12 Elegant Wedding Invitations for a Show-Stopping Affair

A wedding invitation isn’t just an invitation, it’s an introduction — an introduction to the moment you’ve spent months, perhaps even years, planning. It sets the tone for your special day, laying the groundwork for the many details you have in store. And if your heart is set on throwing the wedding event of the year, you’re probably on the hunt for beautifully elegant wedding invitations.

To help you on your quest, we’ve gathered our favorite elegant wedding invitation ideas, along with top tips and advice to help you put together your dream formal wedding invites.

Tips on Choosing Your Wedding Invitations

Invitations offer guests the first glimpse into your wedding details, so allow plenty of time to browse wedding invitation ideas so you can decide how to proceed. Do you like the look of embossed stationery and glittery touches or rose gold with blush floral accents? What about sans serif fonts or calligraphy? Will you select a photo card featuring the two of you or a more minimalist background?

Selecting an elegant invitation is no different from other aspects of traditional wedding planning like choosing the wedding theme or decor for your reception. As a rule of thumb, trust your instincts and follow the patterns and designs that speak to you. Whatever you choose will surely carry an air of sophistication — mixed with bits and pieces of your personality, of course.

Below, you’ll find some of our favorite show-stopping wedding invitations that offer the perfect introduction to your formal wedding — whether you want vintage boho-chic or sophisticated modern wedding invitations.

12 Elegant Wedding Invitation Designs

If you’re planning a formal wedding day, you’ll want an invitation with some stylishness and grace. At Greenvelope, our collection of wedding invitations is filled with designs for any wedding style or personal taste. 

Each design can be customized, so you can experiment with the template layout, fonts, wording, and colors to create your own unique wedding invitation. Here are 12 beautiful wedding invitations that will make a jaw-dropping first impression.

1. Chic Minimalist Invitation

Design: Bonjour Berry

When we think “elegant,” we often think of intricate patterns and sweeping calligraphy. However, in recent years, minimalist designs slowly became the new chic, with white, gray, and hushed color palettes, clean lines, and marble or stone patterns being equally tasteful.

This elegant, laser-cut wedding invitation card features a stone background, thin, sans serif typography, and plenty of blank space to set a stylish, minimalist tone for your ceremony. A corresponding save the date and thank you note feature a photo card of the happy couple, making the completed ensemble more personal.

2. Whimsical Botanical Invitation

Design: M. Taylor Design Co.

This floral wedding invitation ensemble communicates a formal tone to your guests. With botanical, gold foil artwork serving as a border, cursive fonts for emphasis, and bold, classic lettering, this invitation has a bit of an old-world feel.

With an all-black, gold-lined envelope, it would be ideal for a black-tie affair. The save the date card and thank you note are just as luxurious, carrying the gold motif throughout the entire invitation suite.

3. Scripted Invitation

Design: Jessica Williams

There’s something about a black-and-white wedding color palette that’s timeless. The stark contrast between an all-black envelope and backdrop with white lettering makes this classic invitation stand out.

The elegant calligraphy and woven lines add to the classic vibe while switching to block fonts helps the couples’ names create a beautiful design. The black-on-black feel is carried through the save the date and thank you note, creating a dark and daring wedding invitation set.

4. Faint Marble Invitation

Design: Jula Paper Co.

Marble represented prestige as early as ancient Greece, and continues to be used in elegant designs today. In this tasteful letterpress wedding invitation, the happy couple’s names are printed over a faint marble background, finished with a watercolor blush pink overlay. In the top left corner, you can personalize the monogram for your first names. A thin, serif font leaves plenty of blank space, giving this invitation a minimalist yet no-less sophisticated vibe.

5. Gold Bar Accents Invitation

Design: Stacey Meacham Design, LLC

Calligraphy may get all the attention in formal wedding invites, but there’s something bold and powerful about all-caps, serif fonts. With this gold-accented wedding stationery, an off-white, textured background offers a clean look, while a shimmer of gold adds a touch of elegance. The couple’s names occupy the majority of space on this laser-cut invitation, and the wedding details are written in much smaller print to offer a nice visual contrast.

6. Simple Foliage Invitation

Design: Signature Greenvelope

Your guests will surely be delighted by the simplicity of this laser-cut wedding invitation. The luxe design features embossed illustrations of various florals, including greenery, peonies, and ginkgo leaves. The text, featuring a thin, cursive font, can be set in navy blue or black for enduring elegance. The torn envelope carries a textured, almost weathered look that further intrigues the senses. Meanwhile, the envelope liner in a shimmery metallic hue will capture your wedding color palette beautifully.

