Martha Stewart Weddings celebrated their 15th Anniversary with a really spectacular party at the Plaza in New York. Carla Ten Eyck and I attended the event and had a blast! There were so many incredible and talented people in attendance and it was such a pleasure to meet all of them. Clearly, Martha Stewart Weddings is THE magazine in the industry — by far the most amazing — and we wish them 15 more years of success!

xoxo

I was super pumped to find out that one of our weddings from 2009 was featured in Get Married’s premiere October issue! You remember the preppy and chic wedding at the Saugatuck Rowing Club that we designed for Kim and Matt back in May? Well their amazing tablescape and details made it into the glossy! You can actually read the entire first issue online too. We have received several copies in the mail and like what we see! It’s so hard to pull together a magazine in today’s industry so many kudos and congrats to our new friends over at getmarried.com. Also, congrats to Kim and Matt for having your gorgeous wedding featured!!

xox

There was some sad news in the industry today: Modern Bride and Elegant Bride magazine are ceasing production. Instead, they are “combining” contents into a monthly BRIDES publication (now printed quarterly). It may be a result of the economy, but I partly feel that the internet is to blame for these glossies demise! With so much content produced and published on the internet instantaneously, its hard for magazines to compete. I actually prefer that all the content published in the three magazines be condensed into one monthly publication. Sounds like a fabulous transition for BRIDES!

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of working with a lot of my absolute favorite people on a photoshoot with Carla Ten Eyck for her September Ten Eyck Tuesday. I collaborated with Elisabeth of BLUSH floral design and Beth Chapman of White Dress by the Shore to come up with a unique and fun color story in teals and pinks. All the hair and makeup was done by the talented and super amazing Dana Bartone & Co., who are responsible for making almost ALL of my brides gorgeous on their wedding day (me included)!! My studio roomie Thomas Morlock of Vantage Point Films also shot the entire event from his viewfinder. Plus, he drank all the champagne.

For those of you who don’t know, Carla runs an amazing workshop for photographers once a month where she spends an entire day shooting, educating, and discussing her artform. I’ve attended two Ten Eyck Tuesdays and Carla is amazing!! If you are a photographer in the area (you should travel here if your not!) I highly recommend Carla’s workshop. They are so thorough and detailed. Plus, Carla puts the sass in sass-a-frass.

The location for the shoot was really awesome. The building is an interior designer’s dream, full of lots of shops from furniture to lighting. We took over a blank industrial space with nothing except a few sheets of unused drywall laid up against the wall.

This gorgeousness is all courtesy of Carla and Beth Chapman of White Dress by the Shore who dressed and styled our gorgeous models. Don’t you just LOVE this short wedding gown and feather hair fascinator? It was so delicate and pretty in person! I could have played dress up for hours with all the amazing accessories Beth brought.

That gorgeous, vintage pink bouquet is by the equally talented Elisabeth of BLUSH floral design. I love Dan’s peacock feathered boutonniere. Can you see the peacock feathers tucked into Mandie’s bouquet? Check the neck collage of images!

Pretty gorgeous, right? The furniture is from my FAVORITE rental company, Signature Event Rentals, who are responsible for most of the awesomeness you see. That gorgeous white couch? The clear-backed and hot pink dining chairs?! The leather tufted wall panels?!?! The WHITE dinning table?!?!?! Yeah, they pretty much rule. They’re the best, hands down, and we LOVED having their furniture at the shoot!

Elisabeth created a bed of tightly arranged hot pink carnations for our escort cards, which were pennant flags that I made and hand wrote in gold ink. Antonia from Flower upon Flour blew us away with her tasty little gold petit fours with the hot pink fleur de lis… but the pièce de résistance was definitely her INSANE cake!!

Antonia and I had discussed the color story and inspiration behind the shoot… and when she showed up with this…. we were like… seriously?! A teal cake with a gold birdcage on top and hot pink feathers?!

…. up next, our table and some other fun stuff!

xoxo

A few weeks prior to our wedding I picked up a copy of The Connecticut Bride Magazine and read an article I did concerning planning and the internet. Be sure to pick up your copy at your local bookstore to read more!

A few days ago a handsome box arrived at the studio and inside were copies of this Fall’s BRIDES Connecticut magazine. The photography of our friends, Robert and Kathleen, is splashed through out the glossy pages — including our wedding with Michael and Dagney! Be sure to pick up your copy to read all the details!

Just thought I’d share the total awesomeness that is happening around here with our feature on Style Me Pretty this week!

View the feature on Dagney and Michael’s wedding from a few weeks ago as photographed by our friends, Robert and Kathleen Photographers: part i, part ii, and part iii.

Remember my totally awesome Trash the Dress by Eric Langlois of raw photo design? Well his work was featured yesterday! Check it out here! They also spotlighted a bunch of the amazing people who contributed to my trash the dress!

Liene Stevens of Blue Orchid Designs has a very successful and informative blog where she provides business coaching to wedding & event planners. I’ve been reading The Smart Planner since Liene started the blog and her insight (and those of her guest bloggers) have been pivotal to the success of my business. I was super excited to see that I had been featured this morning on her blog in her Meet the Planners series. Click here to check out out! Thanks for featuring me, Liene!

Liene is traveling across the country hosting Blogging Workshops for event and wedding professionals. Highly recommended. Check her website out for more information and to see when she’ll be near you!

Yesterday, Fox61 news at 10 stopped by our studio to interview myself, Elisabeth of Blush Floral Studio, Eric Langlois of raw photo design, and Tom Morlock of Paradigm Digital Video, and get our opinions on how couples could save money while planning their wedding. I advised couples look into off season dates and nights other than Saturday — where the cost differential can be pretty considerable! Here are some other tips we talked about that didn’t make it on air:

Cut your guest list: About 40% of a couples budget is spent on the reception (food, drink, and the site itself). You can significantly impact your budget by cutting the guest list down!

Prioritize. Spend / splurge on what is important to YOU and seek out creative and cost effective ideas for aspects that are not as important. Every couple is different, and therefore, every couple will have different priorities. Once you identify areas that you want to invest in — do so!

Some other advice: If you have a hobby, skill, or something you are love to do — I definitely recommend infusing that into your wedding! But I caution couples: don’t bite off more than you can chew. It may seem like no big deal to do something yourself — and with enough time and preparation no task is insurmountable. Be sure to schedule enough time to get a project done and have a back up plan in case something doesn’t go as planned. Always consider, as well, if doing something yourself is actually saving you money.