Wedding Etiquette Wednesday

Now that you have your beautiful wedding invitations – what is the proper way to address them? Here is a great list of traditional formal guidelines to help you put your address list together properly. Although these are the traditional guidelines in addressing wedding invitations, they are just that - guidelines, so feel free to deviate from these if you prefer to make your invitations more personal or more casual.

General Information / Addresses & Zip Codes

Nicknames or abbreviations should be avoided when possible except for Mr., Mrs., Jr., etc. You may use an initial if you do not know the full name, or if the person never uses his given name.

Cities, states and numbered streets are written out in full (with the exception of D.C.). In regards to addresses, the only optional abbreviations are for Saint (St.) or Mount (Mt.), which can be written either way.


Making sure you have the correct address is paramount. There is nothing more frustrating than having a beautifully addressed invitation returned to sender with postage markings all over it because of an incorrect address or insufficient postage.

When should I send out my Invitations?

Invitations should be sent out six to eight weeks before your wedding date. If you have a large number of out of town guests, we suggest eight weeks to give your guests the courtesy of making reservations and securing travel arrangements more economically.

Mailing Your Invitations

When you first receive your invitations, assemble one complete invitation (including the tissue paper, any maps or additional insertions, and the stamp on the return response envelope) and take it to your local Post Office for weight and measurement. Sometimes it's the size and not the weight which may require more postage than one first class stamp, so we encourage you to take it to the window and have a postal worker weigh and measure it for you. This step can save a lot of aggravation later. Ask to see their selection of wedding stamps and see if they are available as self-stick stamps. When it is time to mail your invitations, if you hand deliver them to your local post office window, you can request that they be hand canceled with a rubber stamp, instead of by a machine. It makes the front of the envelope look a lot more attractive without the large ugly black postal markings all over it.