As an art history major, I always loved the grace and beauty of classic statues…

Now that I design weddings, I love the idea of using them in a wedding ceremony decor or as an extra touch during cocktail hour…

I think they look best in a garden setting, but an elegant ballroom with great architectural detail could work too… Would you consider using statues for decor?

I’m eating up this bold color, what i like to call “punchy red-orange.” Mixed with white, this color combo just feels like the incarnation of the swinging sixties.

Ummm… How awesome is this very modern, red-orange, dollhouse? I covet it so… And the most awesome sixty’s couch with the most perfect pillows ever? Add it to the covet list too.

Photography, from top, left to right:

I love classic blue and white china. There’s just something so elegant and timeless about it.

Um, how awesome is this writer’s desk with three dimensional blue and white tile?

And of course, classic chinoiserie blue and white china adds an exotic element to this classic combo. Would you use blue and white tile in your home? Your wedding design?

I love this unexpected color palatte of aqua and red and it just seemed just so appropriate for a California Christmas/holiday table…

For flowers, I used shades of crismon and red with hints of purple. I don’t usually like red roses, but these cabbage roses are kind of amazing.

A holiday wreath with rosemary…

A happy little ranunculus in the arrangement.

And a congratulations to Jose Villa & Joel Serrato on their wedding and publication in Martha Stewart Weddings. Check it out here.

And a sweet remembrance for a Jane Packer, she helped shape and create the modern floral industry. Check out Chelsea’s sweet remembrance post here.

A little holiday table I designed a few weeks ago is up on Style Me Pretty! You can check it right here.

Probably my favorite form of shopping is treasure hunting… aka flea markets. Kirsten of Beaux Arts Photographie and I made an excursion to the Pasadena Flea a couple of months ago. I was shopping for funky goblets for peach bride (found by the way, 10 mini goblets with etched dragons, $25 for all) Along the way I of course got distracted by all the vintage glass. I brought home this happy red peacock seltzer bottle…

But what I really wanted to bring back with me is this chandlier. Its insanely good. If she were mine I would put her in my grand (imaginary) foyer, the kind where a big sweeping staircase comes to meet a perfect black and white floor…. Someday…

Photos by the lovely Kirsten Ellis of Beaux Arts Photographie.

I love  a wedding full of vibrant color, and this wedding I designed last year had one of my favorite color combos: turquoise, orange, and hot pink. For her bouquet, I used pink garden roses, orange dahlias, sweet veronica, scabiosa pods and maidenhair fern and then wrapped the stems with a deep turquoise silk.

Their ceremony was held under the oak tree at Gainey Vineyards. The bride had a thing for hearts (she actually wore a heart shaped necklace on her wedding day) so I created a big heart out of orange rose petals.

I used the couple’s bird and heart logo on their seating card chart (I actually printed a large copy of it and then used an exacto knife to make a stencil out of it). A collection of vintage fans were placed in wood boxes filled with more orange rose petals.

For her tabletop design, I used a burlap runner as the base to pop the colorful flowers off of. A mix of hammered containers, petite mason jars and aqua glasses from Anthropologie held an assortment of garden roses, cafe au lait dahlias, orange lollipop dahlias, orange roses, tuberrose, geranium, and a bit amaranthus. I bought a bunch of old books and tied with them with more turquiose silk, sort of like old book satchels. At each place setting I hand braided torn silk strips to use as a napkin ring. I also switched out the usually white plates for orange ones to add even more color. I love the vibrant, playful look! You can see more of this wedding over on Style Me Pretty, right here.

If you’re in London, you must check out Brunswich House. Its right by the flower market and the store is a treasure trove of all sorts of goodies. They have loads of old medicine bottles (gotta love the old labels) and the most adorable collection of old children toys. How cute are the kid-sized chairs and the old fire truck?

And of course, the antique hardware is to die for. Oh yes, and if you need some manly horns and skulls for your home, they have you covered.

Photos by me.

