Happy Friday, Violets! You know those weddings that just make you sigh with all their beauty and love? The ones that kind of put you in a wedding dream trance? This one, captured by Pepper Nix, is one of those. Maddie and Gray had an earthy, romantic wedding in the foothills of Utah. With so many organically arranged flowers, rustic details, and mountains in the background (not to mention a gorgeous Claire Pettibone gown!) this will certainly go down in the books as one of our favorites this year. “I knew I wanted a subtle color palette that was romantic and soft, says Maddie of their décor. “We didn’t want strong accent colors or color to be the focal point. We wanted the whole thing to mix together into a sort of ethereal wash of twinkly lights and soft flowers, without being interrupted by intense pops of color. The colors acted as a backdrop, not the defining feature.” We think it worked beautifully! Read below for much, much more on these two and all their details, plus a video from their big day.
Get the tissues ready! There are so many heart-melting moments in this video by Kale Fitch Films!
From the Bride…
Before the Ring:
Gray was studying in London and my college roommate was studying at Cambridge. I went to visit her and we both went to visit him in London, as they went to high school together and we stayed on his floor :). We hit it off and …sadly for my friend…we spent pretty much every minute together!
The Proposal:
We were visiting Gray’s parents in Oregon and we all went out to King Estate Winery for dinner. Gray’s parents gave a suspicious reason for needing to do an errand in the middle of rural Oregon and dropped us off. We went inside and the bartender “suggested” a walk and gave us the option between a graveyard and a view and I chose the graveyard…which I’m pretty sure Gray was not expecting, ha! But it was beautiful and a really sweet moment between us when he proposed.
Did you do a First Look before the ceremony?
We did have a first look and we are REALLY happy we did! We’ve been to wedding before where after the ceremony, you have to sit and wait for a long time to see the bride and groom and we didn’t want people to have to do that, nor did we want our family/friends who were in the wedding party to miss an hour of our wedding night for photos! We wanted everyone to all be there celebrating right after we said “I do.” It was really amazing to have a few minutes before we saw anyone else to really just focus on each other, for me to show him my dress :), which I was really excited about and to just connect and really understand how monumental what we were about to do was. We’re both really glad we did it! We got married and immediately got to celebrate!
Favorite Moments?
Just like everyone says, it was amazing to see Gray waiting for me as I walked down the aisle. He looked so cute and nervous! I just couldn’t believe we were actually at our own wedding! My second favorite memory has to be my little nieces walking down the aisle in front of me. They just looked amazing!
Details of the Day:
Our wedding planner, Jen Bennett, did a fantastic job with our flowers! We wanted very organic and kind of overgrown flowers, nothing too arranged. We opted to have some large arrangements but also a lot of smaller vases on the tables along with big overflowing bowls of flowers. Our color palette was very muted because we wanted the whole event to feel subtle, romantic and earthy without any strong accent colors. We really wanted my mom’s garden to seem like it had kind of just bloomed in the tent.
We wanted to make it all feel really natural but kind of “secret garden”-ish. Because it was July, we couldn’t really use peonies, which would have given us the feel we were looking for. But since we also wanted to use more local flowers, we used garden roses, which turned out beautifully and were soft enough in color. We also filled in with hydrangeas and a few other things. For the messy natural looks we wanted lots of sprigs and sprays, which we did with pieris japonica (my personal favorite!) and eucalyptus leaves. My favorite things that Jen did, besides the beautiful flowers, were the barn wood wall at the back of the tent and the gold leaf on the wood.
I knew we wanted some kind of installation wall at the back of the tent, preferably wood, to ground the whole thing and really set the mood. We wanted rustic, but not burlap or hay….more earthy and romantic… more of an old vineyard or winery kind of rustic. I wanted wood and gold accents and lots of flowers and twinkly lights. Jen came up with this fantastic idea of having our wood wall have lots of little shelves to hold candles, flowers, etc. She also thought of applying gold leaf and painting our monogram on it in white. It was just magical. The shelves holding the candles and spilling flowers was just beautiful. It perfectly fit the idea I was trying to convey, which was a sort of messy mix of earthy, romantic, Great Gatsby and woodsy all at the same time. And the gold leaf just sealed the deal! Adding it to the table numbers has to be one of my favorite little touches of the whole wedding!
Favorite part of the menu?
The plated trio–Skewer Caprese Salad, Golden and Red Beets, and Watermelon with feta, mint and pomegranate molasses…YUM. Our signature cocktails were also really fun for us. About half our guests drank and the other half didn’t, so we came up with two cocktails that we thought tasted really good virgin or not: Sorrel Lime Cooler with Gin and Rhubarb Rosemary with Vodka.
Any advice you have for future brides?
I think the most important thing is to hire good vendors and let them do what they are good at! That way, you don’t have to worry about the details on your wedding day so you can relax and enjoy your own party! Specifically for mountain brides, I’d let the scenic mountains do their thing! I wouldn’t over style or over decorate.
Photographer: Pepper Nix Photography / Ceremony Location: West Family’s backyard / Floral Designer: Solamente Celebrations / Dress Designer: Claire Pettibone / Shoes: Old Navy / Groom’s Attire: Vera Wang Tux / Ring designer: Joseph Jewelry / Jewelry: Vintage / Makeup Artist: Kimi McAvoy / Officiant: Lu Smith (Mother of the Groom’s best friend) / Caterer: Culinary Crafts / Cake Designer: Maha Burhani / Band: Joe Muscolino Band / Wedding Programs: Adrienne Berry at Dingbat Press / Cinema and Video : Kale Fitch Films / Rentals: Diamond Rental / Submitted via Two Bright Lights
This wedding was truly something very special! Wonderful setting, beautiful couple, stunning dress …. and all the trimmings to perfection! A joy to look at and share!