J&H DIY Marquee Lights

This was a joint DIY Wedding project with my hubby @Herman Yip. :)

These marquee lights were definitely a challenge for us — there was a lot of research and problem solving involved. It took two entire days to execute, but the feeling of completing it was priceless! Especially seeing it up on our wedding day in the barn.

Challenge: The venue did not allow us to nail anything inside the barn, so we had to come up with a lightweight solution that we could install with removable command hooks! Our finished product was created with foam core, card stock, and lots of duct tape. The professionally made marquee lights you can buy are usually made out of metal (very heavy and very expensive).

Process (see process attachment):
— Designed the letters in Illustrator with equidistant areas marked to put in the lights. The font matched our wedding stationery and website.
— Printed out the 36" tall letters and taped the letters to white 1/4" foam core and cut them out with exacto knives.
— Spray painted the letters a pretty gold to go with our mint and gold wedding theme.
— We bought a few large sheets of gold card stock and cut 4" strips to use as the framing around the foam core letters. Cut creases into the strips to frame each letter carefully.
— Duct tape madness! Tabs created around each letter to adhere each 4" strip securely.
— Even putting in the bulbs required some problem solving! We had to wire it in an efficient way to save space.
— Voila, all lit up! Such a pretty finished product!
— There are some final images of us installing it on wedding day in our gorgeous barn. :)

DIY Cost = $42
Vintage Marquee Lights cost = $329 PER letter

Amazing savings, we were so happy with our finished result! :)