Inspiration Board | Rustic Elegance with Whimsical Accents Part I

I created these inspiration boards for a client seeking rustic elegance with touches of whimsical, unique, and unexpected notions. The wedding is slated for The Cornerstone Gardens in Napa Valley, CA. The venue is a designers dream with three incredible locations for the wedding: the vineyard lawn for the ceremony, the wedding garden featuring an open tent for dinner, and the garden barn for dancing! There are so many creative avenues - I love it! Take a look at some of our ideas:

The bride's ideal colors are fresh yellows and greens. She would like the flowers to look complete and polished, but freshly picked from the garden. Both the bride and groom's style is fun, crafty, and creative hence the incorporation of unique elements including: colorful buttons for decor, a hallway table as an accent piece, a selection of colorful beverages in a galvanized tub, and croquet to keep the guests entertained.

There are oodles of ways to display your escort cards. The bride requested some form of hanging with clothespins. I took this and ran with it. Here we have flower seed packets, antique postcards, gift bags and escort cards as one, and a few more fun styles. In addition, I threw in the seating board, as the colors and style fit perfectly with the couple's wedding features.

Stay tuned for more of their inspiration boards!

Inspiration Board | Accessories

Oh how I love accessories. There are so many ways to dress up a room/space/yard/estate. One of my favorite roles as an event planner is working with my clients to find their vision and design the colors and theme, while implementing accessories to boost the personality of the event. Here are a few of my latest finds: Simple Whimsical Elements

Implementing nature is a very popular theme today. It is especially great for those on a tight budget. Why? Because there are many things you can collect in the forest, on the beach, in your backyard, etc. that are free. They just require a little crafty DIY!

This inspiration board is made up of fresh accessories that elude an organic feel. The place cards wrapped around a wooden post and held in place with clothes pins is such a simple, yet decorative display; the wooden lantern is used to collect gift cards and decorated with river rocks; a collection of recycled paper hand tied with raffia is used as a unique guest book; potted plants and popsicle sticks create a very whimsical means for seating guests; a beautifully decorated belly belt is used to hold the napkin in place while adding a punch of color to the table; and rustic lanterns hang from tree branches over hay stacks, which are covered with colorful blankets. Each of these images are pretty simple, yet so prominent.

Creative Twist on the Traditional Wedding

Traditionally, weddings were pretty straight forward and the decorations minimal at best. The focus of the wedding was mainly on the ceremonial matters and gathering loved ones together. While these two fundamentals are still huge in today's wedding world, the decorations, theme, and design of the wedding have become almost just as important. You want your wedding to stand out and be memorable - what other way to do so than in your accessories. Thanks to the abundance of magazines, websites, and creative minds there is an infinite amount of ideas at one's disposal. Simple things like signs created out of a plank of wood or chalk boards to direct guests are incredibly trendy at the moment. But, the creative part is not copying a picture, it is implementing this picture and twisting it to reflect your theme, personality, and design. This is the inspiration behind this board. Each item is very simple and somewhat traditional, but they are almost reorganized to produce a fun and different image.

Inspiration Board | Place Cards of all shapes, sizes, and designs!

After all things great and small, fine attention to detail really does play a huge role in knocking the socks off your guests! It may seem like a simple and overlooked part of your wedding, but displaying your escort cards in a unique and aesthetic manner is the icing on the cake! Here are a few of my latest favorites.

Thank you to brides.com, theknot.com, marthastewartweddings.com, and the following photographers:

A Bryan Photo

Autumn Lin Photography

Mindy Myers Photography

Red Ribbon Studio

Angie Silvy Photography

Kim Long Photography

5 Clever Wedding Ideas

1. Having a casual wedding? Use mason jars for glasses. 2. Need a container to hold ice, trash, or decorations?  Use galvanized cans. They come in all shapes and sizes and they look much nicer than a dirty plastic garbage can or bus tub.

3. Need a unique Place Card holder? Use picture frames - they can serve as the favor too!  Milano Series has great clear/paper weight holders that are elegant and functional.

4. Worried about guests losing their freshly poured cocktail? Offer charms or even snazzy name tags at the bar.  These are especially good for mason jars.

5. Having part of your wedding outside? Rent some outdoor lounge furniture.

Simple Place Card Ideas

Although pretty simple, place cards can create a beautiful display and create a graceful entrance to the reception room. You can spend pennies or dollars when creating this display. Check out a few pics below to view simple arrangements:

A fresh rose with place card attached. Christy and John had their wedding date embossed into the card and each person's name engraved in gold writing.

A bed of wild rice held the wine corks in place. Each cork was sliced horizontally to make a perfect slit for the place cards. This display holds up on windy days!

Simple cards clipped onto a string. A simple tablecloth and ribbon incorporates the colors and design of the wedding.

What better way to tie in the beach theme than use sand for the place cards. Since it was a little breezy, the baskets allowed us to easily move the place cards inside during the ceremony and quickly bring them outside as guests approached the table!

Organic & fresh! Incorporating the mountain theme with a green wedding, these place cards were symmetrically placed on a striped linen.