…as a feature flower.
And, wow! Softness never held its shape so well!
Take a glimpse at these gorgeous photos from Jasmine Star Photography Blog. They shot an amazing wedding in Orange County.
The star of the show, besides the bride and groom, is the cotton! The floral arrangements were put together by Lauryl Lane and they are just so fresh!!
I love the different textures together, and the softness of the bouquets mixed with straws.
Very rustic, yet very fun and very chic.
Yes, I had a plan! And yes, this is deliberately in past tense!!
Let me just tell you this, Boho brides. Having your ceremony and reception at two different venues is spendy! After talking to a wedding coordinator on Catalina Island we decided to eliminate one of our sites. She had a good point: guests coming out of town to the island don’t want to go back and forth from ceremony to reception site–they just want to stay put. So even though I LOVE the look of the garden, with its 1930s monumental architecture, locally produced glazed tiles and endemic plants, my guests may be indifferent to it. After all they will be spending a weekend there lounging at the beach.
This was the deal breaker: I didn’t calculate the cost of a shuttle bus transporting guests to the Wrigley Botanical Garden and to the reception site (it looked close to the reception site on the map!). To transport people just over a mile it would be an extra $400. And this is on top of the $1,200 site fee. As this wedding coordinator tells me: our wedding is a “budget wedding” and “this would be a very quick and painless way to cut a lot of money.” So snip: $1,600 is cut from my expenses.
Even though I am very disappointed about this decision.
Good bye beautiful tiles that I fell in love with. Good bye juicy succulents. Goodbye native flowers. A budget bride has to do what she has to do!
So now the ceremony and reception in one place–the restaurant courtyard. Will a courtyard ceremony be pretty? I really don’t know. Somehow my idea of a beach wedding, a garden wedding, or majestic cliffside wedding has translated into a courtyard wedding. The reception space is lovely, but it just is not exactly what I had in mind!
Hopefully this will all work out smoothly!
So, Boho brides, how did your initial wedding ideas change as you planned? Were there any choices you made because it just seemed more logical and budget friendly? How did it work out in the end?
When you think of getting married on an island, it seems almost a stupid question: “will you be getting married on the beach then?” I field these questions all the time from my friends and family. In my case it isn’t stupid at all. We will not!
My fiance, Mr. Cali Girl, was pretty vocal that he didn’t want to have a beach wedding. He had done it time and time before. He loved those beach weddings but he posed the question to me: “Is there any place else where we can have a relaxed wedding?”
I took to the internet and researched as I know best!
I came up with two ideas:
1.) We can wed on the bluffs 1,000 feet above the ocean. The best place out of the venues available through the Catalina Conservancy, in my mind, is The Ocean Overlook at Summit Point.
THE PROS: It would be a majestic view. The trees, ocean, and rolling hills would be the background–how beautiful would that be! It wouldn’t be beachy–but it would have a beach view. The terrain at Catalina is pretty dry so it would feel more like we were getting married on a ranch. We could roll with more of a rustic decor to suit the space.
THE CONS: Because it would be 10 mins out of town we would need to arrange for transportation, which means an added cost. There are no facilities so we would need to rent port-a-potties, which means an extra cost.
2.) We can get married at the Catalina Botanical Garden.
THE PROS: We would have all the decor necessary for a garden wedding. The plant species at the Botanical Garden are indigenous and often rare giving a great eclectic feeling to the site .
THE CONS: Just like the Bluffs we would need to secure this location and the reception site, meaning two deposits. But it does have bathrooms!
We decided to go with option #2 and embrace the garden ceremony. There is a succulent garden there, and I thought that it would be fun to use succulents as table flowers at the reception site. I had a plan!
We really couldn’t! We decided to go switch our wedding from my hometown of Santa Barbara, CA to Catalina Island. It is a mini-destination wedding, really, because it is just off the coast of California. Twenty miles off the coast of Los Angeles–a hour boat ride. Meaning two hours south of Santa Barbara then aboard the ferry for my family. So it isn’t too far. But it still is a destination.
Simply the fact of getting on the ferry boat and setting foot on an island is a breath of fresh air. And for the rest of the family coming from New York and New Jersey it will be a different experience. Things are always a little bit different on an island, more laid back, more isolated.
Goodbye traditional wedding in the bride’s hometown. We are taking the one-town island of Catalina by storm!
