Translating Styled Photo Shoots into a Real Wedding Part II

As a bride to be, the first thing you may do is hit the Internet.  You start surfing wedding blogs like The Knot, Style Me Pretty, Wedding Chicks, Ruffled and then you discover Pinterest (if you haven't already).  Then, you are bombarded with the most gorgeous styled photo shoots, glam weddings and luxury like you have never seen before!  It can be overwhelming, especially when you start trying to describe "the look" that you want to vendors, florists, or even your fiance.  You may get "that look" from him, the look that says....are you crazy? 

Well, you're not crazy!  And neither am I.  I loooooove the luxury look, but realism soon takes over, and putting the luxe look together becomes a bit harder than imagined.  So, what I do is break down the elements, the unique elements that really get noticed.  The elements that take up the most real estate in the room on the table and in pictures.

So, here we go.  Remember our LUXE wedding from my last post?

Let's start with the flowers.  Anemones and roses, gorgeous!  These, of course are huge arrangements, which could be scaled down, or even include more greenery and less flowers, or maybe include less expensive flowers like white tulips, hydrangeas and white stock.  If you really love her bouquet (who doesn't) then splurge for yourself, and make the other arrangements smaller and with more economical flowers.

 Another beautiful and economical flower to add?  Daisies, same colors, still gorgeous.

 Next up...the table.  This Luxury look owes it's beauty to simple layering of crisp linen and of course, that beautiful chair treatment.

For the floor length linen on the table, use your venue's white standard linen, or if you're all DIY, rent solid white polyester linens to the floor.  Then top it with a LINEN overlay. 

I found one at La Tavola Linens , this is their Tuscany white Linen and a hemstitched napkin.

The charger is a pretty standard silver beaded charger, a more economical choice is a simple clear glass, a silver coated plastic charger (Cost Plus World Market is one source for these), or no charger, just the gorgeous napkin and a beautiful sprig of greenery or white flowers tied with natural string or white ribbon.

 Images via Pinterest

On to the gorgeous chair treatment.  The flowing chiffon chair cover is topped with vines and puddles on the floor for that luxurious feeling.  This look can be achieved in several ways, depending on your budget, and craftiness.  Chiffon fabric can be purchased locally (here in Phoenix) for $3.00 to $5.00 per square yard, and a standard chivari chair would take about two yards to drape over and secure the vines on top with ribbon or natural string.  Not complicated, I will be posting a tutorial next week to show you how!

I found two very pretty covers at Classic Party Rentals...not as ethereal, but many venues offer white chair covers as part of their standard decor package.

Remove the sash and add the vines, or leave the sash on and tuck in greenery and a flower.  Don't want to spend the money on this chair treatment for every guest chair?  How about this treatment on the head table only, or even better, splurge on your SWEETHEART TABLE. One of my favorite options for couples, a sweet spot to be together after your vows are done and the party begins.

This simple elegant table, loaded with flowers, silver vases and candles, puts you and your groom front and center of all the attention.  Need more?

Have a great weekend, and come back next week for more...vases, urns and that glorious backdrop for the ceremony.  Can't wait!

Translating Styled Photo Shoots into a Real Wedding

Happy Hump Day!  It's just another Wednesday, but I am very excited to be starting this series of posts today.  I love, love, love styled photo shoots, but it can be overwhelming when a bride on a specific budget looks at the photos and dreams of her wedding being over the top gorgeous like the photo shoot.  It is often a huge let down when she finds out just how expensive, or out of reach the exact look will be.

So, I am excited to share a translation, so to speak of a gorgeous photo shoot, a breakdown of the elements and ways to get the look at your own REAL life wedding.  By incorporating a few of the elements used in a shoot, your favorite elements, and the one's that give you the most BANG for your Buck, you can get "The Photo Shoot Look" on your own realistic budget.

WEDLUXE.com

 

invitation

This gorgeous shoot incorporates one of the hot colors for 2013-2014, EMERALD green.  And this invitation suite is beautiful.  If your budget can accommodate $40-$60.00 per suite, then Palettera is the perfect choice for your custom invitations.  If your budget for invitations can't handle this kind of price tag, here are a few fabulous alternatives.

