Sweet (Wedding) Suite details

I did not grow up dreaming about my perfect wedding, but I did create the world-renowned “Wedding” Pinterest board in college. It was filled with grandiose craft ideas, but when the day actually came to get serious about planning, those ideas stressed me the heck out. I thought that because I am an artist that means I have to DIY everything, but that was too high of an expectation. Instead, I focused on the most important thing: that Tom, myself, and our guests truly enjoy the day. Still, I am an artist so of course I had to insert my creativity into the details that really mattered to me: the paper goods and color scheme.

Part 1: The Venue

It’s true what they say: once you find your venue, everything else falls into place. Tom and I wanted it to feel as if we were inviting our family and friends to our home, so we knew we wanted a venue that we would have all to ourselves. It also needed to be beautiful on its own without decor and we wanted to love the interior just in case everything had to be indoors (so AC was a huge must).

When I was younger, I remember my cousin once saying that she envisioned me having a garden wedding on the grounds of a castle, and with the venue we chose, she wasn’t far off. The Armour House in Lake Forest, IL is a grand manor with beautiful grounds and gardens. We were so fortunate to love the first venue we toured.

While our venue selection did not influence my dress, it did establish the overall feel of the wedding: classic meets old world.

Part 2: The Dress

My Dress

I can’t say I had a dream wedding gown in mind, but I always hoped it would have some whimsical element. Ultimately, I wanted a dress that was comfortable and felt very me.

Similar to venue “shopping,” my dress ended up being at the first store we went to (it was also the same for my engagement ring!). But I didn’t make my final decision until we had completed all of our appointments, mainly because my mom and I were having too much fun.

After comparing every other dress I tried to the one at the first store, we went back and gathered the full ensemble. It was everything: classic, flattering, and even had some color and whimsy. The cherry on top was that it also allowed for the very-popular “second look” with a long, detachable train for the ceremony that I would later swap with a large bow for the reception.

The train had these beautiful silk roses which led to roses being the main flower for the day. The dramatic bow inspired the little girls to have bows in their hair and on their dresses, and the embroidered ivy on my veil inspired ivy as our greenery (Italian ruscus and English ivy were the two main types).

The Ladies’ Dresses

Up until this point, I really had no idea what I might want my bridesmaids to wear. But since my veil had color in it, I just had to play off of it. The three colors were a dusty rose/terracotta, blush, and olive green (there was also a darker emerald green, which came into play later). I still can’t believe we found bridesmaid dresses that were near-exact matches to the colors in the veil!

With the dresses selected, every other decision became that much easier. The colors, venue, and dress details went on to inspire all of the paper goods.

Part 3: The Paper Goods

Now this is where things got creative. I knew I wanted the pieces of our wedding suite to be printed on quality paper, so I reached out to Kate at Flying Rabbit Press. She was so attentive and shared in my excitement; no detail was too small and she offered great advice. For example, I thought an envelope liner would be a nice addition, and she said that while they look really nice in perfect condition for photos, they often are ripped apart when guests open their invitations (a very good point!).

Kate and I established the items to have designed and printed, then selected envelopes and stationery. The components of the wedding suite included:

• Save the Dates

• Invitations and rsvp cards

• Escort cards

• Programs

• Thank-You cards

First was the Save-The-Date design, and I knew I wanted to paint the venue for it; I really wanted to entice each recipient. This is when Kate and I brainstormed font. I told her I wanted something that emulated traditional calligraphy but was a little more playful and less stiff. I think we nailed it with silicia script and we ended up using it for everything from the signage to the website. I even hand-painted the “T&A” and “RSVP” using that font, which is probably one of my favorite details!

For the other designs, I was less sure of what to paint and had to wait for moments of inspiration. I began gathering reference photos for my bouquet and I thought roses would be sweet for the invitation. I had just found a book of vintage floral photos, so I used a rose one as my reference photo for the painting. The program and rsvp card were simple in that we reused that same rose painting. Blue thistle was also considered for the program (they are a Scottish wedding tradition and were included in the boutonnieres and hidden in my bouquet), but looking at the suite as a whole, they felt out of place.

