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Mystic Beach shoot featured in Pacific Weddings magazine
Yipeeeeee! Finally we can show you something we’ve been itching to share for months. Laura of Tuktu Paper inspired an incredible shoot that Verbena Floral took part in. Set at the magical Mystic Beach, French Kiss Event arranged a photo shoot of a laid back, intimate West Coast wedding, and the editors at Pacific Weddings saw a snap on Instagram and asked to publish it! We just got our copy and are so beyond thrilled to share this project with their readers-and now finally with you! The photographer for this shoot was the incredible, talented Christie Graham of Christie Graham Photography (who kindly came over from Vancouver).
This multi location shoot started with this table set up at the Pacheedaht Campground in Port Renfrew (because there was no way we were hauling all this stuff down the 45 minute hike to Mystic!). Then we drove back to Mystic and all hiked down for 45 mins to get the portraits and surf shots. Then back up to warm up around a fire with dinner. We capped off this long day with an incredible Morrocan Stew that Elena’s husband had made for all of us over a campfire on the beach.
Setting up for this shoot involved a lot of vendors! Laura of Tuktu Paper was the talented woman who created all the printed material like the invitations, the place cards, the “You can’t stop the waves” tambourine and the beer bottle labels below. The beautiful dress is an Anna Campbell dress and it is from The White Peony, in Victoria. Patrick Tier of Citizen Clothing provided all the clothing for the groom. Hair was by Elena of Concious Hair and makeup was by Erin Bradley of Style by Erin Bradley. Cake by Ruth & Dean. And Mexi Pops brought their cart and frozen treats so we could shoot the bride and groom with the pops. Without furth adieu, here are some photos from the “wedding”. How gorgeous are these models?! And what troopers-it was not exactly sunny and warm-it was authentic West Coast: breezy. Isn’t their dinner table so sweet? Vanessa bought the pillow fabric from Liberty of London in the UK and had pillows made. The incredible feather scarf (below) and the chevron print table runner were both pieces bought from Coral & Tusk in New York.
And last but not least, our favourite shot: the Mystic Beach waterfall. Absolutely incredible, Christie Graham.And in true Vancouver Island style, we pulled out the surfboards, which were loaned to us from surfboard manufacturers Anian Boards in Victoria.
Fabulous job to everyone involved. It was such an honour and pleasure to work with you all. What a vision to pull together, and the results are something we will all cherish for years to come. If you’d like to see a little more, a beautiful video was shot by Cassie O’Neil of Cassie O’Neil Videography-it really shows all the details of the shoot: http://vimeo.com/96836664.
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Anais and Andrew part 2
So, where did we leave off? Oh yeah, Friday night. Rehearsal night began on the beach where the ceremony would take place the following day, followed by a Mexican dinner in Tofino hosted by Andrew’s mom, Mary. We were invited, but it was back to work for us after checking out the beach.
Anais and Andrew’s families were so great to work with! The event was hosted by Anais’s grandparent’s, Olivia and Carey McKinley, her Mom Erica, her uncle Walker and his beautiful wife Jeannie and their 2 year old daughter Scarlett, who very nearly stole the show. Andrew’s Mom Mary and brother Matt pitched in everywhere, and were busy behind the scenes.
Our schedule was to set up the tables for the reception before noon for the photographer Jana Vackova (by the way these are NOT her photos, hers will be up on the website soon), get the bouquets over to the bridal party at Middle Beach Lodge and then head down to to the beach and set up the ceremony site. We would then pick up the ceremony decor and race back to the reception and finish off the whole look. We wanted Anais to stop in her tracks and cry when she saw what we had done. Oh, and somewhere in there we needed to find time to pull ourselves together and look like we were guests at the wedding.
The entire wedding was a small, very intimate gathering and the overall vision for the day was elegant simplicity. Our plan was to use just a few varieties of flowers and use them in huge quantities, starting with about 80 stems of pure white phaleonopsis orchids in huge vases down at the beach. Anais had us a little concerned when she decided that her and Andrew were going to build the stands for the arrangements out of driftwood! She ended up twisting a few arms and getting some help and the result was so stunning we wanted to take them home with us, but they proved a wee bit heavy. Here we are setting up the ceremony.
The end result was breathtaking!
Sometimes it is hard to get us out of the pictures.
Here is Anais in her gorgeous Vera Wang gown with her Grandpa.
What a touching moment when Grandpa and Anais first saw each other. There was not a dry eye in the room!
Andrew and Anais, now husband and wife.
Now back to the reception where we had transformed the deck ….. kept you waiting long enough! Here it is. Can we talk about how cute Andrew and Anais are?
Beautiful bridesmaids Ananda and Katie. I know, and yes they really are that pretty. And that sweet.
details of the tables …. green orchids at every place setting.
stunning view of Meares Island.
Sunset. Could it get more perfect?
We will have the professional pictures by Jana up soon on the website.
And yes, Anais cried. She was thrilled. It was so much fun, we are kind of sad it is all over!
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Anais and Andrew
We have to dedicate two posts to this particular couple because the story just can’t fit into one! In our business we get to see many couples and we think Anais and Andrew are the perfect couple for a number of reasons. She does all the talking and he mostly smiles and looks at her lovingly. She is hilarious and he laughs at her and appreciates her. She loves him and his quiet ways. The only time he reigned her in during the entire planning process was to say no to the silver votive candles we proposed and so we all agreed, that because he was so undemanding, we would grant him this one wish.
We have known Anais for about 4 years, she used to work part time for us and so we knew she would appreciate us bringing our humour with us to our very first official consultation for her wedding. We dressed up in wedding gowns and made her wear a veil. That pretty much set the tone for the rest of the planning stages.
Anais and Andrew decided to get married on their favorite beach and have their reception at her uncle’s stunning condo in Tofino on Vancouver Island. While all that was a great idea, the logistics for us were mind boggling, to say the least. We had to figure out how to safely deliver hundreds of stems of white phaeleonopsis orchids, a few hundred roses, hydrangeas and more not only to Tofino, but also how we were going to traipse the orchids and vases down to the beach. Our first order of business and one of our better decisions was to rent a cargo van to drive and house all the flowers and supplies. I’m not sure about the pink bow, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.
OK, I can’t believe I just posted that picture of myself. Taking one for the team.
We spent the rest of Friday afternoon settling in to our VERY luxurious accommodations at Anais’s uncles condo development. His name is Walker McKinley of McKinley Dang Burkart and he is the very charming and very talented architect of The Shores. Friday night was spent wiring orchids, making bouquets, centrepieces, bouts and getting ready for the ceremony on Saturday.
This is the deck before we worked our magic. Stay tuned for the transformation. I know, it is fabulous like it is now but wait until you see it!
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