What to give the couple who has everything? Sometimes the answer is easy… choose a gift from their registry, add to cart and move on. But what if the couple hasn’t registered, the items remaining on their registry don’t fit your budget or giving style, or you’re looking for a more personal gift to give? How about giving a personalized quilt as a wedding gift?
A personalized wedding quilt is a heartfelt, truly personal gift that will commemorate this special day and is sure to be treasured for years to come. Quiltlove makes it easy for individuals to purchase quilts in full, or give them as group gifts where friends and family members pay for their individual squares. In this blog post we share some of our favorite tips for giving the best wedding quilt.
Tips for Gifting a Wedding Quilt
A wedding quilt is a wonderful way to wrap a new couple in the love of friends and family members. We offer the following advice to make sure your gift is an instant family treasure.
First, Nail the Timing
To kick off your gift giving, we recommend you make an initial decision about when you would like to give your wedding gift. This will help you you plan how and when to collect the artwork for their quilt squares. Here are three timeline options that work well for gifting wedding quilts:
1.) Give the quilt to the couple on/around their wedding day, as traditional gift giving dictates. Participants make their squares about a month in advance of the wedding.
2.) Ask wedding party members and guests to design squares at a wedding-related event such as a bridal shower, rehearsal dinner, reception or brunch send-off. Give the quilt a few weeks after this activity takes place.
3.) Wait to receive wedding photos from the couple and incorporate these images as quilt squares. Give the quilt a few weeks after wedding photos are circulated.
Second, Incorporate Personal Elements
There are numerous ways to incorporate personalized aspects of the couple’s wedding in to their quilt. Here are a few ideas we love:
- Incorporate the wedding’s theme colors. This is an easy way to make the quilt an immediately recognizable souvenir of the special day and ensure you’re using colors the couple will be sure to love. We recommend the “Choose Your Own Colors” option in our shop to ensure a great match with the wedding’s existing color palette. Don’t see the colors you’re looking for? Shoot us an email and we can help you out!
- Cast a broad net. Be sure to invite participation from both sides of the aisle, including friends, family members and multiple generations of guests. This will make your quilt a true reflection of the couple’s support network. We do!
- Suggest a theme. Ask everyone to create squares centered on a common theme to make for cohesive wedding quilt. We love handwritten signatures for a Guest Book type look and feel, as well as quotes and words of wisdom, drawings of flowers from the bouquet, and well wishes, song verses and prayers. Other creative ideas include vintage wedding photos, leaves on a family tree and hearts and other symbols of love and unity.
- Don’t feel obligated to keep it a secret. While we are generally big fans of the wow factor that comes with a classic, surprise-box-opening moment, this is one occasion where it is OK to check in with the couple about your gift. You might need their help with obtaining the email addresses of their guest list, and/or seek their permission to have an artwork table set up on site at the wedding reception other wedding-event/venue.
I requested a quilt to give to my sister and her new husband as a wedding gift and couldn’t have been happier with how beautiful it turned out! Liz made the process incredibly easy, sent out reminders to all of the friends and family who participated. My sister and her husband absolutely loved the gift and it will be something they can use and treasure forever. I highly recommend Quiltlove as a gift for any (or no) occasion – I promise you won’t regret it!!
Kerry O’Neill Bilewski, Sister of the Bride
Third, Ship Smart
Is the couple taking a honeymoon immediately following their wedding? Depending on when artwork is submitted, it’s possible the quilt will be delivered while the couple is out of town. Consider shipping to a different address, or asking us to hold the shipment until a given date if you know the couple will be out of town for more than a couple of days.
Other Ideas
Any wedding quilt that incorporates love from family and friends is guaranteed to be a treasure. Here are a few more ideas to really take this gift over the top:
- Incorporate photos of the couple’s wedding stationery into the quilt squares (e.g., save the date, invitation, program).
- Plan an art-related activity at the bridal shower, where the bride’s nearest and dearest can gather to draw, paint, collage or otherwise create the artwork for their squares, similar to a sip and paint party!
- Are you a bride or groom planning your wedding? Set up a guestbook-style table at your wedding where instead of signing a book, your guests sign their names on blank pieces of paper (Sharpie-style pens work great). Send Quiltlove the signatures you collected and we can take it from there, printing these signatures on fabric and creating a quilt to commemorate your special day.
Have you given or received a wedding quilt? We would love to hear from you!
As always, thanks for reading.
Warmly,
