Custom designed invitations and announcements for the big and small occasions in your life.Our designs are as varied, unpredictable, and beautiful as our clients.
Custom designed invitations and announcements
for the big and small occasions in your life.
Our designs are as varied, unpredictable, and beautiful as our clients.
ABOUT US
ABOUT US
Nineteen years and hundreds of custom invitations have made us very good at our job. There’s no challenge too big or too small and we dedicate our utmost energy to every project we take on.
Our printers and engravers are Master craftsmen. Our calligrapher worked at the White House. We have the right paper for the job. Thick classic cottons. Handmade papers, silkscreened in Japan, marbled in Italy. We've even handmade leather envelopes!
A little information about our name. The most formal invitations include an inner envelope. This is a throwback to the Downton Abbey lifestyle. Letters from one Lord or Lady to another were ferried over unpaved roads in the sometimes grubby hands of a houseboy. The butler receiving the mail would shuck the dirty outer envelope, put the clean envelope on a tray and present to the addressee "By Hand". Hence, our business name inspired by the manners of classic correspondence.
Award Winning
ByHand Invitations has been named to Washingtonian Weddings' list of recommended wedding vendors, our 10th year in a row!
The creative team behind ByHand Invitations
The creative team behind ByHand Invitations
Steve Bottorff & Katy Kelly
Television art director, typographer and graphic designer, Steve Bottorff and his wife Katy Kelly, an award winning children's book author and illustrator both trained in graphic and fine arts at Virginia Commonwealth University. We started ByHand Invitations creating a friends daughters' bat mitzvah invites in 2004. We have been designing stunning invitation suites for couples celebrating here in the U.S. and abroad and have provided design services for major corporations since 2014.
One hundred percent of our clients have told us they’re thrilled with the results. We are determined to keep that record!
Is 10 stars an option?? Steve is INCREDIBLE. Steve and his wife became a part of the family as we used them for our wedding invitations, programs, escort cards and a ton of other wedding related stationery. We received TONS of compliments on our invitations and we loved that they were custom and fit US.
Sarah G. | McLean, VA
When we viewed his first mock up of the invitation we were in awe of his work. He was able to create exactly our vision. All of our friends, tell us today that the invitation suite that Steve created for our wedding is the most beautiful and creative that they have ever seen.
David L. | Oakland, CA
Steve did a marvelous job on our wedding invitations. We received high-end design services for below-market cost. He met with us, really listened to what we wanted, and came up with designs that were so much better than we had hoped for. He was timely, responsive, and treated us like valued customers, even though we were on a tight budget.
AE | Washington, DC
Our wedding was a true mix between bohemian and traditional. When we asked Steve at ByHand Invitations to create an invite that would reflect the rustic elements while keeping it slightly traditional, he not only figured out how to make every random idea we had a reality, he made them even better. He is so patient, a brilliant artist, and filled to the brim with ways to make your wedding invite go from just alright to frame-worthy.
EM | Chapel Hill, NC