A Midsummer Night’s Dream Wedding Among the Redwoods at Nestldown

Gracie and Charlie toured exactly one venue. Nestldown, in Los Gatos, had the redwoods, the secret garden, and a train, and Gracie’s verdict was immediate: “Honestly, can you say dream venue???” What they built there was A Midsummer Night’s Dream by way of the Pre-Raphaelites, a modern fairytale with pops of color, a few surreal turns, and a coquette streak running through all of it.

Gracie works at a doctor’s office and is a graphic designer; Charlie is a software engineer. They met in 2015 in San Francisco, living in the same apartment building, and had 10 years together by the time they married on May 24, which is why, in Gracie’s words, “it meant a lot to hold a grand celebration.” Bry of Bry’s Photography shot it, Amy of Goodstock Productions planned it, and The Mad Florist did the flowers, starting with a bouquet that gets its own section below.

The Invitations

Gracie designed the suite herself with her friend Camille Contreras, and it was the first piece of the world guests were about to walk into: a watercolor wreath in pink, violet, and marigold around the card, their names in big red script, a burgundy envelope, and a smoke-blue vellum folder closed with a wax seal stamped with a bow. Amy calls it the piece that “introduced guests to the storybook-inspired wedding.”

Getting Ready

Nestldown’s getting-ready room comes with gilt arched mirrors and sculptural white birds on the walls, which made for a pretty backdrop all morning. Gracie and Charlie scoped out a long list of photographers before they found her. “Our photographer Bry was so warm and personable that we would forget she was shooting,” Gracie says. “We got so many beautiful candids from the day.” This is the first of a great many.

The Dress, the Veil, and the Bouquet

Gracie’s CINQ gown is all in the details: a quilted bodice, pearl-beaded straps, a sheer tulle choker, and off-the-shoulder lace gloves tied with ribbon. The cap veil keeps her red hair in full view before it spills into a train made for portraits. One oval pendant on a fine chain finishes it, and her gorgeous hair and makeup are by Beauty by Theo. The shoes get their own moment later.

The bouquet is by The Mad Florist: pink phalaenopsis orchids, stargazer lilies, sweet peas, and hyacinth, with green amaranthus trailing nearly as long as the veil and a few green anthuriums tucked in. The stems are tied with a long olive satin ribbon, which is our favorite detail. Matching the ribbon to the greenery instead of the dress makes the whole bouquet feel like it was gathered right there in the redwoods.

The Bridal Party

Five bridesmaids in dusty-blush pleated gowns, no two necklines alike: flutter shoulders on one, plain straps on another, a gathered neckline with a white butterfly pinned at the front on a third. Each carried a small nosegay of sweet peas tied with ribbon.

At Nestldown, a lily-pad pond, trees strung with fairy lights, and a redwood hillside are all just steps apart, so the portraits look like they were taken in three different places. “Inspiration can come from anywhere, art, literature, music or fashion,” says planner Amy of Goodstock Productions, “and rather than trying to recreate a Pinterest wedding, they chose elements that reflected their values, priorities and personalities.” Gracie puts it more bluntly: “We didn’t ask for a lot of outside feedback or influence. Every decision was made by the 2 of us.”

Charlie’s Look

Charlie wore a white INDOCHINO dinner jacket with satin peak lapels and a single covered button, a white shirt with black studs, a black satin bow tie, and black trousers. His boutonniere from The Mad Florist is simple and a little playful: one green bud with its stem curled into a loop and a small gold starburst pinned above it.

The Ceremony

The ceremony sat on a flagstone terrace at the foot of a stone staircase that climbs straight up into the redwoods. White folding chairs, a blush satin bow on each aisle seat tied loose enough to pool on the ground, and clusters of green plants along the aisle. The redwoods did the rest.

Gracie came down the staircase with a bridesmaid on each arm, to a custom arrangement of her processional played live by harpist Krista Strader. The wedding party had walked in to Billie Eilish’s “Birds of a Feather,” and the newlyweds walked back out to JVKE’s “Golden Hour.” The couple’s one regret from the day is that nobody recorded the harp, since their super 8 film has no sound.

