Digital invitation for your corporate garden party

At six in the afternoon the sun comes in sideways and the place cards under the mulberry tree still read fine. At eight they don't. If you're organising a corporate garden party, that is your first decision — the hour — and the reason to start with a digital invitation instead of a PDF: the time goes in a date field, you can move it later, and nobody is left holding an old version. You can build it and send it today from the catalogue.

A garden doesn't make an event less formal. The invitation does that work. What it has to do is settle the small doubts before they turn into messages: which gate, which shoes, whether the car stays outside.

The hour in the garden changes; the digital invitation does not

Light is the real schedule, so choose the hour by the light. Write "19:45, access from 19:30" instead of burying the time inside a long paragraph. That margin does two jobs: it keeps the queue off the gate and it stops the call asking whether people can come in yet. If the marquee supplier confirms late, you correct the hour in the editor and the link stays exactly the same.

• Put the time in the date field, with the access margin on the same line: 19:45, doors 19:30.
• Name the gate. "Street door on X, not the garage" beats a pin dropped in the middle of the plot.
• Say where cars go and whether they stay outside the grounds. It's the message you get on the morning itself.
• If the marquee or the forecast changes the plan, edit it. Same link, no resends.

Dress code is decided before the menu

Grass and gravel rule out the thin heel. Write "flat shoes or wedges" rather than "elegant", which every guest translates differently. A lunch wants "light suit, hat optional". A night event wants "dark suit and jacket — the garden is lit with candles". Both fit in the text field without trimming.

Then show the garden before anyone walks into it. A private garden usually has a main gate, a service door and a dirt path, so mark the exact point on the map and label it. Upload up to six of your own photos and choose which one opens the invitation: a real shot of the garden at the hour of the event orients people better than any stock image, and you can replace it afterwards without touching the link.

A garden doesn't need a longer invitation. It needs the right gate, the right hour and the right shoes.

How to create digital invitations for a corporate garden party

Set up the confirmation form with what you'll actually use: name, company, number of guests. Answers arrive inside the invitation, in one ordered list, so you count chairs and spot who's missing without chasing anyone. It's an event web page, not a file: guests open a link or a QR in the browser, install nothing, and the content can be configured in seven languages — useful when half the list reads in English and half in Spanish. No printing, no envelopes, no reprint when the hour moves. One payment of 29.99 EUR and one link. Pick a design and try it free by editing the cover.