A Timeless And Classic Charleston Wedding Done In All White

Melissa Hammam
March 24, 2023
Categories: Fall, Real Weddings, Seasonal Wedding Trend, The Blog, Traditional Elegance

A classic wedding is always in style, and we’re swooning over this chic Charleston celebration. Tara Guerard Soiree planned and designed a wedding overflowing with style. The modern yet timeless day was filled with dreamy details and a timeless all white color palette. Ryan Ray artfully captured the love and joy of the day in beautiful photography, see it all inside the full gallery.

From Tara Guerard Soiree… Paige and Dan married in a Catholic Cathedral in the historic district of Charleston, hosted a cocktail hour in one of the oldest hotels in the city (George Washington has stayed there), and welcomed guests for a dinner and dancing in a building dating back to the early 1840’s. Their look was classically tailored and glamorous. Since the space is so cavernous, sound can sometimes be an issue, so we carpeted the space for the first time ever adding an entirely new look. What did you envision your wedding being prior to planning? We both come from pretty big families, and we are fortunate to have a large network of friends and loved ones, so we knew it was going to be a big wedding. That, and I knew no matter what we did, I wanted it to be the most fun party. I am super indecisive as a person, so other than that, I had been all over the place with city/location venue etc. What was your color palette and your style vision? Going into it we had discussed using a lot of champagne/gold and white, which is what we ended up with. It felt so pretty and classic. We had contemplated champagne dresses for the bridesmaids but ended up doing black, which I loved the look of with the groomsmen in the black tuxes. My outfit change into the jumpsuit was a last-minute decision, but so happy with it. I had originally thought I would not do an outfit change for the after party.

We had lots of unique elements and DIY details like a custom dance floor, menu place cards, espresso martini bar, raw bar ice sculpture centerpiece incorporating flowers, late-night snacks with monogrammed pizza boxes and our first dance song name engraved on both of our wedding rings – Still The One. We did welcome boxes for all the guests with local treats and info. Honestly, everything about the whole weekend was our favorite! I will say one of my many favorite moments of the night was when Dan got up on stage with the band and played his Saxophone to Isn’t She Lovely by Stevie Wonder. Another favorite moment was after our seated dinner downstairs, the sax, horn, trumpet etc group from the band came down and did a lap around the tables playing music to lead everyone upstairs for our first dance & all the dancing thereafter. They also lead everyone out in the same fashion at the end of the night in the direction of our DJ/after-party next door. So fun! Dan and I love to dance, and our guests do as well. Definitely a dancing group! So, having the custom dance floor / super fun band, was another favorite detail that helped make our wedding so unique Also, I loved everyone’s speeches. We had the MOHs. Best Men and FOB speak during dinner of the wedding day (food was delicious also), and a crew of friends speak the night before.

The band was amazing, so the whole portion of the night dedicated to dancing was full of favorite moments – then we moved to the after-party to continue the fun with a DJ, which I was so glad we were able to continue the night with everyone. I also loved arriving at the ceremony with my dad in a car, and having a little alone time with him, then leaving the ceremony with dan in the car, and having a few minutes of alone time was really special. Also – during dinner, we had a pianist playing under these beautiful chandeliers which really set a great tone, and before that, during the cocktail hour, the string quartet was playing modern songs which was a lot of fun. Last one! Cathedral Of St. John The Baptist where we got married in is such a beautiful space, walking down the aisle there was so special. The flowers were all done by Tara Guerard Soiree, and they turned out PERFECT. They captured the look we were going for & more. Jim Smeal did the cake. Dan, my parents, the Soiree team, and I all went to meet them and talked through a vision for the cake while tasting all the delicious sample flavors. We decided to do a super light pink background color to make the white applique flowers pop. Photographer Ryan Ray is unreal. He was so much fun to work with, and all of the photos are amazing! Love reliving the day through them. Videographer Siegel Films was amazing, we just got our feature film back and I am watching it on repeat! The best! We had Cru Catering for all of the food, and it was SO good. I actually got to eat! I know sometimes brides run out of time with the craziness of the day. What is one piece of advice that you could give brides-to-be? Use Soiree – haha, but really, they made everything so fun and easy throughout the planning process and weekend. Also, have fun with it! It was the best day ever, and the planning process was a blast too.