Handmade Wedding Projects (Paperback)

The best things in this book are probably the invitations, tiara, choker, albums, and shoe decorations. They look pretty cool, seem easy to make, and relatively inexpensive. A lot of the other ideas in here seem a bit on the cheesy side which is not my style (wind-up toys dressed as bride and groom? sounds like a waste of money). Diagrams are clear but I wish that there were finished measurements on some pieces (like how wide is the choker and what width headband did they use for tiara?). I recommend checking this out from the library vs. purchasing.

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This one is classic for brainstorming ideas., September 29, 2005

By 

Salos Daisy (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Artful Bride: Simple, Handmade Wedding Projects (Paperback)

If you are at all crafty, you'll get tons of inspiration from these ideas. While you may not do these projects exactly, they are sure to spark more ideas. Definately a great resource for the do it yourselfer.