A wedding I designed last year was featured on Style Me Pretty last week. I loved the colorful palette and the vintage school yard theme we did. More on this wedding soon…

And The Rainbow shoot was featured on The City Sage. Enjoy!

Monday: I revisited the reception location and confirmed table layout, made sure my husband’s morning suit fit him (this was an English wedding after all), transplanted toparies, folded napkins, and basically banged through some of the more tedious tasks.

Tuesday: I hit up Alfie’s which is another antique market that ranges from 19th century up to the 70′s. Lots of glass, silver sets, vintage ad posters, and a post modern bench made of pencils,

Wednesday: My flowers arrived from the market and I cleaned and prepped them. The hydranga in England is seriously jumbo (each indiviudal bloom is like 2″ accross) and the garden roses were super fragrant. With flower prep complete, I met my dad and husband and we hit up the National Galley and British Museum. From there we met the rest of the family in Covent Garden and had a proper curry (after many proper pints to be sure).

Thursday: I met Kirsten and we went up to Cambridge and walked to the little village of Granchester to have tea in The Orchard. I studied in Cambridge for a summer when I was in school and I loved the countryside walk from Cambridge to Granchester. You walk along the river cam, the cows hang out with you on the foot path, there are weeping willows, white swans, its basically idyllic England.  Its one of my favorite places in the world and its been a hang out spot to just about every major English literary writer for the last hundred years (this is the spot called “Forever England” in Rupert Brooke’s poem.). Also, the scones there are so freaking good.

On Friday, I arranged all the flowers in the various containers we had collected over the last week, had my nails done (very necessary after you’ve been playing with flowers) and packed up all the decor.

Saturday, was wedding day! I got my hair and makeup done early so I can run over to the reception and set everything up. I met my sister over at the ceremony site and watched her marry her sweet husband. The English registry marriage service is short, but sweet. I loved the tradition of showering with confetti the bride and groom as they leave the register’s office. I might have to steal that idea. The reception was quite the party, the groom’s family is Irish and they are certainly not shy about their love of Jameson (but then neither am I).

Sunday, I flew home exhausted. I had a wedding that following Friday, 9/16, so needless to say I’m still quite tired. Its been a busy three weeks. Anyhoo, I’ll share photos of Cambridge and the wedding when I can. It was so much fun to design my sister’s wedding especially since we have similar tastes, the man she married is a total sweetheart, and  England is one of my favorite countries. A big congrats to my sister and her husband!

All photos by me and my crappy cell phone camera.

Thursday: We went to visit my sister’s ceremony location, scoped out some good photography spots for bride and groom photos and then we headed to Camden Passage. It was mostly closed, and the shops that were open were really expensive.

We wandered down a ways and happened upon After Noah. We found some awesome rusted vintage tea tins that they had a ton of and were also a good price.

Friday: We met my sister’s fiance, Mark, and had lunch at Borough Market which is an open air food market. I got steak and ale pie for lunch. From there, we hit up Portebello Road. We had really good luck at Alice, we found a bunch of pretty pottery, vintage tea tins, and I bought some vintage ink wells to add to my collection.

Saturday: We hit up Portebello Market which was mind blowing. Vintage coins, prints, more silver tea sets then you can shake a stick at, tons of letterpress type, vintage jewelry, doll house furniture… Let’s just say its reputation as the biggest antique market is well deserved. We finished out container shopping here and then I went to pick up my husband from the airport.

Sunday: I made reservations for us to have high tea at Fortnum & Mason’s. A department store that’s been there since 1700, its tea and biscuit packaging is gorgeous and their merchandizing displays are amazing. Seriously, the whole store is so darn pretty. Tea started with a few savory bites and then the staff brought out tiered trays of tea sandwhiches, scones, and madelines. The madelines were incredible, fluffy and light with a touch of lemon zest.  After that the staff came around with a dessert cart filled with rows of pretty bites.

All photos by me and my crappy cell phone camera.

