Making a Custom Calendar: How to Design One for Printing

Making a custom calendar is easier when you set it up right from the start.

A custom calendar is a great project. It’s a chance to showcase a year’s worth of photography, stories or illustrations, and it gives your audience something useful to keep for twelve months. But calendars have a few technical quirks that other print jobs don’t, and getting them wrong can mean dates in the wire binding or a cover that doesn’t line up.

This guide walks you through making a custom calendar from first decision to press-ready file. When you’re ready to print, head to our calendar printing page.

1. Choose your format before making a custom calendar

Before you open a design program, decide what kind of calendar you’re making. The format sets your page size, page count and layout, so changing it later means starting again. The main options are:

Wire-bound wall calendar in A5, A4 or A3, with a hanger. The classic format for photography.
Saddle-stitched wall calendar in A4 or A3, stapled through the fold with a drill hole for hanging.
Wiro-bound desk calendar in DL or A5, sitting on a sturdy board base.
Tent calendar, a single A4 sheet that folds into a stand for desks and counters.

Also decide on portrait or landscape. If you’re not sure which suits your audience, our comparison of wall calendars vs desk calendars can help.

2. Plan your page count and order

Most calendars run 12 months plus a cover, and often a back page with your contact details. Map out every page before you start designing, including which image or story goes with which month.

When you supply your file, export it as single pages in reading order: front cover first, then January through December, then the back cover. Don’t export spreads.

3. Set up bleed, trim and a safe zone for the binding

This is where most calendar files go wrong.

Bleed: extend any background colours or images 3mm past the trim edge on all sides.
Trim marks: include them in your exported PDF.
Safe zone: keep text and important details well inside the trim edge, roughly 5mm in.
Binding edge: wire-bound calendars have holes punched along one edge for the wire and hanger. Keep dates, logos and faces well clear of that edge (allow roughly 10–15mm). The template we send you shows the exact zone.

[Confirm whether templates will be supplied for each format, and adjust this paragraph.]

4. Get your images and colour right

Photography is the hero of most calendars, so it’s worth getting this step right.

Use images at 300 dpi at the size they’ll be printed. A photo that looks sharp on screen may look soft on an A3 wall calendar.
Set your document to CMYK. Bright screen colours (especially greens and blues) can print duller than you expect, so check them before you send the file.
If you have a set of photos from different sources, adjust them to look like a consistent set.

5. Make the date grid readable

A calendar has to work as a calendar. Make the grid easy to read and easy to write on:

Use a clear, simple font for the dates, at a size that’s readable from a few steps away for wall calendars.
Make the date boxes big enough to write in, especially on wall calendars.
Start each week on the same day throughout (Monday is common for business calendars).
Give weekends and public holidays a subtle visual difference.

6. Add key dates, and check them twice

Add the dates that matter to your audience: public holidays, awareness days related to your cause, school terms, giving days, events or your own milestones.

Remember that public holidays differ between Australian states and territories, so decide whether you’re showing national holidays only or the ones for a specific state. Then check every date against an official source. A wrong date is the one mistake that makes people take a calendar down.

7. Export your file from Canva or InDesign

We accept files from any design program as long as they’re press-ready.

From Canva: choose Share, then Download, then select PDF Print. Tick Crop marks and bleed, and choose CMYK if it’s available on your plan. Make sure every page is in the right order before downloading.

From Adobe InDesign: export as a PDF using a press-quality preset. Include 3mm bleed and crop marks, and export as single pages, not spreads.

Our artwork setup guide and FAQ go into more detail. We check every file before printing and will let you know if something needs fixing, but we don’t proofread, so please check your spelling and dates carefully.

8. Choose the right paper

Paper changes how your calendar looks and feels. We print calendars on EcoStar 100% post-consumer recycled paper, in two finishes:

Silk: a smooth, slightly shiny surface that makes photography bright and crisp.
Uncoated: a natural, tactile finish that suits illustration, softer photography and calendars people will write on (pens and pencils write easily on it).

You can read more in our guide to choosing the right paper for your printing.

Need help making a custom calendar?

If you’d rather hand over the design, our parent brand Ethical Design Co. designs custom calendars from scratch or can get your files ready for print.

When your artwork is ready, explore our calendar printing options or request a quote. We’ll get back to you within two business days.