A Most Elegant Reception

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I love this head table; if you are going to have one you might as well do it all the way. All told, this table seated 30 and visually dominated the room with the other tables dancing around it. Centrally located in the enormous ballroom of theLoew’s Vanderbilt Plaza it edged up to the dance floor.

Since I was there for the floral, I have added some pictures of a few of the different centerpieces we used. I think that large glass cylinder is absolutely gorgeous.It is filled with dendrobium orchids and ivory rose petals

Reception décor by Alice Hendry, wedding coordinator, Branching Out event floral and design and T & M Event Rental
All images David Wright Photography

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Rehearsal Dinner Details

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This weekend’s wedding was all about the details; the small touches that add up to big impact. Notice the orchid on the place setting at the rehearsal dinner. The plate of desserts was served with coffee after the plated dessert for the guests to nibble on during the toasts and photo montage. Tomorrow I will post some images from the reception.

Photos courtesy of David Wright

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Observations from a Wedding

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Huge apologies for not posting for the last few days; I was helping my friend Vicki of Branching Out ~An Event Florist with the most amazing wedding. Here are a couple of observations from the back side of pulling off an event this large.

1. I do not care who you are or what your budget, you can not anticipate what mom nature will have in store for you. As you sit there in January planning your event you should know what flowers and foods will be in season for your August date on a normal basis. What you do not know is that mom nature has a 25 day string of temperatures over 95, with 11 of those over 100 in the works. You can not foresee that that your lovely wedding will fall smack dab in the middle of a drought of near monumental proportions just as the temperature records start dropping like flies. Sometimes what sounded great in January is darn near impossible in reality. So if your caterer tells you that the fresh mint for your Mojito’s looks a lot less than perfect because the crop dried out or the flowers that should have looked perfect for several days are wilted half way through the day realize that if there had been anything they could have done differently, they would have bent over backwards to do it. As a bride, you have to be flexible and understand that the professionals you are working with are as much at the mercy of the weather as you are.

2. As you plan, schedule in some free time for your guests. This weekend there were events scheduled non-stop. Luncheon on Friday followed by the rehearsal, Greek dance lessons and then the rehearsal dinner. On Saturday another luncheon, the wedding and reception and a 9:00AM brunch on Sunday. We went to breakdown the reception at the appointed time of 12:30 Saturday night fully expecting the party to still be in full swing since this was a very large, very partying type crowd. But no, not only were we able to walk right in and start breakdown, it seems that the event had actually wound down fifteen minutes earlier than expected. By the time midnight on Saturday rolled around everyone was so worn out that they were all ready to turn into pumpkins. I wasn’t there but I bet there were quite a few no shows at that 9 AM brunch. Any hostess wants to make sure that her guests are entertained, but sometimes a nap is entertainment enough.

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Here’s the Proof

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Brides are always asking me what makes one service provider so much more expensive than another. In most cases it simply the attention to detail.

I was at lunch last week with a friend looking at the proofs of her daughters wedding. This was the beautiful beach wedding from a few weeks back. Of course I was blown away by the images from David Wright but I was even more impresses by the presentation. Each image is presented on a 4”x 6” card with color, black & white and sepia tone proofs neatly arranged in presentation quality boxes.

This is the kind of things that set the really top notch vendors apart from the run off the mill or bargain basement providers. So as you are out there trying to decide who to trust with your wedding, look at the details. Chances are good that if they do a great job on the details the big parts will be spectacular.

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The Sweetest Inspiration

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I have talked before about creating a storyboard to help you design your wedding. Well, no one does it better than Abby Jean over at Style Me Pretty.

Abby calls them inspiration boards and does them on her computer. This week she is showcasing some of the best of the best entries in an Inspiration Board Contest among her readers.

Wow! What an embarrassment of riches. I could spend all day just ooohing and ahhhing over the beautiful ideas. All perfectly pulled together by Abby’s deft touch.

She has been generous enough to post a list of how-to hints and tips on how to put your own inspiration board together.

Thanks Abby, you always inspire me.

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Fun with Chair Ties

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How is that for different. The table cloth is orange Bengaline and the chair is dressed and bound in moss and persimmon lamour.

I just thought this was as clever as could be. What are you going to do to dress up those little folding chairs that so many people are using? Why give them a tie, of course. That always adds a well dressed edge.

All images: David Wright
All Linen and design: BBJ Linen

I’ll post the gorgeous cake table tomorrow.

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I loved this overlay. It is called Monte Carlo and the colors are too die for. MaryMac paired it with a black under base and chair color and then accented her creation with Cerise Lamor napkins and chair tie. You have got to love the creativity of the staff at BBJ.


The centerpiece is from Ed Vance over at the local Flower Express. What a hidden treasure he is. Whoops! I guess he’s not so hidden any more.

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Decor Bonanza!!

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I had the best time today. I went over to the BBJ Linens showroom to see some of their new offerings. It seems that once a year the company runs a friendly little in house competition to see who can design the loveliest tables. WOW with their selection of gorgeous linens how can you go wrong.

In the true tradition of southern hospitality the showroom here in Nashville threw open their doors, stocked the bar and loaded down the buffet with tasty morsels. The guest list included the who’s who in the local event industry. Always fun to see old friends and meet new ones.

BBJ Linens was started 25 years ago by three women upset by the terrible selection of linens available. Working from home they began to create their own linen using beautiful fabrics. Today BBJ has 15 showrooms spread across the country and a huge team of fine professionals to help you plan your décor needs.

Their website is not only some of the prettiest eyecandy around but also has a great interactive tool to help with making decisions. For more personal service just call 1-800-405-6944 and they will hook you up with your nearest showroom. Then one of their reps like MaryMac here in Nashville will talk you through the process; send you swatches or even a whole table cloth until you are happy with your choices. In some cases, you can even hire their production crew to come and tie all of those beautiful but tedious chair ties.

Dear friend David Wright took a ton of pictures for me today. So many wonderful shots in fact that I’m going to break them up into a couple of posts with full details on fabrics. Keep reading.

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