Romantic Garden Wedding with Vintage Details
A garden wedding with French country accents is right up my alley, so I’m particularly smitten with this beautiful day from Yes, Dear. Studio and Wallflower Inspiration. Whitney and Steve exchanged their vows in San Diego amidst romantic scenery, vintage details, and touches of gold and navy, which all adds up to a classic look we’ll enjoy for years to come!
From the bride, Whitney: Steve and I met at work in San Diego. After many years of friendship, he proposed in Big Sur at Glen Oaks in January 2014. We decided that we would take a month to enjoy being engaged and then start the wedding planning. I grew up Virginia and he is from Sonoma County – so picking a destination for the wedding was unlimited. We decided on San Diego since we live there and the weather is always perfect. Our first venue tour was at Twin Oaks Garden and we immediately fell in love. It has an old schoolhouse that was built in 1891 that is now used as a bridal suite. And not to mention the beautiful flowers blooming everywhere and the “French country” accents as my fiance calls it!
We wanted our wedding to represent us and to thank everyone who travelled to be there for our wedding, so we did a lot of DIY projects! I have two very talented and creative parents, so it was fun to involve them in the planning process. The only hard part was that they live 2,500 miles away from me. I was constantly sending my Mom ideas! My parents helped to make the 21 table numbers that my Dad cut out of recycled wood and my Mom stenciled the white numbers onto. My Mom also also put together a memorial table with old wedding pictures of our parents, siblings and grandparents. My mother in law and my father in law sanded and painted our “Miles” sign to indicate how far people travelled for our big day (people came from Guam, Copenhagen, Virginia, Indiana, etc). But, I was the main DIY-er for the wedding. I love the color NAVY and I am obsessed with chalkboards. I had navy and white ribbon on my bridal bouquet, on the cocktail tables, the name tags and even as a runner on the dessert table. I also spend countless hours making a welcome chalkboard, a bar menu and hashtag signs that were places on all of the cocktail tables so we could see all of our guests pictures the day after the wedding!
I wore a beautiful dress by Tara Keely that I had buttons added from my Grandmother and Mom’s wedding dress to the back of my dress as my something old. Also, I wore a Chamarro Bamboo bracelet that was handed down to me from my Mother in Law who originally received it from her Mother in Law on her wedding day. We love playing Jenga and decided to have our guests sign the blocks instead of using a traditional guest book. Now every time we play the game we can read the sweet messages left by our guests!
Also, we were so blessed to have found the most amazing and talented vendors. I love photography so naturally after booking our venue we started researching photographers in San Diego. Yes, Dear Studios was the first husband and wife team that we met. After our meeting my fiance and I knew they were the team we wanted with us the day of the wedding. We also chose Amari Productions for our videography. I spent hours watching their wedding films posted on their website- so it was a no-brainer to pick them. And our florist- Esther of Wallflower Inspiration… where do I begin?! She was instrumental in helping me with our table design. We used old vintage books, teacups and wooden cigar boxes for our centerpieces and then toped them off with beautiful white and pink flowers. Esther put all of the flowers in small and large mason jars so the guests could take them home at the end of the night. One of our favorite moments (and most memorial part) of the day was the ceremony. As I was walking down the aisle, it felt a raindrop. I remember looking at my husband to be and telling him “… It’s raining”. He looked and me and told me- “I know. It’s going to be ok”. In that moment I decided, rain or shine, I am marrying the love of my life and a few raindrops are ok. As soon as were were introduced as husband and wife and everyone was under the tent, the rain came pouring down! Don’t they say raining on your wedding day is good luck? I think they are right! Advice to couples — it is easy to get wrapped up in all of the details — but remember to take it all in and be present in each and every moment! It truly is the best day ever!
Be sure to watch the video by Amari Productions and see this wedding come to life!