Real Wedding: Betsy + Andriy’s Viceroy Palm Springs Wedding

Today I have a gorgeous Palm Springs Wedding to share with you guys photographed by the talented Heather Kincaid. Betsy + Andriy are from Chicago and decided to have a small destination wedding in warm, sunny Palm Springs. Thanks to Betsy for reading GWS while she was planning + sharing some details into their gorgeous day. :)

gold wedding shoes

vintage hair piece

We knew from the beginning we wanted a small destination wedding; some place where our closest family and friends could mix and mingle all weekend and everyone get to know each other better than just over one evening. Our main reason for choosing Palm Springs was its great weather – warm and no rain in the desert right? Well just our luck (or so the wedding gods say), it rained on and off all day for the wedding. So we just made some changes and moved cocktail hour from around the pool to indoors, added the clear tent for dinner on the lawn, and moved the bar inside the ballroom instead of out on the patio. In the end, the weather didn’t dampen anything- we had such a great time and having all our friends and family come out to California to be with us is what really mattered.

bride in wedding dress

wedding hairpiece

I absolutely LOVE Betsy’s dress + hairpiece! From Betsy, “My dress was by Amy Claire and wasn’t a “bridal gown”, but just an effortless long white dress that I thought captured the old Hollywood look perfectly. As for my hairpiece, I commissioned two fashion design students in LA to make my little hat. They sent me photos of vintage materials they found at a local millinery and we sort of worked together on the direction of the piece based on my dress, jewelry, and other design elements in the wedding decor. The hat was my absolute favorite part of my look!”

groom in grey socks

wedding bouquet with anemones

wedding portraits

wedding party in the desert

bridesmaids in peach

I also loved the idea of my bridesmaids looking different and stylish in their own way, so I choose two neutral colors from J.Crew and they each picked a dress that fit their style and accessorized with jewelry and shoes of their choice – I loved the outcome of different dress choices, different jewelry (some bold, some more classic), and all their fashionable shoes in varying colors! And the men all wore slim custom made suits by Indochino, Andriy’s favorite suit company. Andriy had the inside pocket of his suit jacket monogrammed “Last Day of Freedom 2-19-11” – so cute; I loved it.

wedding invitation

wedding in a church

wedding exit from church

wedding invitations

dinner recepetion

bride and groom chair

We fell in love with the Viceroy right away. The décor, designed by Kelly Wearstler, was so chic and art deco cool and the grounds of the hotel are so intimate; we immediately pictured dinner on the Presidio lawn with the mountain as a backdrop and the stars overhead. We wanted long tables and family style food for a more “dinner party” vibe. And it was the hotel’s old Hollywood glamour style that was the inspiration for my look and overall theme. We wanted things to look glamorous yet a little vintage at the same time.

reception outdoors in tent

We love eating local, organic foods and decided to serve a family style dinner to give the event a more “family” feel and be less stuffy.

couple wedding

The party continued after dinner, with the bride and groom thanking their guests, and then inviting everyone to join them back in the ballroom for a few special dances and an evening of celebration with Megan from Fig Media who flew in from Chicago! A large coffee and dessert bar filled one side of the ballroom and guests left messages of advice for marital bliss for the happy couple.

There were also a few handmade projects that we brought in to the affair like custom table runners (made by my mom) which had the same design motif as our invitations. My mom also sewed into my hairpiece the black lace petals on top as a last minute addition. She also took the hanky she carried in her wedding and one of my grandpa’s old ones and monogrammed them for Andriy and I with our names and wedding date. This took care of my something old, borrowed, and blue.

The place cards, dessert table cards, and Mr. & Mrs. signs to hang on the back of our chairs were all handmade by Andriy’s creative sister. She even incorporated the leftover envelope liner from our invitations (which was a textured metallic mink color) into each piece to carry that design element into the reception. We also choose to do an advice jar instead of a guest book. We found this beautiful white ceramic apothecary vase designed by Jonathan Adler with the word Love on it, and also some vintage french post card paper that we cut into pieces and had guests write their advice for us on and then dropped into the jar. Now we can display the jar in our home and always think back to the wedding when we see it.

Congrats to Betsy + Andriy and thanks for sharing your wedding with us today! :)

Vendors:
Photographer: Heather Kincaid (see even more from the wedding here)
Reception Venue & Catering: Viceroy Palm Springs
Floral: Jensen’s
Invitation Designer: Be U Brides
DJ: Megan Taylor of Fig Media
Wedding Planner: Celebrations of Joy
Dress: Amy Claire
Bride Jewelry: Elizabeth Cole (earrings), JCrew (bracelets)
Bride Shoes: BCBG
Bride Hairpiece: Holiday & Knox
Robes: Plum Pretty Sugar
Groom Suit: Indochino
Groom Tie: Burberry

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