Chica and I once threw a bridal shower at a local bookstore’s cafe for a good friend. The bride-to-be was an avid reader and we wanted to surprise her with a unique, literary-inspired invitation. We wanted the invitations to be books themselves, so we considered lots of hardback and paperback alternatives. We finally decided on the beautifully-decorated, inexpensive Dover Thrift Editions paperback books to alter and make into the invitations.

First, we chose a Dover Thrift Edition that matched the fall color scheme we wanted to use. We loved the idea of using the Love Poems edition for the invitation, but the colors didn’t match with our scheme, so opted to use another edition instead (Sonnets from the Portuguese). We had a nice cover now, but didn’t like the actual title of the book, so we used a small X-ACTO knife to cut out the title area on the front of the book, leaving a little window in the cover.

The book title was taken care of, but there was still a strip of text running across the top of the cover of the book that we wanted to hide. To take care of that, we glued some brown ribbon across it and poked in a few tiny leaf-shaped brads as an added piece of decoration.

We now had a beautiful cover with a window, but the title page wasn’t very nice. To cover it, we started with a piece of coordinating cardstock. We tore all four sides to create soft edges and used brown ink to distress the edges even more. On the top we stamped a fall leaf, and on the bottom we put another torn and inked piece of cardstock that we stamped with “You’re Invited” written in a nice script font. Then we printed a photo of the couple (in sepia tone to match the color scheme) and matted it with another piece of cardstock. We then mounted the photo in the middle of the title page, making sure that it would align perfectly with the hole we cut in the cover.

We used library pockets and library card inserts to convey the actual invitation information. We mounted the pocket to the inside of the back cover of the book and filled in all of the party information (Time, Date, Place, etc.) on the card insert. We decorated the pocket by distressing it with the ink, stamping it with the leaf stamp and adding more of the same ribbon and brads that we used on the cover.

The final touch was a matching bookmark. We purchased a simple bookmark kit and decorated each one to match the pocket. When we sent the invitations, we put the bookmark in the back of the book. This helped the recipients find the actual party information in the back.

You can easily expand this idea to many occasions and with many different book ideas. I especially loved the Dover books because they are so nice, yet inexpensive. They would make a fantastic item to hand out as a wedding favor. You can customize them by stamping them with a “Thank you” message or you could even create stickers on your computer with computer sticker paper to add to the book with your picture and wedding information.

Also check out: Our friend Donna’s blog entry on About.com for more shower ideas and tips!