Romantic Pastels Wedding On The Toronto Islands
When you sift through a gallery for hours, wishing over and over that you were one of the lucky guests at a wedding, that's a testament to the beauty of the day. But when you sift through the gallery, feeling every moment, hearing every laugh, crying every cry, that's a testament to the wedding and to Tara McMullen for capturing the tear inducing day!
From the Bride… Both of us have been living in the city, and the Toronto islands have been our escape from the streets throughout the year. Whether it was heading to the beach in the summer, cycling in the fall, cross country skiing in the winter or bocce balls being thrown around in the spring, it is our local day cottage and we needed a place to continue our memories for our nuptials and future. We lucked out with a heritage church on the island that was built in 1884. It was on the lake surrounded by trees and birds. It was us.
The venue was an old school turned into an non for profit artist’s residence, right off a semi private beach and surrounded by nature. For Kaelem and I this was extremely important. We wanted old, some place that had footprints and a story, we wanted a place that served a purpose for people and not just a hall or building that threw weddings and events. It needed to be more and we were so fortunate to have found Artscapes’ Gibraltar point.
Our wedding theme had to also portray our free and forward way of thinking. There was not a lot of rentals at the venue and having to bring everything with boats and renting gets quite expensive. We decided to source out wholesalers and purchased about 20% of the items and donated it to Artscape, so they have more to offer for future events. We also collected from family and friends jars, vases anything glass we could get to create our terrariums which were the favors for our guests. These plants also have a story as Kaelem brought me an orchid on our second date to teach me how to love it and not kill it, then I can move on to bigger things like boyfriends, husbands and children. We had our bridal party come over to help make them on a Sunday Funday.
I was responsible for the weddings website which had all the details of our boat departures, info of the day, the boat party and any updates.
Kaelem designed our invitations, menus’ and ceremony programs. We had a rustic meets city feel. We had everyones names as a photo card and they had to find it on a bird cage that were suppose to be hanging off a tree, but it had rained on and off on our day that we kept indoors instead. Being a Portuguese and Canadian wedding, food was very important. We had to make sure we had enough food, because my family would have definitely complained, but most importantly we had a suckling roasted pig served as a late night station, a portuguese wedding traditions.
Our flowers were Lavender, SIlver Brunia, Thistle, and Dusty Miller impart tones of greys and purples, accented with whites and greens of Dahlias, Queen Annes Lace, Amaranthus, and Thlaspi Green Bells. The combination of centerpieces arranged in birch wrapped vases, and set atop wooden chargers, table numbers attached to large glass bottles with single stems of Queen Annes Lace, and clouds of Baby's Breath in glass bottles placed throughout the tables calls to mind the whimsy of a "just picked" field flower bouquet. My bouquet was a combination of orchids, peonies, calla lily, white roses and some hydrangeas. My bridesmaids had baby breath bouquets. Elegant and simple. The groomsmen had baby breath with twiner boutonnieres and the groom has a white rose with twine boutonniere.
We had to somehow keep our love of cycling and being green on our wedding day that we rented a 2 seater quad cycle and put cans at the end of it.
Music was quite important, we had friends of ours play at the ceremony (a pianist and violinist), a dj and a band for the reception and cocktail hour. We had a friend of ours be dj on our night boat party that was on Lake Ontario with the bright Toronto landscape behind us.
We had many friends and family who helped us during our wedding day and prior preparation. I have to also thank my cousin Ellie who was my main day of coordinator. We couldn’t have done this without them.
It rained and we loved that it rained (it made the tent worth it)!
Our friends and family still talk about their experience and how it was one of the most memorable weddings they have been too. They had the time of their lives, and we did as well. We were so happy to show our families how KCDC does it. This day was special because we just did what we do best. Have fun!
The venue was an old school turned into an non for profit artist’s residence, right off a semi private beach and surrounded by nature. For Kaelem and I this was extremely important. We wanted old, some place that had footprints and a story, we wanted a place that served a purpose for people and not just a hall or building that threw weddings and events. It needed to be more and we were so fortunate to have found Artscapes’ Gibraltar point.
Our wedding theme had to also portray our free and forward way of thinking. There was not a lot of rentals at the venue and having to bring everything with boats and renting gets quite expensive. We decided to source out wholesalers and purchased about 20% of the items and donated it to Artscape, so they have more to offer for future events. We also collected from family and friends jars, vases anything glass we could get to create our terrariums which were the favors for our guests. These plants also have a story as Kaelem brought me an orchid on our second date to teach me how to love it and not kill it, then I can move on to bigger things like boyfriends, husbands and children. We had our bridal party come over to help make them on a Sunday Funday.
I was responsible for the weddings website which had all the details of our boat departures, info of the day, the boat party and any updates.
Kaelem designed our invitations, menus’ and ceremony programs. We had a rustic meets city feel. We had everyones names as a photo card and they had to find it on a bird cage that were suppose to be hanging off a tree, but it had rained on and off on our day that we kept indoors instead. Being a Portuguese and Canadian wedding, food was very important. We had to make sure we had enough food, because my family would have definitely complained, but most importantly we had a suckling roasted pig served as a late night station, a portuguese wedding traditions.
Our flowers were Lavender, SIlver Brunia, Thistle, and Dusty Miller impart tones of greys and purples, accented with whites and greens of Dahlias, Queen Annes Lace, Amaranthus, and Thlaspi Green Bells. The combination of centerpieces arranged in birch wrapped vases, and set atop wooden chargers, table numbers attached to large glass bottles with single stems of Queen Annes Lace, and clouds of Baby's Breath in glass bottles placed throughout the tables calls to mind the whimsy of a "just picked" field flower bouquet. My bouquet was a combination of orchids, peonies, calla lily, white roses and some hydrangeas. My bridesmaids had baby breath bouquets. Elegant and simple. The groomsmen had baby breath with twiner boutonnieres and the groom has a white rose with twine boutonniere.
We had to somehow keep our love of cycling and being green on our wedding day that we rented a 2 seater quad cycle and put cans at the end of it.
Music was quite important, we had friends of ours play at the ceremony (a pianist and violinist), a dj and a band for the reception and cocktail hour. We had a friend of ours be dj on our night boat party that was on Lake Ontario with the bright Toronto landscape behind us.
We had many friends and family who helped us during our wedding day and prior preparation. I have to also thank my cousin Ellie who was my main day of coordinator. We couldn’t have done this without them.
It rained and we loved that it rained (it made the tent worth it)!
Our friends and family still talk about their experience and how it was one of the most memorable weddings they have been too. They had the time of their lives, and we did as well. We were so happy to show our families how KCDC does it. This day was special because we just did what we do best. Have fun!