REAL WEDDINGS | Samantha & Bradley
How did you two meet? We met at a photography workshop. We both loved photography before we met and were pursuing different educational & networking opportunities. After exchanging “business” information we began to talk, met over coffee, did some photo shoots together and eventually fell in love. We’re now a husband and wife team of professional wedding photographers.
How long was your engagement? We were engaged for 15 months. Because of the nature of our business getting married in the middle of the summer wasn’t an option because of how busy we are. We also didn’t want to be planning in the middle of our busy season for a fall weddings, which meant spring was the perfect option!
What inspired your wedding theme? We both love anything and everything vintage! We’re big into crafting and doing things unique.
What inspired your wedding color palette? Honestly we saw another bride who had a variety of soft colors, peaches, pinks, champagne and ivory and I just adored it! I’m a pretty girly person too, so of course I loved having a variety of pinks!
What was special about where you got married? The venue where our reception was held is a very unique location within Grand Rapids. There’s a big whale skeleton hanging over the dance floor and all sorts of fun activities for guests to do. The biggest hit was the carousel.
What do-it-yourself projects did you do? More like what didn’t we do? We really had a great time putting together all sorts of fun personalized crafty things for our big day.
Bridesmaid’s bouquets: My mom is an avid scrap booker and has a candy land of craft supplies. We originally wanted a crinkled paper look for the flowers but after some experimenting we weren’t getting the results that we wanted. After some more research we found a cartridge specifically for the Cricut machines that cut out stencils for all kinds of flowers. I fell in love with the rose flowers. It basically cuts out a spiral on any paper desired and then you use a quelling tool to form the flowers themselves. It was a very tedious task and there were tons of flowers that needed to be made but it was worth it.
Card Box: I lucked out finding an old suitcase for $2.00 at a yard sale and threw some old books with lace in it and a vintage camera on top and viola… card box!!
Pennant Flags: We had a TON of these incorporated in our wedding. A great friend of mine helped with these and made them super amazing. We picked out a lot of really great fabrics of different textures and colors and put them all on a thick hemp string.
Seating Chart: This was a pretty involved one. We found this great old window with several panes. We made stands so it could be up right. We designed our seating chart to look like chalkboards but they were actually Jpegs. We alternated the seating chart and also images from our engagement session. We had them printed with a stiff backing and attached them to the windowpanes. It was a big hit with our guests.
Place Cards: We found a ton of vintage photos at an antique store and because we’re photographers we definitely wanted to find a way to incorporate them in some capacity. So, we cut out 5x7 cards out of our favorite color paper and glued the images to the paper. We put tags on the cards and wrote out people’s names as well as stamped some pretty flowers on it too. We tried to coordinate the pictures with the people sitting there. (Definitely a few funny ones in the mix!)
We ordered things from Etsy like: The bridal bouquet, boutonnières and invitations.
What advice do you have for other brides? The best advice I can give to a bride who is planning her wedding is to just enjoy the process. Give yourself a realistic amount of time to do your crafty projects, recruit friends and family to help and don’t get overwhelmed. Make it fun and remember that all of the fun things you’re doing are for your wedding day!!
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DIY WEDDINGS |
diyweddingsmag.com
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