Gone are the days of traditional white colors at the altar and ivory linens on your reception tables.  These are the days of color - big, bright, bold, and beautiful colors.   

What are today's trends?  It's all about thinking outside the box, stretching your imagination, and portraying your own personality through your event.  

Here a couple of 2012 trends:

• Colors: Black and cream is everywhere!  However, accompany them with a pop of bright color to add pizaaz!
  
• Desserts: Forego the 7-tiered fondant cake for cupcakes or bite-sized desserts.
• Favors: Skip the plain organza bags filled with jordan almonds.  Try assorted candy bars where you fill your own favors or photo booths for your guests to take home a personal momento.
• Florals: Lush bouquets are back!  Expect bright colors and a variety of exotic flowers.
• Centerpieces:  Try something different such as edible or paper crafted centerpieces.  Or even go with a different centerpiece on each table (remember to tie them all in somehow)
• Bridesmaids Dresses:  Try different style dresses in the same hues
• Themes: The theme of the wedding is no longer just the color.  Try doing a vintage theme with juke boxes, or a vegas theme with big martini glass vases.  How fun would a masquerade themed wedding be? 
• Aciivities:  Weddings are no longer just about the bride and groom.  They're about actually sharing your special day with those you care for and making it just as much about them.  Include activities such as photo booths and candy bars to give your guests something to do.

Skip the cookie cutter wedding and do something that ties in with who you are and what you like.  They sky's the limit!

Decorating intimate gatherings at home is vastly different from decorating a formal 300+ person wedding at a hall.  You need more materials, larger storage space, a larger budget, and to top it off you don't have a month to leisurely decorate.  On the contrary, you usually have a 2-3 hour window at a hall to setup.  Talk about pressure!

In this day and age of Do-It-Yourself (DIY) and all the multitude of resources available to find the perfect decorative elements, many opt to forego Professional Decorator services.  And if you have a huge budget to buy everything (buying items is usually at least 2 times more expensive than decorator's prices), a huge storage to store everything before and after the event, and a huge cavalry of family and friends that will be there day after day for a month to go to a multitude of appointments all over the state, work with all the separate vendors, pickup, prep, transport, setup, cleanup items (essentially 3 times- when picking up items from all the different vendors, the day of, and the colossal chore of cleaning up and reorganizing items to store), AND still be able to spend time with you, have time to get themselves ready, and still have energy to ENJOY the events - then POWER (and props) TO YOU!!!

In addition, there's a lot of insight that decorators have that can help avoid little mishaps the day of.  The worst thing is to run everyone to the ground prepping only run into unavoidable issues the day of - issues that a professional would have circumvented and/or be able to work around the day of.

So for those of us that aren't superhuman and don't have superhuman friends/family at our beck and call, it's strongly encouraged to hire professionals.  If you're the type that needs to keep control - find a decorator that will work closely with you step by step.  And if they don't have items that you want, have them get them.  But leave the work to them!  In the end you'll save money, time, energy, tiffs with those that you love, everyone will have fun at your event, and your big day will look EXACTLY as you imagined!

 When considering types of decorations, the second question (the first question should be what you want the overall theme to be – which we’ll discuss in a future blog) you should ask yourself is whether or not your outfit should match your décor.  The overarching answer is no…and yes.  Let me explain.

First the “no”- this is your big day, so make the focus to be on you, not how well the shade of fuschia you chose to wear is an exact match to the special hand-dyed fuschia hydrangeas you ordered.  When your outfit matches your décor, you will blend in and essentially you become just another centerpiece in the grand scheme of things – not exactly the punch you’re looking for you your big day.

Now comes the “yes” – you also don’t want to be in a situation where you completely clash with your decorations either.  For example, you don’t want light pink and turquoise decorations when your outfit is orange.  So what’s the solution?  Pick a minimum of two colors for your theme where one is the dominant color and the other is an accent.  Essentially, décor ties in best when the main color in your outfit is the accent color of your décor and vice versa.

One other thing to keep in mind – don’t match the colors of your décor with the exact shade of your outfit.  Variation in color shades adds another dimension to your event which makes it look even more spectacular. 

Always remember that a good decorator will willingly put together a mock table setting with centerpieces and linens to help you visualize the end result.   After all, you don’t want any surprises the day of!