Zapf Chancery is a cheap-looking font. But it (or a clone) happen to be available to just about every wanna-be graphic artist under the sun. It takes much more planning, skill, resources, money, etc to design a printed piece, versus slapping one together in a standard size with a generic font.

Not to say that people are cheap...many people pay through the nose for litho, thermography, or engravure of an invitation that has lazy typesetting.

Look for alternatives that have the same availabilty to the artist setting the type. Bernhard Modern, Adobe Garamond Italic, Adobe Minion with small captials and old-style numerals.

If you know a graphic artist who will comp you the work, and a small press shop who will bill you at commercial rates (not retail), you can have custom invitations made for a lot cheaper than you think.

For our own wedding invitations, I put in some assembly labor and did all of the design and production. Duo-tone outer card with sepia & silver photographs, printed vellum insert tipped (glued) into the outer card. 2-color RSVP and directions. Vellum outer envelope, white inner and return envelopes. Thanks to a friend who owns a print shop, and an existing account with a paper supplier, the total for the job was well under $300.

Zapf Chancery never entered the equation. IIRC, everything was from the Adobe Garamond family, including ligature replacements and hand kerning of important type.

If you have the resources and patience, don't cave in to what is cheaply availbe. Spend the effort and make it feel special.

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