Bombay invitation

vintage birds invite

pompdesign

These invitations range in price from $3.00 - $40.00, from printable to customizable, all of them lovely and perfect for this gold and green color combination. 

On Friday, I'll show you an easy way to recreate the chair treatment shown in this shoot with chiffon and greenery, and if your budget can't handle this special look on all the guest chairs, then you'll love the sweetheart table and chairs feature!

See you then!  And if you want to talk about recreating this look for your wedding, just give us a call for a free one hour design and decor consultation.  480-252-3240

Michelle & Ryan Modern Wedding in the Desert + Part 2

Part two of Michelle and Ryan's Memorial Day weekend Celebration begins with the gorgeous, recently renovated ballroom at The Fairmont Scottsdale Princess Resort. I was so happy when I heard that the resort was replacing their very Southwest carpeting with a more neutral selection.  The gold wall treatments and gold ballroom chairs were incorporated into our overall color scheme, which was originally silver and purple.  Gold was easy to add and actually gave warmth and glamor to the room. 

The table numbers were a DIY I found on Pinterest.  They gave a metallic look without the expense of metal table numbers.  Half of the tables were lit with an assortment of white, silver and clear candlesticks, all with white candles (part of our signature collection of rental decor).  This also reduced the cost of the florals.

The other half of the tables were graced with the most amazing white tulips.  A fresh, clean, modern look, leaning, almost reaching out of each vase.  Some were a trio of three different sizes of tall cylinders, others were low, leaning bowls.  One of the servers asked me if the flowers were supposed to be like that, or if she should straighten them for us!  Don't expect everyone to "get" your vision.

The Sweetheart table created for Michelle and Ryan started with an amazing clear acrylic table from KOOL Party Rentals. 

I created an eclectic combination of gold and silver balls, clear stands, white flower petals and purple LED lights.  Then, right under the top, lots of crystal jewels, and on top of that, loads of candles in different shapes and sizes and more of those gorgeous parrot tulips. Gold champagne flutes, square silver chargers, pearl napkin rings, their own little platters of mini desserts, and last, but not least, their own little sweetheart cake topped with two large white roses and perched on a mirrored stand.

 

 

The Escort Card Table was draped in La Tavola's gorgeous sequined chevron linen.  Mirrored trays filled with glass crystals held the sleek, modern escort cards.  The floral arrangement was re-purposed from the welcome table at the ceremony and we added shiny silver ball candle holders for a simple elegance and glow on the table.

I decided to use the venues' amazing new tables for the dessert table, modern sleek, grey stone tops and silver trim.  This was actually my first dessert table with NO LINENS.  I loved it!  I used two tall, curvy white vases and one very traditional black vase in the center. The florals we chose for all the guest tables were white tulips, But, when Ivy walked into the ballroom with dozens of white parrot tulips, well my heart was singing!  These gorgeous beauties gave such a n exotic feel to the my design for the arrangements.  I absolutely love the movement of the tulips throughout the evening, uncontrollable and wildly natural.  Just lovely. 

 

 Desserts: Mini Peach Cobblers, Lemon Macarons with vanilla butter cream, Espresso Mini Cupcakes, Dark Chocolate Cake Truffles with edible purple Disco dust, Vanilla Bean, Peaches and cream Cake shots, Vanilla and Blackberry Cake Shots, Vanilla Macarons with Blackberry butter cream.  

 

Now, Lets talk about MUSIC.  This couple wanted to have fun, and the band delivered loads of it!  From the second the guests entered the ballroom until the band reluctantly played their last encore, this party rocked !  The Hamptons Band was amazing, and when they left, they told me that they have never played a wedding that was this much fun.  Now, that's quite a compliment for Michelle, Ryan and their guests.  It's true though, never have I seen a group of people genuinely have this much fun together.

Venue: The Fairmont Princess Resort
Photography: Imaginale Design
Florals: Garage by Ivy
Design, coordination and decor: Angela Saban Design
Cake and Dessert Table: Angel Cakes Bakery
Linens: La Tavola