DIY Wedding Guest Book Frame w/ Hearts

Home Accessories, Party decorations, Photography

unique wedding guestbook_ frame with hearts - tutorial - FineCraftGuild.com

A wedding guest book offers treasured memories of your big, important day. Unfortunately, once that married life is on its way, things like a wedding guest book is rarely looked at. Such a pity. This unique DIY wedding guest book frame solves the issue. Guests get to write their wedding wishes and names on individual hearts surrounding the hearts of the married couple.

It makes a unique wedding guest book into a beautiful wall artwork, where the married couple gets to see the wedding guests’ names and wishes every time they walk by.

DIY Wedding Guest Book Frame w/ Hearts

Here’s how to make one:

DIY Wedding Guest Book Frame w/ Hearts

Craft Supplies

1. Two sectional frame kits(one kit for the top and bottom, and one for the left and right sides of the frame). A good size for this project is 16 x 20” but check the pre-cut glass/plexi-glass section of your craft store to see what standard sized glass they have in store. 12×12” might look good too.

Do what’s practical: pick a matching set. Having said this, having a pane of glass cut to size is not expensive, but it may involve extra trip to the store …

If you know where the artwork is going to hang after the wedding, then you may wish to measure that area and use those dimensions as a guidance for your artwork aka guest book shape and size.

And … consider how many hearts it must contain. That depends on the number of wedding party guests.

2. Glass or Plexiglas sheet to size. Rule of thumb: Go with glass for small frames, and plexi for large frames.

3. “Large” wooden hearts (1.5″ or 2″ and up); and a couple of packages of small, thin wooden hearts.

Get 20 or so more hearts on white stock than your number of wedding guests. You don’t want to run out of hearts…. (Extra hearts allows people to redo their writing, in case the first lettering is not so great …) Pop a handful of hearts in the frame. This way, it will look better at the beginning of the party. Also, having a few ‘mock’ wishes in the frame helps your wedding guests understand what is expected of them.

Note: Prices (quality and quantity) vary greatly for these kind of hearts. Also search under ‘woodsies hearts’. Not that the Darice brand gives you just a few hearts in a package! But there are incredible deals also such as this Darice Wood Shape 1000 pack for under $8 at the time of this writing. (contrast that with say $4 for 7 pieces.)

4. Glue (and paint).

If you go with acid free materials, then use acid free glue as well. Acid free keeps your artwork alive longer. In this case, you will want to paint all your hearts with an acid free acrylics paint. And use an acid-free fine-line sharpie.

5. A couple of thin acid-free fine-liners/ Sharpies.

6. Two little bowls.

7. A Small Display Easel 10 Inch
– to present the guestbook and collect the wishes.

8. Screwdriver to screw the frame elements together.

How to make this Unique Wedding Guestbook

Step 1: Assemble 3/4 of the frame, leaving the top side of the frame off. First, make your U-shape, but leave it a bit loose by attaching but not tightening the screws. You will find that the wooden or metal frame sides are attached at the back with a metal L brackets. Insert the back of the frame. It will take you less than 10 minutes to do this. It is really easy. Kind of like a simple IKEA project…

I have dealt with numerous of these kind of self-assembly frames, and I noted that they are pretty much all the same.

If you want a video tutorial on how to put such a ‘sectional frame’ together, here it is:

Tip: now is a perfect time to double-check that the larger hearts you have chosen are not too thick for the frame! The ones I am referring to are .12”, while the smaller hearts are 1/8”, which is about the same. If your larger hearts are significantly thicker than the smaller ones, you might want to sand them down a bit, at the back.

Step 2: Paint the two larger hearts a contrast color, in the color scheme of the wedding party décor. Let it dry. Then, print the two names of the wedding couple. When dry, glue these two onto one smaller heart that snugly fits in-between them, so as to keep the large hearts in position and upright. See picture. When that glue is dry (or tacky), attach the hearts to the frame backdrop, about 2/5th of the way down.

Step 3: Insert the glass or plexi-glass front- panel and tighten your frame.

Tips & Hints

Tip 1: Make a little note card explaining how to use your unique guest book.

Tip 2: Use one of the little bowls to hold the blank hearts. Have a couple of acid-free pens ready. Use the other matching bowl in case your frame overflows with hearts. You want to collect all of the hearts carefully.

Tip 3: Tie the presentation of the guestbook into the overall wedding party décor.

Alternative uses of this Guest book Frame

Now, I am presenting this here as a Wedding Guest book. However, I think it works equally well for as a guest book all other milestone celebrations, be that School/College Graduation, Making it to 40, or Retirement.

wedding guest book photo credit: ACFcustoms Drop Top & Heart Wedding Guest books