7. Elegant Snapshot Invitation

Design: Stacey Meacham Design, LLC

This chic, elegant invitation features space for a gorgeous photo of the happy couple and all the finer details about your big day. Gold foil accents and a stunning script font make this an ideal invite for a contemporary celebration.

8. Endless Love Invitation

Design: Pretty Plum Sugar®

Invite your loved ones to celebrate your vows with this delicate floral invitation. This design is sweet yet sophisticated and the corresponding envelope liner offers more visual interest. Choose from six beautiful colorways, all in soft neutral hues that will complement an elegantly understated wedding ceremony and reception.

9. Floral Still Life Invitation

Design: Claudia Owen

Capture your guests’ attention with this striking floral arch invitation. Choose from deep orange or bold red, then add your own wedding details into the arch shape to create a stunning bespoke design with a gorgeous floral background.

10. Brooklyn Invitation

Design: Jula Paper Co.

If florals aren’t your style, this contemporary formal invitation is ideal for an elegant wedding ceremony with a quirky, playful twist. We love the clean lines and simple fonts mixed with modern color palettes and touches of script typography.

11. Acadia Invitation

Design: National Park Foundation

Your guests are sure to be impressed by this delicate sea-inspired wedding invitation. Featuring raw torn edges and painted illustrations, this design comes from our National Park Foundation collection inspired by the sights and atmosphere of the Acadia National Park. (There are also plenty of other options if you’re considering an elegant National Park wedding.)

12. Ornate Oval Frame Invitation

Design: Becky Nimoy Stationery

Catch your guests’ eyes with this wonderfully ornate wedding invite featuring traditional serif and script fonts against a striking backdrop. It’s available in a range of color options — or, as with all our templates, you can ask our design team to customize the color palette instead. 

This invite offers plenty of room on the reverse side to share a wedding poem, a message about your love story, or any other details you’d like to offer about your big day.

A Few Notes on Formal Wedding Invitation Etiquette

When it comes down to it, this is your big day, and you make the rules for your wedding invitation wording, design, and timeline. That said, if you plan to throw a formal ceremony, there are a few wedding invitation customs you may want to abide by.

How to Phrase Your Formal Invitations

First, always print full names on wedding invitations — and this pertains to the names of the happy couple and the names of your guests. Second, when selecting your wedding invitation wording, avoid abbreviations and include full dates and addresses.

When to Send Your Elegant Wedding Invitations

Finally, when telling loved ones about your upcoming celebrations, it’s customary to do so sooner rather than later. Try to send your save the date notes 3-4 months before your big day. Your formal invitations will be sent next, roughly 6-8 weeks before your ceremony.

For destination weddings (particularly those requiring international travel), plan to send your save the dates a full year in advance, with your formal invitations arriving three months before the ceremony. Bridal shower invitations and bachelorette party invitations can be sent roughly one month before the festivities.

All-in-one invitation suites can help you stick to this timetable. With Greenvelope, there’s no need to spend time hunting for invite accessories like vellum belly bands or wax seal stickers. You don’t need to scramble for current addresses, stand in line at the post office, or hope your wedding invitations arrive on time. And you don’t have to play the waiting game, wondering if paper response cards will ever show up. 

With paperless invites, you simply upload an Excel file of your wedding guests’ email addresses and your gorgeous online invitations will land in their inboxes in minutes. (You can even send them via text or social media if you don’t have an email address.) 

Plus, you can seamlessly track RSVPs, send survey questions, share the latest updates about your special day, and more all from a single dashboard. 

Greenvelope Makes Sending Elegant Wedding Invitations Easier

You’ve spent months planning each detail of your dream wedding — and we have no doubt it will be the most elegant affair of the year.

Still, planning a formal wedding ceremony can be stressful. At Greenvelope, we want to take as much planning off your wedding plate as possible, so you have more time and energy to enjoy this once-in-a-lifetime experience.

There’s no need to track RSVP cards, answer last-minute texts from guests, or call your loved ones asking if they’d prefer chicken or steak at the reception. Instead of wrestling with all those DIY details, we handle all of the above, tracking survey responses and open rates, and sorting your guests’ last-minute questions with ease.

From all of us at Greenvelope, congratulations! Sending your elegant wedding invitations marks the final countdown to your big day, and we’re so happy to play a small part in it.