Did we make the right decision? Would you have made the switch, Boho Brides?
How will all these wedding plans pan out!
Did I mention that my hometown is a resort town? Where all the stars from Los Angeles come to have a retreat? Whenever I mention that I come from Santa Barbara, California the person’s response is always, “Oh, it is beautiful there!”
…And it really is. I love it there, I miss it!
I was so excited to share my beautiful hometown with my fiance’s family (many of whom never have been to California).
There are so many sites that would make a beautiful ceremony site. Top on my list were a.) Chase Palm Park (it is on the waterfront and even has a vintage carousel!), b.) Manning Park, a woodland enclave in the midst of Montecito, c.) The Old Mission A.C. Postel Rose Garden–just across the street from the historic California Mission.
And did I mention the reception venues? The Bacara Resort & Spa and The Four Season’s Biltmore. These were the top two on my list.
So being the planner that I am, I researched all my top sites. Talked to the wedding coordinators at each facility. Then I figured out the best pricing, the best ambiance, the best food. Then proposed our pick to our parents.
A mid-morning ceremony at The Old Mission Rose Garden and a late lunch reception at The Bacara. It was all decided! It was going to be beautiful!!
The contract for the Rose Garden was signed. It was a public park so the fee was (somewhat) minimal at $650 with a security deposit of $150. The checkbook came out, everything was mailed, and I received confirmation for the venue. Then after negotiating the price with The Bacara and the final contract was drafted something just didn’t seem right. Why did the venue need 90% of the total food and beverage fee over 12 months in advance. Every other site only required 5-10-25-50%. I had never seen something more than that. Was The Bacara going through hard times? Were they going to go bankrupt before our wedding? Was I being swindled? So I gave the wedding coordinator a call. And that is when I found out that our site was secured for July 31st, 2009 not 2010!
After figuring out the SNAFU, the wedding coordinator was going to call me back and let me know the price increase for the 2010 date. I guess they were going to give us a good deal for the close 2009 date. But then after I left messages, and emailed he didn’t call me back. A week or two went by. Then second thoughts went through my head.
What about Catalina Island–the place we vacationed last year and had a blast at. The place where I attended my first wedding as a child. Should I switch our traditional hometown wedding for a (semi)destination wedding on Catalina Island?
“If I were a flower growing wild and free”
“All I’d want you to be is my sweet honey bee”
All I Want Is You by Barry Louis Polisar is my new favorite wedding song (featured in the opening of Juno) This wedding film featured on Style Me Pretty is so sweet it is coated in honey! http://www.stylemepretty.com/2010/01/13/michigan-wedding-iv/
“All I want is you, will you be my bride”
“Take me by the hand, and stay by my side”
“All I want is you, will you stay with me”
I am trying to incorporate some island elements into the design of my wedding since my fiance is of Filipino descent and we will be getting hitched on an island. One of the celebratory Filipino items will be fans–much needed in the humid tropics, they may or may not be functional on the semi-arid Californian island where we will get married (will it be in the 60s and foggy or in 80s and sweltering!?). If they are not entirely needed, I want them to be at least an added piece of decor, right!
I am constantly making note when I see fans making an appearance at a wedding. Especially when they have a bit more pizazz than just the regular store bought kind (meaning: straw or white and bamboo).
I loved seeing this post on Style Me Pretty that profiles a destination wedding in Bali. The ceremony was held in a courtyard–similar to how ours will be–and is a mixture of casual and more formal. The fans they use are spruced up with different papers in geometric designs. The patterns in chocolate brown & cream and white & black add a lot of visual excitement to the calm surroundings. They even compliment the Balinese dancers’ attire. I also love the colors of magenta and purple mixed with the natural landscape of lavish greens.
Very beautiful, and in the dead of winter here in NJ/NYC, I can’t wait until my own burst of sunshine on our wedding day. So, thanks SMP for featuring more South East Asian & Pacific Island weddings (…and held somewhere other than Hawaii, although I am a sucker for these too it is just nice to see variety).
Bridal Chorus (a.k.a Here Comes the Bride) screams “We Are Getting Married!!” But are there other songs that can make the bride and her guests feel a.) excited b.) happy and c.) in love while still in line with bride and groom’s personalities?
