You wouldn’t think of “whimsical woodland wedding” and “modern art gallery” in the same sentence, but Elizabeth and Nick knew what they wanted! We were thrilled to work with them from the beginning to create the wedding of their dreams!
With Long View Gallery in DC as their venue, Elizabeth wanted to bring the outdoors inside, in a modern way.
As big fans of combining modern and vintage design components, we bonded over her design theme. We clicked right away over their desire to provide their guests with an out-of-the-box, unique experience throughout the whole day.
These lovebirds met in 2017 when they both volunteered for Peace Corps Cameroon. They were such a fun and unique couple to work with! Every part of their wedding just made sense for them and added so much special charm. From Elizabeth’s cape made by her grandmother in lieu of a veil to the giant protea in her bouquet to represent her development work and love of Africa, nothing was overlooked. We also loved that Elizabeth and Nick’s grandmothers picked out poems to read during the ceremony. Involving those close to you in such a simple way is a perfect means of incorporating them into your wedding!
There’s so much to love about Long View Gallery. One of the first things that stands out for us is the utility of the space. You could easily rely on the fabulous artwork on display with minimal furnishings for a modern, industrial chic vibe. Alternatively, you can transform it while still highlighting the art. This is what we did for Elizabeth and Nick. We molded the space to their vision through colors, textures, and 3D elements like the ceremony hanging arch, the 3-sided fern bar, and the mid-century modern lounge area. Cedar & Lime helped us bring it to the next level with the two amazing hanging floral installs above the dance floor and bar, too.
Aside from the space itself, another amazing thing about Long View Gallery is the location. Blagden Alley is a hip area of DC known for its eclectic murals and fabulous bar and restaurant scene. Elizabeth and Nick took full advantage of the amazing murals for their portraits and family photos.
This wedding was the logistical event of the century, and we pulled it off!
In total, we had 12 different vendors involved in making the industrial-chic gallery into Elizabeth’s whimsical woodland. One thing couples need to think about when they are considering “blank canvas” venues is that they will need to bring everything in. This includes everything from tables and chairs to even bathrooms in some cases! Thankfully, the venue had good bathrooms, but we did bring everything else in through our fabulous team of vendors.
Undeniably, the best part of this day was seeing Elizabeth and Nick’s (and their guests’) reactions to the flip of the ceremony space to the reception space. The utter amazement on their faces seeing the vision we had worked so hard on together was priceless! Their guests’ exclamations over all of the dainty details we had built in only made it better. Elizabeth and Nick were both all about color and uniqueness. It was important that we used Elizabeth’s favorite color green and worked in many other Fall/Winter colors to compliment it. This helped us build a truly diverse and unique experience for their guests.
One of our favorite details was…
the escort card/favor that we and Haley (owner of Cedar & Lane) came up with. We displayed dried florals in test tubes for the guests to bring home with their escort cards tied around them with twine. Figuring out the escort display was a challenge, as Elizabeth & Nick wanted something that tied into their whimsical woodland wedding theme and be something their guests hadn’t seen before. They also loved that the favors were sustainable. The dried florals in each test tube were from other weddings that Cedar & Lime had done.
This whimsical woodland wedding in a modern art gallery was quite the feat, but such a joy to help bring to life. We loved the opportunity to be a part of kicking off the rest of Elizabeth and Nick’s love story!