I went to England for my sister’s wedding, Tracy, (she’s married a Brit, hence the location) but of course I couldn’t not design and plan her wedding. She did most of the leg work there, sorting out the venues for ceremony and rehearsal and booking most of the vendors on her own. I brought a photographer from LA, Kirsten of Beaux Arts Photographie to shoot the wedding. I packed one suitcase full of custom napkins, a runner, floral supplies, craft punches, paper, various forms of glue, ribbon, basically anything I could pack, I did. I landed on a Friday and the following day was her hen do (aka her Bachelorette). We drank Pimm’s Cups and danced to the Spice Girls.

Monday: I checked out her reception location so I can start figuring out what kind of containers to buy and how many. After that we went fascinator shopping at Oxford Circus and then hit up Top Shop. I got some awesome black oxford heels there, the shoe department is freaking huge and fabulous.

Tuesday: We went to Covent Garden Flower Market and figured out a flower purveyor (Alagar). I also ordered garden roses direct from David Austin (both vendors were very pleasant to work with).

From there we happened upon an architectural salvage store, Brunswich House, accross the street from the flower market. It was way too much fun in there, vintage hardware, old children toys, serious period clothing, awesome books, dollhouse furniture and so on. If you’re in the area definitely make a stop there.

After that we ran over to Sunbury Antique Market at Kempton Park Racecourse which is open the last Tuesday of every month. The website says its closes at 2pm, but it in fact closes at 12pm. We got there at 12:30pm and did a speed antiquing job second to none. In 45 minutes, we bought 25 containers for the wedding. There were swords, knights’ masks, (still regret not buying one, especially since they were asking only 55 pounds!) amazing furniture, I mean seriously, even half closed it was the best antique market I’ve ever been to and the prices were really good. We got a ton of awesome tarnished silver pieces, mostly from the 1890′s, goblets, these awesome brass urns that I’m totally obsessed with and which I lugged back in my suitcase.

Wednesday: We hit up the hardware store and got buckets for flowers, I found an awesome tool belt thingie, and of course, the most exciting plant ever: a venus fly trap. For 4 pounds, we had to bring her home.

All photos by me and my crappy cell phone camera.

I love modern containers and these cement ones from Jamali Gardens, are so darn fun and versatile. They’d be perfect for a modern wedding with monochromatic blooms. They’re also easy to spray paint, I just painted some for a Spanish themed wedding I’m doing in the next couple weeks. How would you use them?

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of designing a wedding for Amanda & Roy. How cute are they during their first dance?

For the ceremony, Amanda wanted a very simple chuppa structure. I used birch wood poles and sheer white chiffon to create a relaxed look. For her ceremony, the coordinator, my old assistant and friend of Amanda, Cynthia, used my oversized chalkboards for her programs (eco-friendly and you don’t have to rush around printing programs at the last minute).

For Amanda’s bouquet, I used cafe au lait dahlias, garden roses, white lisianthus, lavender, and lamb’s ear. For the bridesmaids, I used lavender lisianthus, peach roses, peach dahlias, lavender, gomphrena (those funky purple balls) and lamb’s ear. The groomsmen’s boutonniere were made of gomphrena with lambs ear and wrapped in burlap.

For the seating card table I created a fruit stand with peaches and plums. I used bittersweet to ground the back of the table mixed with white hydranga and olive leaves. I then pinned the seating cards to the peaches. For her cocktail tables, inkwells from the 1870′s held garden roses, tall medicine bottles held freesia and  galvanized bucket held even more peaches.

For her tabletop design, I found cool wood boxes and draped the table number from it. Containers were a mix of patina copper containers from Jamali Garden mixed with vintage brass and pewter goblets. At each place setting, a hemstitch napkin was tied with lavender baking twine and a piece of lavender tucked in. This wedding was so much fun to design, I loved the seasonal fruit we used (I gott the peaches from a local farmer) and how elegant, but not stuffy, the whole vibe of the wedding was. Special thanks to Cynthia for her coordination skillz and One Love Photography for the amazing images!

Remeber my inspiration for the peach wedding I was working on?

Well you can check out the final design for this wedding right here. Enjoy!

Photo by One Love Photography. Floral and event design by Kelly Oshiro Design.