Archive for the 'Real Weddings' Category

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We’re Featured on Once Wed!

Head on over {here} to see the full feature, including lots of photographs of Kellie’s beautiful paintings, which served as centerpieces and escort cards!

photo: Gia Canali

S + E’s Wedding Featured in C Weddings

{we’ll share more soon, but in the meantime, click any image to enlarge!}

We love C Magazine’s stylish C Weddings issue!  Last year, they featured Negar & Peter’s downtown Los Angeles wedding.  This year, they’re featuring S + E’s secret-garden-in-wine-country wedding.  We were so excited to get our copy in the mail yesterday!

Real Wedding Feature on Vera Wang Unveiled

Nada & Paul’s wedding is being featured on Vera Unveiled today! {Click here} to see more images!  It’s also definitely worth trolling through the archives over there. I love fashion sketches, and the “behind the dress” posts have some really beautiful ones.

photo: Gia Canali

Getting Great Wedding Photos, Tip #17: Be Enthralled!

I’m wading through the ever-increasing volume of images we’re making this wedding season, and certain things do stand out: like the rapture of a couple completely enthralled with one another.  They forget about me and the veil (between the presentation of themselves to the world and how they actually are when the rest of the world isn’t watching) disappears, if only for a second.

photo: Gia Canali

Brandon & Serra’s One-of-a-Kind Los Angeles Wedding with Pretty Vintage Touches

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I love the sweetness of Brandon & Serra’s wedding.  Everything, everything was fashioned to be personal, to be romantic, to be sweet and meaningful.  And the results were just about perfect.  Plus, this was one of the thriftiest and most resourceful wedding planning crews I’ve encountered.  Brandon and his twin brother, Brian, are the photographers behind Twin Lens Life.  And Serra is a maven of vintage fashion, and all-things-vintage, come to think of it.  Everything from fashion to decor was handmade or scored from vintage stores and thrift shops around Los Angeles.

Below: a few photographs of Serra & Brandon getting ready. I took just a moment right before the ceremony to get a couple photographs on my 4×5 camera.

{click any image for a closer look}

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Below: some of the ceremony details. Click any image to enlarge. Brandon & Brian made the wooden signs (that fancy W and the plumage!).  I love the lace draped tree. And the just-gathered feelings of the bouquets and arrangements.   Florals by Amanda Claverie, Rosebud Floral Design.

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Above: one of the zillion polaroids from Brandon & Serra’s wedding. Below: This ceremony was just about perfect (and complete with a rooster strolling through, if you look closely!).

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After the ceremony, while we took group photos and photos of Brandon & Serra, the guests entertained themselves with games and tea. This is handy tip to steal: have something fun for your guests to do while you do your formal photographs.  This is especially important if you plan not to see each other (and therefore not do any of the group photos before your ceremony).

It was hard to get Brandon’s twin brother, Brian, to hold still for a photo during cocktail hour. Since the boys are also wedding photographers, Brian made the rounds during cocktail hour getting a Polaroid—er, Fuji instant print—of each and every guest for the escort cards / guest book. They blogged {here} and {here} over on their blog, Twin Lens Life, about this project, which I think would be fantastic at any small wedding. Not exactly diy if you’re not a pro, but definitely handmade and one of a kind.  I’m looking forward to seeing—and doing!—more of these unique one of a kind projects at weddings, which seem to be gaining in popularity.

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Everything about this wedding was so romantically-styled, down to the tiniest detail. There were piles of old books, and gatherings of baby’s breath, an old typewriter, candles, vases of a few blooms, tiny ceramic birds. The table was like a tableau. But my favorite little details, besides the “tree” with the Polaroids that Serra and Brandon had taken together over the course of their relationship (pictured below), were their love birds, Frankie and Allie.

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A few more quiet moments before the end of the day:

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We had so much fun rotating through our (and Brandon & Brian’s!) collection of vintage film cameras, toy cameras, instant film cameras, et cetera.  I loved getting to share in the absolute joy of shooting along side other lovers-of-photography (their crafty guests were snapping as many photos as I was, it seemed!).  Congratulations, Brandon & Serra! Thanks for sharing! May your years ahead be happy and filled with lots of Polaroids! This wedding is also being featured {here} over on Snippet & Ink today!

the end!

photographs: Gia Canali, venue: Heritage Square Museum, LA; florals: Amanda Claverie, Rosebud Floral Design; super 8mm wedding film: Tim Neilsen, Flicker Films, shown {here}; hair, Louis Santelices; pretty much everything else: handmade, thrift store or vintage shop finds.

Wedding Season is For Love Birds

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I have real ones in store for you next week! Happy weekend!

photo: Gia Canali

Negar & Peter’s Elegant Downtown Los Angeles Wedding

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Negar and Peter’s wedding was fantastically formal, glamorous, and richly textured in a way that very few weddings here in California ever are.  If I could think of one phrase to describe this wedding, it would definitely be, dressed to the nines.  Of course, that phrase makes a lot of sense when a fashion stylist weds a writer.

{click any image to enlarge}

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Above: Tiny Pine Press designed and handmade these formal letterpress wedding invitations for Negar & Peter.  I love how they look like they might have come out of grandma’s wedding album … or an F Scott Fitzgerald novel.  They make me hope for a return to classical wedding design.

Negar & Peter had a traditional Persian ceremony, fireside, with a beautifully decorated sofreh. In Persian ceremonies, I love when all the girls (sisters, friends, mothers, aunts, etc.) get up and sprinkle the couple with sugar flakes.  What wedding couldn’t use a little sweetness like that?

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Negar called on her gifted pals, Joseph Free and David Rogers, who are usually busy designing events for Vogue and fashion designers, to design the florals and decor for her wedding. Inspired by their handiwork, and not surprisingly, this is the wedding that made me rethink baby’s breath.  Heaps of lacy-soft baby’s breath and the warm glow of candlelight, it turns out, are pure magic. Here are a few of the intricate and particularly stellar details:

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Even the wedding’s tiniest guests were dressed up and ready to party:

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We were honored to have this wedding featured in C Magazine’s C Weddings this April and are doubly thrilled that it’s being shown off on Style Me Pretty {here} today as well.

photographs: Gia Canali; venue, The California Club; invitations: Jennifer Parsons, Tiny Pine Press; floral design: Joseph Free; event decor: David Rogers; gown: Monique Lhuillier; bride’s jewels, vintage Neil Lane; shoes, Valentino

Things I Like: Peonies

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I am ready for summer. I am.  But I do not think I am ready for peony season to be over just quite yet.

photo: Gia Canali; bouquet: GD Designers