Hello Chrystl. You made a beautiful bride. Gorgeous actually. And your wedding…well, it’s enough to make me think (well, know) that we could be the best of friends. You see, as much as I have learned to really love color infused into wedding day style, there is just something about a perfect white wedding that gets me every time. It gets the wedding giddies going in full force and yours was total white perfection. With photographs by Caroline Ghetes this little fete is the epitome of all things SMP. And lucky for us, there is so much more goodness in the gallery!
Click here to see the entire gallery of images!
From the Bride…Nick and I met about five years ago working at the same restaurant in the suburbs of Chicago. There was something different about each other and we became friends right away. Our friendship came easily we both were interested in the same things and loved spending time together. In the five years that we dated I graduated college becoming a photographer full time and he opened a restaurant. We always knew that we were going to do something different in our lives than an office job we are both creative and after he proposed and we were planning a wedding we knew that our creativity would easily translate into our wedding day.
We are both from the western suburbs of Chicago we actually went to the same high school just not at the same time (we are about 5 years apart in age). However, Nick wanted to have a destination wedding and I didn’t, I wanted to get married close to home. However, my mom’s friend, Rehnea Raines, opened a wedding venue called The Ranson House in Huntersville, NC and the previous year I had been to a wedding there and fell in love with it. There was something different about it and it had that southern charm that simply cannot be found up north in Chicago. I told Nick that we could get married out of state only if we could get married at the Ranson House and when he saw the venue for the first time it wasn’t difficult to decide. I work in the wedding industry and I wanted something different for my wedding day and that is exactly what we got.
After 3 or 4 trips to Charlotte we were able to plan a wedding from Chicago, I had a lot of help though. I had a friend or knew someone in almost all my vendor categories. The details meant a lot to me I knew that is what really makes a wedding beautiful and it definitely paid off. My mom’s friend is the top Floral designer in Florida and she came to do the flowers and decorations in the tent. Photography is my passion and so I put some hints of that in the day, in one room of the house I made a display of old family wedding photos and antique cameras. Caroline Ghetes took our engagement photos I had them displayed in different parts of the house. There were a lot of details and I had a lot of help my mom is creative just like I am and she did a lot of work.
What made my wedding so meaningful to me was that every detail meant something to either Nick or I. I think a wedding should reflect who you both are and we were able to do that in so many ways. We had 140 guests come from different all parts of the country it meant the world to both of us and we wouldn’t have changed a thing.
Venue: The Ranson House / Wedding Coordination: Rehnea Raines of The Ranson House / Wedding Photography: Caroline Ghetes Photography / Wedding Videography: A Family Friend / Wedding Dress: Amsale / Bridesmaid Dresses: Jasmine B2 / Groom + Groomsmen Attire: Jos A. Bank / Wedding Cake: Noona’s Sweets / Decor: Cheryl Swartzel / Makeup: Courtney Vose
