Dresses, Dresses and Colors Galore!

Our tent in the midst of being decorated

Few things about our wedding planning process were easy.  Two of the things that were fairly easy were our wedding colors and the bridesmaid dresses.  At first I thought colors would be daunting, with all the colors of the rainbow to choose from (and infinite combinations!).  But when I really stopped to think about it, there were certain colors I was instantly drawn to.  When I was the Maid of Honor (MOH) in my bestie's wedding, I kept a little box in my apartment filled with wedding ideas I found and would bring the contents to her on each visit to her in Boston.  Among the contents of the box was a catalog of J. Crew bridesmaid dresses, with a collection of dresses in green and cream on the cover.  I loved the combination.  I thought it was elegant yet fun.  And four years later, when planning my own wedding, I remembered that image and decided that the green/cream color combo was strongly in the running. Green is also a nice unisex color, which I thought Rich would appreciate. But I also loved photos I found f bright color palates.  We were having a late summer wedding and I thought bright colors would also be a fitting option - red, fuchsia, orange, yellow.  I was having four bridesmaids (or so I thought) and thought I could give each of them one of the colors.  They could each wear the same style dress but in a different color.  But the more I thought about it, I was drawn more to green and cream.  Rich agreed so I was sold. 



Bridesmaid dresses in action



So I instantly started the search for the perfect green bridesmaid dress.  Undeterred by the fact that I had yet to buy my own dress, I scoured the internet to see what I could find.  I was in a good friend's wedding two summers before and she had chosen beautiful bridesmaid dresses from Alfred Sung  (it's a beautiful eggplant color and I've worn it at least 3 times since and gotten compliments each time!).  I decided to start my search there.  I filtered by "green" and within a grand total of 10 minutes, found the dress.  It's fun, classic, unique and would flatter the body type of each of my fab bridesmaids.  One of my bridesmaids happened to be on gchat at the time so I sent her the link and asked her opinion.  She agreed it was a great dress.  After convincing me she wasn't "just saying it" to be a good bridesmaid, I sent the link to the other girls.  Everyone agreed they were great.  And I even liked the "pistachio" green it came in.  My MOH was coming for a visit in a few weeks so we decided she'd try it on so we could check it out in person.  Once again, we were sold.  The dresses were done.  Winner!  I then ordered a yard of the fabric, which I figured I could put to good use.  I sent a small swatch to each bridesmaid, gave one to my mom, one to Rich's mom, put one in my wallet and gave a few more to friends of my mom's who would be helping with various projects along the way.  I used that swatch a thousand times over the next year.  Keeping it in my wallet was a perfect place since I would have it with me even when I changed purses.  We used it to find the right PMS for all of our printing, during our trip to the hardware store for paint, finding ties for the groomsmen and a million other things.



Table decorated with green gingham runner, green hurricane
lamp, movable type 'R's & 'K's, apples and colorful flowers

 And as we chose decorations, I still wanted a little "pop" of color.  And I decided that I could take my love of the red/orange/fuchsia/yellow palate and incorporate it carefully into our design.  I decided my bouquet and Rich's boutonniere  would be colorful.  I also found fabulous paper lanterns on a Vermont wedding site being sold in just the right colors.  For $20 I scored 10 large lanterns and about 40 small ones.  I wasn't sure what I'd use them for but I figured they were worth the price.  We also decided that we'd have colorful napkins.  Our linens would be green or white, and the colorful napkins would be the perfect pop of color along with the flowers on the tables.

So in the end, I got everything I wanted and Rich and my bridesmaids were pleased - cute dress, great color and ideal accent colors to keep it all fresh and fun.  All in all, I think both or bridesmaid dresses and our color choices helped us continue to strike just the right "tone" for our wedding, which made us very, very happy.