The escort cards were simple - just the name of each guest - but I really did not want a cow or chicken sticker to signify entree choices. I thought wax seals had such an old-world look, so we had different color wax seals made to signify the entrees (Abby Choi Designs). The venue coordinator was all for the idea, as long as the colors were distinguishable enough for the servers, so we used - again - those three wedding colors. We needed a fourth, so we brought in gold, which served as an accent for other details. The night before the wedding rehearsal, it was Tom’s job to fold all 125 escort cards and attach the corresponding wax seal. He did fabulously!

We needed three envelopes - save the dates, invitations, and thank yous - so can you guess which three colors we used? Blush was used for the save the dates, olive green was for the invitations, and dusty rose was for the thank-you cards.

The thank-you cards were tricky. The simpler route would have been to use the roses again, but I wanted it to really feel like the card was coming from me and Tom, so a portrait of us felt so perfect. But how do I paint a portrait from our wedding day that hasn’t happened yet? I pulled together so many reference photos to create this design - other wedding couple portraits, our outfits, and inspiration photos for my bouquet. This was done about six months before the wedding, so I just crossed my fingers that how we looked in the painting is how we would look on the actual day.

I absolutely adored every part of the paper goods design process. To me, thoughtful details make things extra special. And with the paper goods designed, it was on to everything else…

Part 4: Everything Else

All of the other details really (wax) sealed the deal. The emerald green I mentioned was present in my mom’s dress; my dad’s tie; and the black watch plaid on the men’s pocket squares, ties, and socks. Even our little ring bearer had a black watch vest. It was too cute!

Our flower girl was beaming in her puff-sleeve dress twirling all the way down aisle. Her sash matched the dusty rose/terracotta color of her mom’s dress (one of the bridesmaids) and her basket was a real find. When shopping for my dress, I saw the gorgeous satin basket adorned with silk flowers that matched the wedding colors so perfectly.

Similar to emerald, gold became another accent color for the day, so all of the signage (and my original paintings for the paper goods) had gold frames, which really added to the old-world feel. We didn’t have any interactive pieces at our reception, but we did have a table filled with family wedding photos going back four generations. It was a nice bonding moment during the wedding planning process to gather the photos and each couple’s wedding dates and locations. My mother in law said how great it is to now have all of that information in one place!

Before selecting our venue, I had envisioned a very colorful wedding (no shock there). But the idea became a little overwhelming and after finding the Armour House, going the classic route felt right. So for the flowers, we had a mixture that were all white. Roses, peonies, and ranunculus (and that secret blue thistle) for my bouquet, roses for the wedding party, and hydrangeas for the fountain and escort card table.

The centerpieces were an unexpected addition. Originally, we planned for candles and ivy, but my mom wanted something spectacular. We had our appointment with Eileen at Lake Forest Flowers to go over everything for the wedding and saw an arrangement she had designed with silver branches; so we asked if she could do something similar in gold. Eileen worked her magic adding white cherry blossoms to the gold branches, and the result was like a firework! We fell in love instantly and loved how they looked in contrast to the other arrangements.

To add to the old-world feel and make art an even bigger part of the day, we had an incredibly talented live painter. Leanne Larson (@paintmyweddingday) creates dreamy impressionist paintings, and I cannot express to you how breathtaking custom art is in your home. We hung the two paintings from Leanne and the paintings I made for the paper goods in ours, and they warm my heart.

At the End of the Day

I understand that some may find these details or the wedding industry in general somewhat fussy, and sure, it can be. But if you love the process and are having fun with it, do it up! As long as you aren’t letting the little things get in the way of the bigger purpose of why you are hosting and planning this event, just enjoy the process. It’s true you that you only have one wedding day (knock on wood), but it’s not helpful to let the pressure of that idea dictate everything.

My advice is to focus on a main goal (ours was for us and our guests to be comfortable) and to then get specific on the details that really matter to you (for me, it was my dress and the paper goods; for Tom, it was the desserts; for my dad, it was the band and wine; and for my mom, it was her dress and little wedding traditions). Make it special because it is special. And special can look a lot of different ways.

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