A Wedding Tale: Vintage & DIY Style – Alexandra & Ryan (Part Two)
A bride after my own heart, I'd like to introduce you to
Alexandra & Ryan. Their special day was so spectacular in it's
vintage and DIY glory that we've had to split this feature into two
parts. This is part two, to see part one click here.
What was your favorite wedding detail? Cont.
I really
enjoyed making "whimsical" crafts for our wedding; like my felt flower
and button rehearsal bouquet, the paper doll seating chart, or the
twist-on-the-traditional paper-maché bride and groom cake topper.
I
made a stack of "wedding presents" wrapped in vintage paper and ribbons
to hold the cards guests gave us, and placed it along with the other
presents on our traditional gift table.
For favours, we did a candy
buffet – but used vintage ribbons and containers to hold our pink,
yellow, and white candy. Each jar or container was labeled with puns
on 1950s hit songs, like "twizz and shout" for the twizzlers, or "mama
said there'd be mints like this" for the scotch mints.
To preserve our
memories, I designed a guestbook at blurb.com
to look like a 1950s romance novel – inside was the story of our lives
and our relationship and guests wrote their greeting around the photos!
Did vintage play a role in your wedding? If so, how?
From the moment I said "I will" to the day that I said "I do," I was
smitten with the idea of having a vintage-inspired wedding. The time
period between 1948 and 1964 holds so much charm and fascination for me
that it was a natural choice and source of inspiration for our wedding.
My desire to have a mid-century wedding was no doubt fuelled by my
early and ever-going love of 1950-1960s romantic comedies. In fact, my
dream wedding/life comes directly from those images forever burned onto
my retinas as a child: Elizabeth Taylor in the original Father of the
Bride, and "bunny-nose" June Allyson, Betty Grable, and Doris Day in
every movie they ever made. By referencing old cinema classics, 1950s
wedding guidebooks, interior design and fashion magazines, and by
intently studying home movies and wedding pictures from the era, I was
able to build up an impressive file of notes on classic weddings of the
era. Besides our wedding day attire, accessories, and hair styles, I
was careful to include period-specific flowers and floral combinations
(hence the profusion of carnations, dahlias, old roses, and gladioli)
in our church and reception decor. Our unsual colour palette (ballet
pink, blush pink, buttercream yellow, mustard yellow, gold, charcoal
grey, and white) was directly inspired by old "Hollywood" style hotel
lobbies and ultra-feminine boudoirs. Our guests loved seeing the 1957
Bel-Air parked outside of our tiny church, and were extremely
enthusiastic about our 1930s-1970s playlist at the reception. The dance
for was packed all night – not a single guest was sitting down!
Any vendor recommendations?
I'd highly recommend our floral event designer, Larissa Meade from Bridal Beginnings in
British Columbia – she was so professional, and her creativity and
understanding of my vision blew me away. When some mishaps occurred on
the wedding day, she drove back to my house and personally fixed each
and every bouquet. An angel!