When you live with a chronic illness any day can be difficult, and managing your wedding day can quickly become stressful, overwhelming, and even painful. In part two of our guide for how to plan a wedding when you have a chronic illness, I’m exploring practical tips to help you navigate the actual wedding day with comfort, ensuring a memorable and manageable celebration. Your needs and wants should be the focus of your day; design a day that will be the best wedding day experience that you can have.

Planning a wedding is a journey, not just a one-day event. There are countless moving pieces, from finding vendors to creating timelines and solving last-minute issues. Many couples start their planning process thinking that a Day-of Coordinator will be enough to pull everything together. While having someone to oversee your wedding day is essential, hiring a Full-Service Wedding Coordinator will make a world of difference throughout your entire planning experience. Let’s dive into why a wedding coordinator is the better option for reducing stress, saving time, and creating a flawless wedding day.

Couples often ask “Do we need a wedding coordinator if our venue has a coordinator? Is there even a difference?”

The answer to both questions is, “Yes. Absolutely.”

A wedding coordinator’s focus is on making sure your wants and needs are met, whereas a venue coordinator is focused on ensuring the venue is well-maintained and well-represented.

A relaxed, bohemian microwedding surrounded by the vibrant hues of nature at Morgantown’s West Virginia Botanic Garden provided the perfect backdrop for the couple’s unique style and commitment to an environmentally-friendly wedding.

When you're planning a wedding and managing the symptoms and limitations of a chronic medical condition, it brings extra challenges. We at Bespoke & Beloved are intimately acquainted with those challenges, and we’re here to help you navigate that journey without using up all your spoons before the wedding arrives! With some thoughtful preparation and planning, you can still design a memorable, joyful wedding day that fits your needs and celebrates your love!

Move over, dusty rose and terracotta! 2024 is all about embracing a softer, sweeter hue: Peach Fuzz, the Pantone 2024 Color of the Year. Peach Fuzz also blends effortlessly with a variety of styles; it is perfect for any season and goes with any color palette! You can mix it with brights, neutrals, earthy tones or pastels — your imagination is the limit.

Sarah and Ken envisioned tying the knot amidst a winter wonderland with a touch of Christmas spirit sprinkled throughout. The results were nothing short of magical at J. Verno in Pittsburgh’s Southside.

It’s important to set a realistic budget before you start committing to the details to ensure you are comfortable later down the line and don’t end up “wedding broke.”  It’s also important to do your research and make sure that the things you are envisioning are achievable with the budget that you have. Creating a wedding budget is the foundation for a stress-free and financially responsible wedding planning process. An accurate budget allows you take control of their wedding planning journey and ensure that your wedding dreams, preferences, and unique style aligns with your financial realities.

While the first few months of wedding planning are all about the big picture, the last few months focus on those tiny details that make your event uniquely your own. Surprisingly to most people, these can be some of the most overwhelming months due to time constraints and decision overload. If you’re close to the finish line and feeling the pressure, here are five things that will make the last few months of wedding planning less stressful.

As a wedding planner, I've seen it all when it comes to wedding day stress. The truth is, no matter how well-planned your wedding is, there will always be a little bit of stress on the big day. But fear not! I'm here to share some of my favorite tips and tricks to help you manage wedding day stress like a pro so that you feel calm, cool, and in the mindset to enjoy all of the special moments of your wedding day.

Most people don’t need another crock pot as a wedding gift. Fortunately, some of our traditions around wedding registries are changing, and technology is making it easier than ever to create a registry that will have gifts your guests will feel confident giving and you will love receiving, and even more importantly, using!

A wedding planner can help you through the research and decision-making process, keep you on track, and ensure you and your family and friends can enjoy the moment. Wedding planners are experts in the event industry and can be an invaluable resource in what it takes to coordinate an event that is not only personalized to you but beautiful and logistically sound, all while respecting your budget comfort zone.

Weddings are a time of celebration — for your love for another person, the friends & family who have supported you along the way — and to dress up in fancy clothing is incredibly exciting, but the pressure to look perfect in real life and in those photos that will last for ever can be daunting. That said, let’s talk about some helpful tips for staying positive and loving your body at any size throughout the wedding planning process & beyond.

