DIY Envelopes

I know standard issue envelopes are easy to find. But what if you have a card or letter that’s not quite a standard? It’s actually pretty easy to make your own custom envelopes, no matter the size or shape of what needs to be contained. There are several tools out there for making envelopes. I won’t deny it. I love my tools. I even sell a few of them here in Manila.

Here are a few of the ones I have and use. The first is the Martha Stewart Crafts Mini Scoring Board. This comes in a large, mini, deluxe and I don’t know what else.

It’s a multiple use kind of tool. The mini even has a standard size templates on the reverse side.

The large scoring board comes with a cheat sheet for paper sizes depending on your card size. It’s hidden inside this little compartment up top.

I fell in love with the We R Memory Keepers Envelope Punch Board almost immediately though. Much more intuitive and user-friendly. The punch-and-score element makes envelope making much much easier.

It also comes with a cheat sheet of paper sizes.

These tools are great and all. It’s the easier cleaner way of making envelopes. The question is, what do you do if you don’t have any special tools. Here’s the completely DIY way, using no other tool than a pair of scissors. Take your card or tag, and paper to match.

First, measure the dimensions of your card. The great thing about this DIY method, is that you don’t have to follow standard sizes.

I always wondered how they come up with the starting paper measurements! So what did this closet geek of a crafter do? I put pencil to paper, and tried to figure out the math behind it. And here it goes. Stay with me here, please!

This is some extrapolation of the Pythagorean theorem. Take the length and height of your card. Using a calculator, square the length, and square the height. Add those numbers together. Get the square root–yes, you can use a calculator. Then, add an inch to that number.

I ended up with 5.0311 something something. No need to be exact here, really. Just round it out to a 5. This means, I need to start out with a 5-inch square.

See how the card fits neatly in the middle of the sheet when it’s laying diagonally?

Flip the envelope paper over. Place the card as centered as you can. Fold the side flaps or corners towards the center.

Next, fold the bottom flap or corner upwards. Can you see the envelope starting to form?

Fold the top flap or corner to size. Almost there!

Glue or use double-sided tape to hold the bottom flap in place.

Let’s try this with a bigger card. I used a pressed flower piece as a sample.

I measured it, and the dimensions were 5 inches x 7 inches.envelope.

So, I went back and used that same envelope formula.

I pulled out the calculator and ended up with a 9.6023 something. I rounded that down to a 9.5.

I followed the same instructions and the card fit perfectly on the envelope square.

I did the same folds as I did with the smaller envelope. You may notice the folds become bulky. You can cut these triangle folds out.

Your sheet will end up looking like this, if you make the small snips.

You can also trim the bottom flap of the envelope to make your envelope look more polished.

All done! Who said crafters don’t do math? Let me know if this works for you!