Virginia Backyard Wedding
After saving up to buy a house, Melissa and Chris decided to skip the traditional venue route to have their wedding reception in the backyard of their newly purchased 1950s home. Hence the inspiration for a retro backyard fete. Captured by Amy Otto Photography who kindly shared these images with us!
From Amy: We started out with bridal preparations at the Hotel Monaco in Alexandria, where the couple would spend their wedding night. After a first look in the hotel, we took a little time to get some images in Old Town Alexandria of the couple and their bridal party. Melissa and Chris are big fans of film and plastic toy cameras so, I was happy to shoot a bit of film and do some Holga panos. After Old Town, we were off to the couple’s house for the ceremony and reception, all hosted in their backyard. The ceremony featured readings from The Jerk & sharing of lemonade, which was so sweet. There were so many DIY elements to this wedding: The cake topper and ring pillow were knitted by the bride. She also made the paper chain decorations while Chris made their very own photo booth, complete with the ability to instantly upload the images to Facebook. Chris’s brother in law painted their guestbook, and Melissa’s family worked on the ceremony chair decorations and the getaway car. The couple designed and screen printed the invitations themselves, and Melissa and her bridesmaids put all the flowers together after ordering them from a wholesaler.
View all images from this wedding in the gallery
Wedding Vendors + Venue (Old Town Alexandria, Virginia):
Reception Venue: Private Residence / Getting ready location: Hotel Monaco / Wedding Photographer: Amy Otto Photography / Caterer: Eat & Smile Catering / Dress Designer: Dolly Couture / Heirlooms and extras: Beach House Living / Calligrapher: Angelique, Ink / Jewelry: Macy’s / Bakery: Silva’s Patisserie
knitted ring pillow is the cutest thing EVER.
their ring pillow is too cute!
Love! Love it! It is so simple, but looks so unique. Love the bride.
Very sweet! I love the fireworks- I recently just found an image spelling out LOVE with fireworks and I thought it made a brilliant wedding photo.
I love the bride’s dress!
Thanks so much for featuring my wedding! Here I was just scrolling through my blog feeds and all the sudden I see myself! I had to do a double take to figure out what was going on.
You can check out some super fun polaroids that my little sister shot at my wedding here https://dropandanchor.blogspot.com/2011/07/wedding-recap-part-3-instant.html
This totally made my day. 🙂
I love all the unique handmade items in your wedding.It goes to show if couples will just use their imagination,they can put on a beautiful wedding without the big pricetag.
Love the bouquets! So simple and cute!
As a fellow VA backyard wedding bride…. yay/nay opinion on the caterer? Can email me if want to review in a less-public forum. MUCH appreciated!!! I’m struggling to find a locally-farmed & fresh caterer.
Candace, the food was amazing and the wait staff was pleasant and cleaned up after themselves, but the overall experience wasn’t perfect. Some things that were promised were not delivered (amount of signature cocktail ordered, containers for ice, signage with descriptions of the menu items) There are some kinks to be worked out as they are a growing business, but the food was DELICIOUS.