Wedding Wednesday: Colors/Theme

Once you have some of the boing preliminary items out of the way--budget, guest list, wedding date--it's time for the fun stuff to begin. And yes--this does include wedding dress shopping. But before we can get to that, there is another important element to decide: the wedding theme/color scheme. An elegant, traditional wedding will call for a completely different wedding dress (among other things) than a fun, upbeat, modern wedding. So, let's look at a few ways to find the perfect color scheme/theme for your wedding.

The first thing to take into consideration is the season in which you are planning to have your wedding. Summer weddings are great, but it might be strange to use rich, fall colors like burgundy in the middle of July. Likewise, light, soft pastels might get lost in the snowy background of a winter wedding. Use inspiration from nature--and possibly even the venue if you have that chosen--to help guide your selection. And don't be afraid to keep an eye out everywhere you go--you might see a pattern on some fabric that you like and could incorporate into your invitations and maybe onto your cake. You could see a color combination on a mannequin in a store that resonates with the image you have for your wedding. And of course, the internet abounds with sites that offer suggestions of color combinations and have a plethora of images of real weddings so you can see how the shades come together (Style Me Pretty was visited almost daily while I was planning my wedding). 

Sometimes selecting a theme will help you focus on the color scheme that you want to use. A modern theme could incorporate bright, bold colors and geometric shapes; an elegant French or European theme would be more likely to use soft pastels and possibly accents of gold or silver. Darrell and I both love the outdoors, and both have fond memories of childhoods near water, experiences that we plan to pass on to our children (freshwater for me, saltwater for him), so I wanted to incorporate that into our May wedding. I also love spring and the brightly colored flowers, so we decided on a predominately blue wedding (with lots of water being incorporated in our centerpieces) with bright pops of colorful flowers throughout. Easy-peasy. 

One last thing that we did with the color scheme that was helpful was go to a hardware store and look at paint samples. I know this may sound strange, but it gave us a basis for what shades of the colors we were looking for (because trust me, you tell a baker you want blue piping on your cake and you might get a totally different shade a blue than what you wanted). So, not only were we able to mix and match colors to find shades that complemented each other, but I then had tangible color samples that I could carry around to show our vendors so they had a better idea of exactly what I was talking about. This method might be equally helpful if you are stuck on accent colors to use--I know my sister is leaning toward an orange wedding since that has always been her favorite color, but isn't sure what to do with the orange. So, I suggested that she go look at paint samples, find an orange that she likes, and figure out other combinations that go well with it.

Of course, sometimes decisions on theme/color scheme aren't finalized until after you find "the dress"; you may fall in love with lace and decide to incorporate an old-fashioned feeling into your wedding or perhaps a gorgeous, poofy dress with feathery accents calls for the incorporation of feathers throughout your wedding. This happened even to me--after choosing a dress that had a silver sash I decided to incorporate silver into my blue, brightly colorful wedding (and it ended up being the perfect accent to our bright cobalt blue!) So, without further delay, let's head to the bridal salons next week!