five thousand cranes and a yurt village

I’ll always remember the cold November day that we flew to an island in the Pacific Northwest for a site visit with our clients to examine the property where their weekend wedding would be held. Outwardly I was calm, collected and positive… internally I was overwhelmed. The property was beautiful, the cliffs overlooking the water were breathtaking… but essentially what we faced was an un-level, vast open field with no running water to tap into and no electricity to pull from. Add on top of that the concern that the island where the wedding would be hosted did not have enough lodging to accommodate all of the guests for the long weekend. If that wasn’t enough to process and work through, the clients then asked us to create a wedding that combined their love of aviation, adventure, literature, the out doors, Lord of the Rings and Narnia. They wanted an “other-worldy” ethereal experience that was classy and elegant and not cheesy.

Needless to say there was a lot to take in and a lot to figure out… and only nine and a half months remaining before the wedding.

We rose to the challenge and created a wedding that I would define as one of the highlights of my career. We problem solved the lodging shortage by building out and hosting an entire village of yurts. I completely re-designed and flipped the original concept of the reception design just a week before the wedding when a rental company did not have the additional chairs to accommodate the unexpected increased guest count. We folded five thousand paper cranes when the ones I ordered arrived the week of the wedding completely unusable. Every single detail was intentionally curated with purpose and then thoughtfully meticulously executed.

While this was one of the most challenging weddings I’ve ever produced in my entire career, the challenges made me feel so creatively alive in a way that I hadn’t felt in a long time. The project was such an honor and joy to be a part of, and I’ll remember this celebration for the rest of my life.

The most special part of this entire wedding was who we created it for. The bride and groom are two of the most kind, generous, gracious, thoughtful and trusting humans I have ever met and have had the gift of working together with. Their belief in our ability, their willingness to listen to us and let us guide them, their trust in our process and the design vision I presented, and the freedom they gave me to just create was the true magic in this process and what yielded the results that follow.

And, although I’ve already written too much… I would be very remiss not to mention my incredible team and the all- star cast of vendors, without whom none of this would have been possible. In addition to producing three incredible events throughout the weekend, we essentially produced and ran a hotel on property. I asked a lot out of my team and vendors that week and they completely delivered at the highest level, working around the clock to make magic. I’m eternally grateful.

If you want to see all the behind the scenes of how this wedding came together, be sure to watch all of the highlights from Instagram!