For the last five months I’ve been jotting down songs that I hear on Pandora that I would like to be played during the ceremony and reception. Right now, as I am searching for a wedding DJ, I am trying to figure out what mood I want to evoke while at the ceremony. In the running are:
Happy in Love (for a sunny, SoCal wedding like mine–for two happy go-lucky people like us)
-Sweat Pea by Amos Lee
-Better Together by Jack Johnson (already our Wedding Website Theme Song)
-I’m Yours by Jason Mraz
-Hey (I Love You) by Spearhead
-If You Wanna Be Happy by Jimmy Soul
-Banana Pancakes by Jack Johnson
-Hallelujah by Jeff Beck
-Forever Loving Jah by Bob Marley
-Happy Together The Turtles
-Here Comes Your Man Meagan Smith
-Never Had Nobody But You M.Ward
-Thieves She & Him
-If You Want to Sing Out Cat Stevens
-505 Arctic Monkeys
-Amber 311
-Is This Love by Bob Marley
Classically Cool (traditional classical solo piano music but with a hip, indie chillout spin)
-Suite Bergamasque: Claire de Lune by Debussy
-Loreta and Desiree’s Bouquet George Winston
-After the Summer Hits Nobody
-For the Trees Matmos
-Living in the Country George Winston
-Canon in D by Pachelbel
-Gogel by Gonzales
-You’re Beautiful by Vitamin String Quartet
-Bermuda Triangle Gonzales
-Moonlight Sonata Beethoven
-Hallelujah by Vitamin String Quartet
-The Tourist Gonzales
-Lazy Calm Cocteau Twins
-An Ending Brian Eno
-Variations on the Kanon by Pachelbel
Eclectic Romance (what I always listen to on my iPod)
-To Be Alone With You Sufjan Stevens
-Paradise Sade
-New Slang The Shins
-Come Away With Me Norah Jones
-Shift Grizzly Bear
-How Lucky We Are by Meiko
-By Your Side by Sade
-Wild Is The Wind by Amel Larrieux
-Across the Universe Rufus Wainwright
-The Promise Tracey Champan
-Ordinary People John Legend
-Girl by City and Colour
-1, 2, 3, 4 by Feist
Vintage Love (a mix of fun and conservative)
-I Can’t Help Falling In Love by Elvis
-My Baby Just Cares for Me by Nina Simone
-Have I Told You Lately Van Morrison
-The Girl from Ipanema Astrud Gilberto
-Que Sera, Sera by Doris Day
-La Vie en Rose Edith Pilaf
-If Louis Armstrong
-Lean on Me Bill Withers
-Harvest Moon Neil Young
-Love Me Tender Elvis
-Here Comes the Sun The Beatles
-What a Wonderful World Louis Armstrong
-Black is the Colour Nina Simone
What mood are you going for, Boho Brides? What songs will accompany you down the aisle?
*images from Amazon.com
I have transitioned from watching We’s “Bridezillas” to “Platinum Weddings.” When I first got engaged I was obsessed with “Bridezillas.” It is a ridiculous show sold on the promising theme: brides-to-be who are self-centered and controlling will make for a fabulous reality show. I think this show appealed to me because it showed all my worst fears. It showed me how not to handle situations, how not to treat your family and friends, how not to be because, essentially, the brides ruin their own days. 
Now as I am closing in on the months until my wedding I am ditching the flurry of craziness for the calmness that is “Platinum Weddings.” I no longer want to think of the bad things that could happen, only the exciting things will happen on our day. Last night I watched Naomi & George’s platinum wedding in Mexico and loved the style of the wedding. It incorporated traditional Mexican culture and translated it to a glamourous affair. The bride could have been pulled directly out of a Frida Kahlo portrait: a steep peineta diamond comb sat perfectly on her head, her black hair parted and woven in braids, a row of red roses gradually decreasing in size wrapping from ear to ear around the nape of her neck. The ceremony was understated with logs acting as seats, traditional pillar candles at the ends of the rows. The guests followed the conch blowers down a path from the ceremony site into an amber lit cave for the reception dinner. Yes, a cave. How glorious it is to be a Platinum bride. No napkin out of place, no musician out of key, no bride running around screaming that it is her day. Check out more photos of the event on the website andreanaphoto.com. Tune in with me on Sundays at 9 pm!
The Bohemian Bride 