A Modern, Elegant Soiree II
If you thought the details that Katrina infused into her wedding were gorgeous, wait until you see the fashion. It’s one part wispy and romantic, one part city-chic…the look is absolutely fabulous!
all photos by the oh-so-talented Dennis Lee Photography
I am hoping that Katrina will stop by the comments section a little later today to answer some of your questions. She did an absolutely incredible job with this wedding. It really does look magazine-worthy, and yet so approachable and real. It’s the best combination.
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The bridesmaids dresses are so pretty - where are they from?
Abby asked me if I wouldn’t mind adding a few thoughts, which I am of course happy to do…
I loved, loved planning our wedding. It was like a giant designing and decorating dream come true for me. We knew that more than anything we wanted our wedding to be fun, one giant party with all of our family and friends. We also knew that we wanted it to reflect the urban nature of the downtown Chicago location. The look really got a jumpstart when we found our venue, the River East Art Center. River East is an art galley with lots of glass and exposed brick and timber, and we fell in love with it right away. We decided to play off the natural elements of the gallery using varying shades of brown and green, and of course, per Abby’s suggestion, lots of candle light.
Fashion is a big passion of mine, and I had so much fun looking for dresses. I adored my dress and the bridesmaid dresses (both by Vera Wang) and I thought they were a nice light and playful contrast to the stark nature of our venue. I stuck to my guns on using classic black tuxes for the guys despite all the protests of “but black tuxes will look awful with the brown bridesmaid dresses” and I am so glad I did. I think the black and the brown together gave a sense of the urban sophistication we were looking for. We did however replace the bowties with green neckties to keep the look from being too stuffy.
I also had a lot of fun with the paper suite and flowers. We used an adorable Save the Date from Abby Jean Press and invitations from Claudia Calhoun. The programs, menus, escort cards, out of town inserts, and table numbers (with some help from Abby’s inspiration board) I designed myself. I knew I wanted the flowers to look beautiful and not too stiff. I worked with our florist to incorporate some whimsical touches using roses, orchids, amaryllis, ranunculus, hanging moss, fiddlehead ferns, cocks comb, hypericum berries, seeded eucalyptus, and button mums. One thing I learned about planning is that it helps to have an idea of what flowers you do and do not want!
Oh, and I would be remiss if I did not give credit to our photographer, Dennis Lee. His pictures made everything look even more beautiful than I ever could have imagined.
Thanks so Abby and ladies for letting me share! Please feel free to email me if you have any questions.