Julia has been sharing her fabulous ideas with us for months – and today’s post just might be my favorite yet! With her wedding just a few weeks away, Julia opens up about her decor inspiration…
What would I like my guests to remember about our wedding? Besides that we are completely in love, have great family and friends and have a bright future ahead of us? The WOW factors; otherwise known as the things that make guests say “wow.” I think each couple has their own set of wows – for some it is the flowers, for some it is the music. For me, the ultimate “wow” had to be at the reception. I want guests to walk in and be in awe.
The first important detail to my wow factor is lighting. I know a lot of people do not have room in their budget for lighting, but I think this is the one element that can make a room achieve a certain ambiance. You can make it warm and bright or romantic with lots of shadowed areas.
The picture below (from Kate Parker Weddings) is very similar to what I have envisioned. The blue LED up-lighting will give that huge pop of color against the other grays, whites and blacks in the room.
The next important wow is my tablescapes. About two years ago, I pulled this image (on right) from a Pottery Barn catalog. This was the original inspiration for the tables. It took me about three months to figure out the best way to pull together these centerpieces. To pull off the tree-like branches, I knew I needed either birch, curly willow, Manzanita, or cherry blossom branches.
Source: Birch: weddify.com
Curly Willow: ProjectWedding.com
Manzanita: theknot.com
Cherry Blossom: Boutwell Studios
Those are about it in terms of options of branches. The Manzanita was really the perfect branch because it looked like a branch off a tree in a forest. But, boy are they expensive if you live on the east coast. Thus began my never-ending search for Manzanita. I was about to give up, when I found faux branches on Smith & Hawken (unfortunately, the store is closing at the end of this year, but I will be selling mine after my wedding is done). I found inspiration from a bride selling her centerpieces, so I DIY’ed everything and mine will look VERY similar.
Believe it or not, I found the crystals on Lillian Vernon for super cheap and looked like the much more expensive Pottery Barn ones (which I think have also been discontinued.)
Another important part of the tablescapes is the linens. I found this photo on a wedding linens site and my vision became complete with the crushed silver linen with black napkins and white chair covers.
Last wow factor is something that reflects our winter wedding theme; the escort cards. I found this picture on the knot.com. My entire family spent a few months during the summer collecting pine cones and we spray painted all of them lightly with a platinum color. My mother-in-law-to-be even sorted them to find the ones that would stand on their own. This was a simple project that really cost very little.
There are a lot of other little elements that pull the entire look together – you’ll just have to wait until after the wedding to see how it all turned out.
I am so excited for Julia and Chris’ big day! Stay tuned for her post-wedding recap and lessons learned!
As someone who like this type of lighting, how much does it tend to cost? Obviously it depends on the room size, etc but is it something likely to end up being 10k for a medium sized room that would accomodate something like 50 guests?