Orange and purple wedding canopy at the Ritz-Carlton in Dana Point

Most friends usually pick up the phone and call (or these days, text) when they see something that reminds them of a friend. My friends break out their cameras when they see a wedding.

101_0210This wedding took place at the Ritz-Carlton in Dana Point. It is actually overlooking the ocean, which you can’t see from here — if the photo had been taken with the ocean in the background, the image would be completely washed out.

From what I hear, and as you can see, everyone who came upon this wedding thought the colors were gorgeous and they appear to be quite vibrant. Orange and purple don’t generally come to mind when I think of a traditional wedding — either it was an Indian wedding, or it was simply a very non-traditional bride. Very bright colors like orange and red are often used at Indian weddings, as are the orchid garlands, but Indian weddings also tend to have more wedding accoutrements than a simple canopy.

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Decorating a 25th anniversary wedding

Getting to five years married is tough enough these days, so making it to 25 years? That’s definitely a milestone that should be celebrated.

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This wedding took place in 2004 at Burbank’s Pickwick Gardens. The bride was a friend of my mom’s, so my mom of course pulled out all the stops to decorate this wedding. Quite honestly, I’ve been wanting to post the above picture for years, but didn’t sit down to properly edit it until just recently (the wedding took place in July and it was extremely bright that day). But I was thoroughly impressed with how the ceremony decorations came out here — large arrangements with lavender roses, orchids and pink ginger and lots of ti leaves spray painted silver, on top of silver lamé-draped columns.

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Church and ceremony pew decorations


Decorating pews for the ceremony can be difficult. Not all wedding ceremonies are performed in churches, and sometimes churches are the most difficult places to decorate of all. A lot of churches, especially Catholic churches in my experience, do not allow tape on their pews of any kind, so trying to attach some sort of decoration on pews usually ends up with a wrestling match between you and some rubber bands. There are also clips, but those slip off easily, and you don’t want a flower arrangement slipping off as you walk down the aisle in your full-skirted wedding dress.

Above is a picture from a wedding in which I was a bridesmaid a few years ago.

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Aisle decorations

Walking down the aisle on your big day, you want the path you walk to be as beautiful as you feel.

Flickr photo by Kauai, HI

So I figured I would give you a few ideas on decorating the aisle you’ll walk on your big day. Above, you’ve got Hawaiian orchids marking the aisle. Of course, the rest of the scenery in Kuauai is so beautiful, you don’t need much else.

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Wedding decoration ideas for a gazebo

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If you can score a wedding venue with a gazebo, do it! Gazebos are so easy and so much fun to decorate and make your wedding look spectacular. Best part is, you don’t need a whole lot to make a gazebo look fancy.

Flickr photo by Zandania

It’s not easy to find a spectacular gazebo set up like this, but they seem to be common in resort areas, where you don’t need a whole lot of space for dozens of guests. This gazebo, in Cuba, was decorated with white chiffon and a couple of vibrant flower arrangements at the front.

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Customized and printed aisle runners

When I was doing research on another post, I kept coming across these photos of custom aisle runners on Flickr. I was not even aware you could customize your aisle runners!

Flickr photo by www.chicuniqueinc.com

There’s a couple of ways that your aisle runner can be customized. The most popular customization seems to be the last initial of the groom (the new family name), the bride and groom’s first names and the date of their wedding. Makes sense, and its a nice souvenir of the big day. This aisle runner was done by a company called Chic Unique.

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Wedding ceremony decorations

When you say “I do,” what are you hoping your surroundings look like?

Photo by Hoang

A lot of brides-to-be hope for a beach wedding, which can mean so many things here in Southern California. You could aim for an actual on-the-sand ceremony, or you could do something like this — have your wedding within the comfortable confines of a beachfront hotel like the Huntington Beach Hyatt. You won’t accidentally get some uncomfortably large man sunbathing in an uncomfortably small swimsuit (or, heaven forbid, in nothing at all!) in your wedding pictures, but you still get the sunshine and refreshing salty air of a beach wedding.

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