When modern meets New York, it’s always a match made in heaven and then when you add in a fabulously creative couple with their own Film Company and design and styling by Hatch Creative Studio, the wedding turns into a total home-run. We’re talking right out of the park, Babe Ruth style. Creativity is bursting from every little inch of this fête, including an amazing installation of paper chains, a flash mob during the ceremony and a cool as can be logo representing the water towers above STUDIO 450 where the festivities took place. Dave Robbins Photography snapped all the goodness from beginning to end and believe me, you’ll want to take a trip to the gallery for the full day. It’s New York at its finest.
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From the Bride…We fell in love with the venue because it was a beautiful all white space, and we wanted to embrace the stark whiteness of it, the blank canvas, but add some accents and warmth. Lots of little candles everywhere. We wanted to express the beauty of the urban environment, and take advantage of the rawness of the studio space in a cool industrial chic way. But still beautiful, and a little unexpected. We wanted our guests to feel a sense of delight. We wanted the venue to feel very New York, but “our” New York.
On the roof of the venue (Studio 450) there are two giant water towers, and water towers became a design element that we used in our Save The Date, Invitations, Website, our ‘logo,’ and embossed by hand on the cover of our programs. It’s hard to explain why we like watertowers so much — style, functionality, and unexpected beauty. They invite you to look up, and once you do, you see the city in an entirely new way. There’s a metaphor in there for marriage somewhere!
The paper chain idea was to make a beautiful mess of paper chains behind the ceremony space. We like the symbolism of the chains, joining links, as we join our lives together, as a couple, but also with our family and community. But we also liked the idea of taking a very common and humble material like paper and transforming it into something unique and beautiful. Barb and Nelson took this little seed of an idea, and transformed it into an incredible installation that far exceeded our expectations. It wasn’t just a backdrop for our ceremony … it became part of our ceremony. It became a representation of our community, and all the different friendships and relationships that had collectively brought us to this moment in our lives. What started as design idea has now taken on a life of its own. After getting married we formed a production company together: Paper Chain Productions. The name now represents to us not only our wedding, but our partnership, our connected community of friends and family, and the idea that you can build something beautiful and inspiring, from a simple scrap of paper.
We were engaged for a year and a half, which is a super long time to be in the ‘planning stage’ of a wedding. By the time the wedding rolled around, we felt pretty planned out! So we decided it would be fun to have a moment of ‘planned spontaneity’ during our wedding ceremony, and we invited our lovely and fearless friends to help us execute it. Two days before the wedding we sent out an email to a group of our friends, asking them to participate in an impromptu performance smack in the middle of our ceremony. We didn’t know what to call it at the time, but a ‘flash mob’ comes close. We didn’t ask anybody to rehearse, and we had no idea how many of our friends would actually participate, let alone if the idea would work. But that wasn’t the point. The point was to do something fun, and utterly in the moment. It was wonderful, and is one of our favorite memories of the day. At the end of the readings, a friend stood up in his chair, and belted out “It don’t mean a thing, if it ain’t got that swing.” Followed by 15 or so of our friends standing up and joining in “Doo-ah, doo-ah, doo-ah, doo-ah, doo-ah, doo-ah, doo-ah, doo-ah, doo-ah!” This happened twice, and the entire thing lasted maybe 30 seconds. It was perfect. Looking out to see our friends and relatives bravely standing up and “doo-wah-ing” and dancing their hearts out, seeing the surprised and delighted looks on every one else’s faces, and hearing the explosion of laughter…it was such a sweet release, and connected everyone with each other for the more serious moments that followed.
Wedding Planner: Just About Married, Rebecca Joyce / Event + Floral Design: Hatch Creative Studio / Wedding Photography: Dave Robbins Photography / Photo Booth: We Love Photobooths / Invitation Design: Mother of the Bride / Officiant: Friend of the Groom / Ceremony + Reception Venue: STUDIO 450 / Lighting: Lightworks Interactive / Catering: Marcey Brownstein Catering + Events / Wedding Cake Decor: Hatch Creative Studio / Hair + Make-up: Face Time Beauty Concierge / Wedding Dress: Saja Wedding / Bride’s Shoes: Stuart Weitzman / Ring Box: Bride’s Great Great Grandfather’s Snuff Box / Logo + Map Design: Mark Stinson (Groom’s Step-Brother)