A gorgeous DIY summer wedding in Oakley, CA
Gabi and Joshua’s summer wedding at Brownstone Gardens was a cheerful DIY celebration in hues of pink and blue. Complete with parasols, butterflies, boater hats and Filipino dancers, their wedding day was overflowing with laughter and love, as captured by Jasmine Lee Photography.
Planning a wedding has been editorialized to be such a daunting task. Stressful, nonetheless, but it shouldn’t obstruct from the simple goal of love and matrimony… And so, I wanted to get rid of the archetype of the “Bridezilla” and create a new bride persona: The Bride Boss, who’s in charge, collaborative, and minimizes drama!
I did this by making my lists, schedules, and trying my best to keep everyone included and involved. With that said, it was easy to do DIY because as I would do my research on wedding blogs, all I’d have to do is gather some photos, narrow my choices down and tell my family and friends, this is what I want, help me achieve this. My moms were great at this. They were very hands-on and thoughtful in my decorations. Especially my mom who created the masterpiece cake topper and my husband’s mom who helped me refine and complete my reception look. She also made the ring pillow, matching bibs and the pocket squares!
Overall, I made planning a wedding “look” easy because I kept in control — meaning, once I’ve gathered my ideas from people, websites and magazines, I totally blocked everything else. That means, no more looking! I think that’s one of the challenges in planning a wedding — there’s so many new trends and themes that a bride loses her sense and character and she ends up planning for something too ideal that may not even be what she wanted in the first place!
In retrospect, I think inspiration came naturally as the planning fell into our hands. It started with choosing a date, in my case, it’s around our original anniversary. Then came the venue, then my dress and his suit, and most importantly, the photographer to capture my style with their talent. Once I envisioned and achieved the highlights of the wedding, everything revolved around it, which allowed me to create a cohesive, complete and elegant summer wedding. – Gabi
You can check out Gabi and Josh’s highlight film by JD Creative Studio here!
Artists
- Photographer: Jasmine Lee Photography
- Event Venue: Brownstone Gardens
- Hair: Rachel de los Reyes
- Makeup: Pamper Me Fabulous
- Dress Designer: Pronovias
- Dress Store: Novella Bridal
- Floral Designer: Flowers by Elizabeth
- Catering: Blue Sage Catering Co.
- Cake Designer: JessiCakes
- Video Editing and Director: JD Creative Studio