Getting engaged is such a big milestone in any relationship, and wedding planning is such a fun time of your life. Of course, you may also find yourself be wondering where to start to think about planning your big day. Here are the top three things engaged couples should do before doing anything else.

According to Pantone, Vivid Magenta represents “reveling in pure joy,” “encourages experimentation and self expression without restraint,” “welcomes anyone and everyone with the same verve for life and rebellious spirit. It is a color that is audacious, full of wit and inclusive of all,” and finally, “whose exuberance promotes a joyous and optimistic celebration.” All of these are qualities that I try to bring out in Bespoke & Beloved couples’ weddings. Here are some great ways to use this pinky-red color in your wedding design.

If you are attending a wedding, it may seem like everything has gone back to normal. But if you are planning a wedding right now, it’s a wild world full of changes. Here are some of the changes you may see planning your wedding in a post-covid event world.

Everybody makes a big deal out of Pantone’s color choice every year, but there are a bunch of other companies that select a color of the year. Here are a few, along with examples of how you might incorporate each of them into your wedding.

According to Pantone, Veri Peri promises “to bring joy as the 'happiest and warmest of all the blue hues,” and who doesn’t want that at their wedding? I actually like this color, as I haven’t seen too much of it here in Pittsburgh, but it can be a hard color to use in a wedding. Here are some great ways to use this unique periwinkle color in your wedding design, whether you want it as the main color or as an accent pop.

One of the questions I always get when I post photos from a workshop or a styled shoot is “How much would that wedding cost?”. So I’ve put together some investment numbers to give you an idea of what this wedding would cost to host as a real wedding.

It is impossible to pull off a styled wedding without an amazing team of partner vendors, and that was especially true this year with COVID causing all sorts of changes and chaos, and these wedding pro partners were troopers through it all, and they helped us create a styled wedding that outdid my expectations in so many ways.

In a move that is so totally 2020, Pantone bucked tradition by naming not one, but two colors of the year for 2021 — Ultimate Gray and Illuminating. At first glance, these colors seem a little faded and lack-luster, especially after the rich, saturated pops of Classic Blue and Living Coral, but I am really excited about these two colors because they are so incredibly versatile!

Bespoke & Beloved Events and Jackson Signature Photography are teaming up to host their second Wedding Day Walk Through Workshop for photographers. This three day wedding training workshop held at the George Washington Hotel March 20-22, 2020, will give each attendee an opportunity to learn how to prep for a wedding day and a chance to photograph a (fake) full wedding without the the stress of a real wedding day. Live Q&A with wedding vendors happens as instruction and shooting occur.

The news of Noah’s Event Venues closing last Friday has left many couples with no venue for their wedding. Not only are these couples out of their venue and their money, they may also be out of all of the other vendors they’ve already booked if they can’t find a new venue available on the same date. Local wedding industry members have rallied together to help couples find all the new vendors that they may need, and many vendors are offering discounts to help offset the additional expenses of planning a new wedding.

Each and every couple and situation is different, and there is no right or wrong way to go about this, but there are certain things that need to be done at the beginning of the process no matter what kind of wedding you want and what else you do. Here are my top five things to do once you have that sparkly bling on your finger.

As part of our workshop series, The Fine Art Wedding Workshop, Jenn Marie Wedding Photography and Bespoke & Beloved Events wanted to highlight boudoir photography as a part of the wedding photography and styling. We knew that, like the ballet, we wanted to have a white and a black swan; and I knew that I wanted an overt nod to ballet for this shoot with a leotard-style body suit and a romantic white lace bralette and panty, that I accessorized with pointe shoes, tutus, and feather accents.

There is something ethereal about fall weddings, and this one is no exception. Sarah’s inspiration for the wedding was an enchanted fairy tale forest in blush and burgundy with sea foam green, and the fall foliage at Lingrow Farm provided the perfect background to bring her vision to life. And a little mud didn’t stop the Photography by Amanda Wilson team from capturing this adventurous couple’s wedding day perfectly.

Boudoir celebrates the beauty of now. Who we are, in this moment, the strengths and the flaws. I want to talk a little about a few myths about the practice and why I think that it is far more than racy photos or anything else its detractors might call it. And, why I recommend it to my wedding clients as more than just a present to their significant others.