We’re bringing another fabulous guest blogger to SMP this afternoon. We’ve had a crush on her gorgeous design blog for some time now, so we could not be more excited to have her on board… give a great big warm welcome to Erin of Apartment 34.
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Upon first glance at Courtney and Brandon’s northern California wedding I was immediately taken by the beautiful setting, the glamorous touches, and the obvious attention to detail. But when I read that, from the moment they got engaged, Courtney and Brandon’s goal was to have the wedding feel like “the best dinner party we’ve ever hosted” I knew I was absolutely going to love this wedding and the darling couple behind it! When you take a look at Hannah Suh’s gorgeous images, I’m quite sure you’ll agree when I say I would have loved to have experienced such an charming fête in person. You can see every beautiful detail in the gallery!
See more of this delicious party in the image gallery
From the bride:
When Brandon and I first got engaged, I remember talking with him about how we wanted our wedding to feel. Nearly immediately, we could describe it – we wanted it to feel like the best dinner party we’d ever hosted. For us, that meant our absolute favorite people, great food and wine, and for the environment to feel like our home.
My Mom and I had been talking for YEARS about the vision we had for the wedding day, but when the time actually came, it seemed the words, the descriptions, and text just didn’t work. So we began to put together a folder of all the images that I loved from various blogs and a common thread began to appear. Rustic but elegant. We coined the “Organic Elegance” as the theme for our wedding. The constant themes seemed to be beautiful lighting (and lots of it), dreamy washed out sunset colors, and organic textiles.
We had the wedding at the home of my parents’ friends, which dates back to the 19th century (really old by California standards!). It’s an old farmhouse with huge old growth trees and incredible late afternoon light that streams onto the property.
I started scouring local stores for lanterns, burnt out chandeliers and glassware to hang from the huge oak tree and help curate and anchor the space. My mom took charge of the table settings, sourcing burlap for the table runners, framing old family photos and finding more candelabras than we could count! No two place settings were alike – it was perfect.
We had decided on three somewhat separate areas, the pre-wedding, cocktail area by the pool, the ceremony site and the reception area. We tried to group like items in the three spaces so “eclectic” didn’t become anarchy! We spent four long weekends of yard work at our venue, finding “barn wood” and painting signs, moving and arranging and then putting it all back for our wonderful hosts.
The only vendors we worked with were our lovely photographer (Hannah Suh) and our caterer (Blue Sage Catering). Everything else was, in one way or another, homespun.
All in all, we got exactly what we wanted – our favorite people surrounding us as we fused our lives, complete with candlelight and amazingly delicious dinner.
Photography: Hannah Suh of Hannah Suh Photography / Catering: Blue Sage Catering / Rentals: Stuart Rentals / Venue: Hillside Farms, San Ramon CA