Annie of Officially Hitched officiated; their planner, Amy, found her after a lot of research. The Vietnamese and Korean ceremonies happened before the wedding weekend, on separate days and with family only. “This way, we didn’t feel rushed on our wedding day and could bask in the celebrations,” Gracie says.

The music was all them, “mixing meaningful favorites with playful modern choices,” as Amy puts it.

Just the Two of Them

After the ceremony came the portraits: a big laugh with both arms out, and a lift with the bouquet held up like a trophy. “She also captured our aesthetic and mood perfectly,” Gracie says of Bry, and you can see it here.

Now, the shoes we promised: Cult Gaia’s Cassidy sandal, a stiletto with a sculptural calla lily built right into it. Wearing a flower on your feet at a wedding this full of them is exactly the kind of choice we love.

The Reception

The seating chart is one of the most unique details of the day. The Everyday & Co hand-lettered every table and guest name straight onto a length of lace-edged tulle, then draped it over a white rack on the lawn so it hung like a veil, with a blush bow at one corner and stargazer lilies on a stone pedestal beside it. It’s soft, romantic, and so much more personal than the usual acrylic or mirror. It’s also an easy idea to borrow: all it takes is a rack, a few yards of tulle, and someone with a steady hand. For more ways to make yours memorable, see our favorite wedding seating chart ideas.

Dinner was on long tables on the lawn, with Danny Thomas Party Rentals and For The Table behind the setting: ivory linen, wood cross-back chairs, matte white plates, lavender faceted goblets on pineapple-textured stems, a polished silver coupe, and a scalloped pale-blue napkin at every place. The place cards are scalloped too, lowercase script on white.

The guests clearly got the memo: a lilac tulle midi with a beaded corset and a swan-shaped crossbody bag, a magenta faux-fur shrug over a dark floral gown, a black textured coat with a floral neckerchief. Gracie and Charlie wanted their guests “engaged and fully immersed in the experience,” Amy says, and you could see it before anyone even sat down for dinner on the lawn.

Live artist Studio Athley spent the reception sketching quick portraits of the guests, and those drawings were the favors. Everyone went home with a little picture of themselves from the night, which is exactly the kind of favor nobody forgets on the table. If you’re stuck on favors, this is the idea to steal, and we’ve rounded up more creative wedding favor ideas here.

Dinner and Dessert

Food was at the top of Gracie and Charlie’s no-compromise list. “Our guests still talk about the hors d’oeuvres and dinner,” Gracie says. “If there’s one thing we knew we had to splurge on, it was good food.” Continental Catering served it family-style: galbi flat iron steak in a Korean BBQ marinade, five-spice salmon with a balsamic soy glaze and brown butter, steamed broccolini, and miso rice. Dessert was a bar of matcha panna cotta with black sesame brittle and a Vietnamese coconut and lime crème brûlée under toasted coconut, which the couple would skip next time for a reason that is hard to argue with: “Selfishly, it was really for the two of us but we didn’t even get to eat any! We were too busy dancing, and so were the guests.”

The cake came from Cake Coquette, for the cake-cutting photos, alongside a dessert bar for everything else. Theirs was two buttercream tiers ringed with strawberries, with a pair of tiny animal toppers dressed as the bride and groom on top: sweet, a little silly, and completely on theme.

The First Dance

The first dance, to Kali Uchis’s “Telepatía,” moved indoors to Nestldown’s wood-beamed hall, and Bry caught it from the balcony just as Charlie spun Gracie and her veil opened out around them. AVL Entertainment took it from there, and the dance floor is the reason nobody made it to the dessert bar.

The Send-Off

Their last word for anyone planning: “So many people will pull you apart or aside for pictures, well-wishes, etc. Hold on to each other!”

Congratulations, Gracie and Charlie! All the best from GWS.