DIY Project: Martha Stewart Programs

Posted Saturday, September 27, 2008 11:01 AM

I've had a lot of inquiries about the programs we made both from the message boards, and also left here on my blog. I figured I'd revisit this project to leave some more detailed instructions and also show a picture of them from the wedding day!  I'll start with the eye candy first, here's what they looked like on the wedding day:

Ok, so the background, I bought a Martha Stewart Weddings Magazine (one of many) about a year ago that had a whole bunch of different program ideas in one of their articles. I completely fell in love with an accordion fold program that had letterpress flowers and text on the front and back covers. They were gorgeous! I love the look of letter press, but it is not something that was in our budget, and the flowers don't really work with whatever "theme" we had going on, so those were scrapped. But, I did keep with the general structure of the program.

Here's a stack of them after they were finished, including shots of the inside.

Now for what everyone really wants to see... the instructions! I have to start this off by saying I apologize for the picture quality. They aren't mine, I took photos of pages in Martha Stewart Weddings that showed how this was done. You can also consider that my credit to using something of Martha's, I am by no means taking credit for this as my own. I'm just passing this on to the masses that may have missed this wonderful issue of MS Weddings. Love ya Martha, kisses!

Step 1

You need to create a insert that is 5 inches by 14 3/4 inches. The insert will be made up of four panels about 3 3/4 inches by 5 inches. Two of these inserts will fit on one 11x17 paper. By the way, I used just regular paper for the inside portion of the program. The covers of the program were made using cardstock and sized 4 1/8 inches by 5 1/2 inches.

Martha's directions states they put crop marks in the corners of their 11x17 pages to make it easier for cutting and to mark the locations for folds. I'll be honest, I was getting pretty tired of trimming paper after all the DIY paper items we had done by that point and I paid Office Depot about $5 to cut all of our programs for us.

Use a bone folder to score the fold lines on the pages. I found it easier to do several at a time, especially since I was using a paper trimmer with the blade replace with a scoring blade. If I didn't do several at once the scoring blade ended up cutting through my paper instead. Plus it made this process go faster.

Step 2

If you don't cheat like I did, this where you will use a crafting knife and ruler (or perhaps a paper trimmer?) to trim the extra edges off your programs. Then start fold the paper along your score lines to create the accordion.

Step 3

Attach the front cover to the proper side of the accordion. Martha suggests using a glue stick, we passed on that since we didn't have much luck with ours on a previous project using the same cardstock. Instead we used a double sided tape runner. Whatever you use, make sure it's clear drying and non-greasy so it doesn't soak into your paper. Once the front cover is in place, flip the accordion over and attach the back cover in the same fashion making sure to have the back cover even on all sides with the front cover. Be sure to firmly press down on both covers after attaching them to the accordion.

VIOLA! FINIS! Martha also suggests placing them under a stack of books to press them nicely when you're finished.

If you're wondering about the cover of our programs, it was a simple monogram I printed out at home on cardstock and cut to size then glued to the front of the program. Easy peasy!