I Created a Beautiful Album in Minutes Using This Giftable Photo Book Service
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Create a travel book, recipe collection, seasonal books, and so much more.
Real Simple / Mixbook
I got married more than 13 years ago (gasp!), and while the beautiful memories remain in my mind forever, they’ve never been put to paper. With a bit of bad luck and an unfortunate story, we never received a wedding album—just the digital copies of the photos that were taken. Among the vows from that day, one that I made post-wedding was to create an album myself, but time passed quickly. That’s why I was thrilled with the opportunity to test an easy way to finally make a beautiful photo book full of special moments from our day. And when I did, I also realized it was a thoughtful gift for any occasion—especially the holidays.
To make my memories come alive on the page, I started browsing through Mixbook’s photo book options to find the one that suited my style and my needs. There were so many to choose from, but I landed on Simple Modern Wedding, which featured light text to accompany the photos along with an uncluttered layout. On top of wedding albums, Mixbook has themes like travel, holiday, pet, and recipe books, and prices start at just $15.
Mixbook Simple Modern Wedding Photo Book
Mixbook
$15
Each theme comes with a variety of layout options, so you can find one that accommodates your photos. I preferred minimal text and a photo-heavy book, which the Modern Wedding layout achieved, but there are also options that have more text that can be featured as is or customized with your own words. I found that uploading my photos directly from my computer was a breeze—I just added my entire folder of about 250 photos, and they were fully uploaded in less than 5 minutes.
As someone who isn’t the most creative when it comes to visual design, I appreciated that Mixbook gives you the option to let the service automatically create the layout for you from the uploaded photos. While I gave it a shot with my own book, I ultimately chose to place the photos in the order that made sense for my meaningful day. If I were designing a personalized book for a loved one based on travel adventures we shared, photos of their family, special recipes for a cooking enthusiast, or photos of their beloved pet, I’d put this time-saving feature to use.
Mixbook Modern Holiday Photo Book
Mixbook
$15
It was also helpful that the service let me know if one of my photos was not high-resolution and would appear blurry on the page, so I could select another one to get the best quality album possible. I surprised my husband with the wedding book, and he was thrilled to finally have these tangible memories.
Among the variety of book options, I chose the medium-sized hardcover book, which arrived in pristine, crisp condition. You can pick from hardcover, softcover, and lay flat exteriors, landscape, square, or portrait designs, and sizes XS (6 by 6 inches) to L (12 by 12 inches). Each book has a starting number of pages—mine was 21—but you can easily add more to accommodate your photos.
Along with creating durable, glossy photo books, Mixbook also offers calendars and photo cards starting at just $2 in time for the holidays. In fact, every year, my siblings and I create a calendar for our mom to remind her of how her grandkids have grown, and I plan to effortlessly make it using this photo service this year.
Mixbook Full Photo Layout Calendar
Mixbook
$35
With holiday gift season just around the corner, don’t rack your brain trying to think of that perfect gift for a close friend or family member. Head to Mixbook to start creating a one-of-a-kind gift for someone you love.
Mixbook Modern Minimal Cookbook Photo Book
Mixbook
$30
Mixbook Holiday Arched Frame Cards
Mixbook
$2
Mixbook Modern Travels Photo Book
Mixbook
$15
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