Years ago, I was a bridesmaid in a series of weddings all of which took place from late October through January.  I wore a red bridesmaid’s dress to all of them, and at least two out of the three had a “holiday theme”.  And I totally understand why that is. As a bride when you decide to have a winter wedding, it’s hard to come up with creative ways to embrace WINTER without just putting out white birch branches or embracing a red holiday-esque color scheme.  So, I thought I’d share some of favorite details to make your winter wedding feel COZY without adding in a cheesy factor.

TEXTURE AND COLOR! While everyone knows that the look of snow is obviously winter, texture in general can create a cozy atmosphere, especially if it involves knit details, lace details, woven fabrics or… for lack of a more technical term… things that look fluffy.  People tend to think white and blue for “snow” and reds and greens for “holiday”, but neutrals and metallics can often create a more warm atmosphere than any of the former.  Here are two tabletops: one by Nuage and the other by MDS Floral Design (via Grace Ormond).  I adore the use of texture on the Nuage table mixed with mettalic woven fabrics.  The MDS table is successfull in it’s use of white, greys, vintage lace, unprocessed cotton (fluff!) and soft toned colors to create an atmopshere that makes you want to take a cozy nap by a fire. 

Speaking of Neutrals… I just loved this bride’s choice to put her bridesmaids in this cool grey. There was something classic winter about it, without the girls looking like holiday candies. And it was topped off nicely with the faux fur stoles.

  I love using Jewel tones at Winter Weddings.  They don’t need to be heavy handed, but think purples, ruby reds, deep turquoise and metallic and you will have a festive atmosphere with minimal effort. Consider using Moroccan glasses for wine or even as votive holders… They add a bit of sparkle and flair to the tabletop in a subtle way.   Or even just work your tones into your stationery.  For our NYE wedding where we wanted to try and NOT go “holiday” we worked with a pewter, gold and plum palette.

Peaches and Pinks are ALSO awesome winter colors… Sometimes pale and warm tones are MORE effective at creating romance than bright, bold colors.  This season, I’ve been in love with Peaches and Pinks with metallic accents.  Below an amazing winter bouquet via Once Wed, a fabulous centerpiece in peach and mercury glass from Saipua and the floral arrangements I made for Mayra’s November engagement party (with wood and gold accents)….

In general, don’t be afraid to think outside of the box for winter inspiration. Think of what tones and textures make you feel cozy, warm and festive and it will definitely take you in the right direction!

I am a devil about details, and sometimes, when setting up a table top, a naapkin will speak to me and say “Hello! I want to be folded and have a menu card tucked inside me.” While other times the napkin looks up and says “Hey, you!  I need to be tucked delicately under the charger plate causing my color to contrast with the linen and form a rhythmic pattern around the room.”   And still other times, the napkin looks at me and says “No, I think what I need is a napkin ring of sorts… Don’t you think?”

There was a time when the napkin ring seemed about as dated as the ballroom chair cover with a satin tie back that matched the bridesmaids dresses (sorry if you are doing that look.. It’s not a bad look, but it is a dated look).   But, lately, the voice of the napkin has been in my head again CRYING out for a napkin ring.

If you don’t know what I mean, take a look at this tabletop from the Newlywish WWRD Registry Repatterned launch… Can you imagine if this table setting featuring Mark Ingram’s collection had just been done with a pocket fold?  NO! It was screaming for the understaded glamour of this napkin ring with the delicate folds that can only be created BY a napkin ring!

I’m working on a 1920′s Glamour inspired wedding and saw this dragonfly napkin ring from Remarkable Rhinestone that I just loved… It adds more than a dab of glamour, but it also feels a bit more homey… So much of the time when we are designing a wedding, even if it’s terribly glamorous, we try to make it feel like a hosted party for a few hundred… While menu cards are a fantastic detail to add to a tabletop, I think the idea of a napkin ring (which most people use only at home for holiday entertaining) seems, somehow more like an elegant touch vs. “wedding”-y.

That said, napkin “rings” needn’t be only for black tie tables, they can go casual and homey as well AND can be made from nearly anything.  At this intimate wedding for 100, we took simple butcher’s twine around an Irish Linen napkin and to create the “look” of a napkin ring and to serve as a place card.

I’d love to hear if napkins speak to you?  Any favorite ideas for unusual napkin rings that you’ve seen or are using at your wedding?

One of the greatest challenges being a bride is that it’s so hard sometimes to visualize things… and one of the greatest challenges being a designer/ florist/ visual vendor who is working with brides is to help the bride visualize! So, when I saw this App on Stylist Home, I immediately had to download it to PLAY, play, play!
How it works? Download it to your phone, take a photo of your dinner plate or charger plate that you might be looking at for the wedding reception, and then pick from their 101 shades of linen. If you are contemplating purchase for home, it’s even more amazing because they will direct you straight to the retailer (Sferra Bros) website. It’s really, honestly fantastic with the one exception of the fact that you can’t email PHOTOS of your plate/ linen combo, you can only share on facebook. I guess it isn’t worth doing if you can’t share it with your 850 other “friends” :-)
Here’s the link to the App!

A few months ago we were tasked with designing a dinning room for a dinner at Ramscale. The space, which is an old Soho apartment that has been converted to an event space. The challenge was to make it elegant, but rustic AND to fit into the room about 12 more bodies than we all thought the room could actually HOLD. This seems like a simple challenge, but in practice it felt more akin to a Project Runway challenge where you are given a yard of fabric but are asked to make a ballgown for a small elephant.   Add to this the one request that our client had- that we distract from the ceilings that featured some track lighting she wasn’t so crazy about.

Our concept- An Urban Woodsman look.  And our guests?  How did we fit them all in?  Knowing we had to use every inch of space, we converted a built in sofa in the room into bench seating.  We used a combination of tall, thin communal tables, a couple of wooden farm tables AND, in the elevated areas of the rooms, lounge tables.  We used linen and floral to tie all the different tables together.  To distract from the ceiling, our floral team from Melarosa created Wisteria “Frames”  around the windows that drew the guests eye to the amazing view, and away from the track lights.

As I had mentioned last week, Mayra and I were in Mexico checking out some amazing wedding locations in Michaocan and Queretaro, two states in Mexico that are a little off the beaten path of the usual Mexican locales for weddings, but undeniably almost more of what we think when we think “Mexico”.  From Haciendas to private estates on crystal clear lakes in the mountains… this region of Mexico has so much to offer in terms of culinary, cultural, aesthetics and history and of course… fun!  I will spare you the details of the fact that I ate like a hobbit during the trip (first breakfast, second breakfast, first lunch…. etc), and just assure you that you will be blown away by the region AND by the prices!  I’ll be posting some of Mayra and my favorite locales in Michoacan and Queretaro in the coming weeks, but for now, here is an inspiration board I put together of some of the things that I personally found inspiring.