How to Find Your Theme

Sometimes it's about what you have planned for since you were a little girl and sometimes it is based on your creativity. Mine was based on what was in front of me. I was never a person who dreamt about my wedding and had big ideas about what I want and must have. I was opposite. Every since opening my business, everyone always asked me, "You must have been planning your wedding for years and want to help others." And that was so far from what my truth was. I got into the business because I love planning parties and am extremely organized. I have a very creative brain that has been doing engineer work for a long time. I got sucked into Wedding TV shows and went to a few weddings that I thought could have used some help. So, I decided to use my creative and organized brains and go to work.

This is true when picking a theme, and we all have a theme. Whether it's shabby chic or modern elegance, it is still a theme. Some people go with a more dramatic presentation of a theme, like myself. So here is my process for picking our theme:

Carlos and I are pretty dramatic, we met doing theatre, We also love movies. He worked at a movie theater once and I was a film major in college. So, we knew from the start that some of those elements may creep their way in. Our first order of business was finding the reception space. I knew I wanted a more northern type wedding with a sit down dinner and open bar. I also knew from doing so many weddings that I didn't want to deal with rentals and having to do a lot of set up and tear down on our part. I do that all the time and it is not my favorite part of the job, especially when the bride and groom have to chip in. We also knew that we loved the "downtown" feel, being on a rooftop or overlooking Nashville. So we stuck to either downtown venues or one's up in the air. The first one out of the box was perfect. It was a hotel close to downtown with a Penthouse ballroom with a patio overlooking downtown Nashville.
Now this is how we chose our theme. Since I am  penny pincher, I asked questions about what is included like tables, chair and linens. They offered black or white linens and napkins and the chairs were red. Boom! I already pictured it, black table coverings with white napkins folded and draped with the red chairs with only red flowers and centerpiece.

Then it all fell into place. We wanted to do come really dramatic engagement photos using a Film Noir theme. These photos were used in our save the date cards that set the tone and theme for all that was to come.

So start early and set the tone. It really doesn't take much to have a theme. But don't get overwhelmed by a lot of ideas. It is really hard to have a hiking, dog, movie, modern theme. Keep it simple, keep it relevant to the couple and make sure that you can keep it in budget. Our save the date postcards were made on vistaprint and were free for 100 of them. We had to only pay for the artwork to be placed which was about $1.49 per picture. Some great themes are Old Hollywood/Movie (which we used), Beach theme(especially if you are on a beach, go with that theme) a color theme(use a color to describe your theme), a location theme(like where you are from, where you live or a favorite place), a hobby theme(like sports or music). Everything falls into place when you have a goal.