Held at Zephyr Lodge in Liberty Lake, WA, Kendra and Adam wanted a colourful, retro inspired wedding which they discovered was actually pretty unique for their area. In the Pacific Northwest the wedding default seems to be moody, muted and rustic, but they wanted the opposite! It made it pretty difficult to build the bright colourful wedding of their dreams at times, but luckily (with a bit of help from Rock n Roll Bride!) they were finally able to find some like-minded vendors who were thrilled to be a part of their day.
Their wedding was enriched with meaningful moments and heirlooms. Kendra proudly wore her Nana’s satin gown from 1950, which had also been worn by her mother in 1989! She had it tailored to reflect her style and their wedding fell 72 years (to the month) of her Nana’s big day. She wore it with her mother-in-law’s veil that she had made herself. Kendra did a first look with her 92-year-old Nana and it was one of of the wedding’s sweetest moments.
While the bare-bones nature of their venue offered a blank canvas for creativity, it brought logistical challenges like providing restrooms, staffing and lighting themselves. They also did lots of DIY including the 20 ft starburst ceremony arbor and colourful seating chart. Adam’s mum added gold starbursts to the vases and the bride designed all the signage.
The ceremony was officiated by their best friend. The couple walked down the aisle with both sets of parents and their dog, Theo, was served as the ring bearer! “Our vows were our favourite part and the part people kept talking about afterwards”. Kendra said. “Adam made me burst out laughing the whole time and I reveled a letter my 10-year-old self had written to her future husband. Another favourite memory was when we each took an Instax photo of each other to capture that perfect moment from the perspective of our partner (we took photos at the rehearsal too so we have both sets of photos to compare). We also had a moment at the top of the ceremony where we were able to look out at the crowd of our loved ones and soak it all in!”
One of Kendra and Adam’s favourite things to do is dance, so having great music and a hopping dance floor was of real importance to them both. Kendra continued, “We were thrilled to be able to find our DJ who specialises in retro weddings and really got our vibe. He had everyone out on the floor all night!”
“We had a popcorn station, yard games, an outdoor lounge and a big paint by numbers where all the guests were able to paint a piece of a canvas portrait. We didn’t know if people would really do it but it was completely painted in by the end of the night! For our exit, our guests blew bubbles as we danced down to the song Double Trouble which is a silly song from the Will Ferrell movie Eurovision.”
Kendra and Adam had a long engagement, which really helped when with saving the $60,000 they spent on their day. “We were engaged for two years which gave us so much more time to pace ourselves, save and plan”, she said. “We also tried to have designated wedding planning ‘dates’, where we would pour a glass of wine and get to work! Having scheduled times to plan together helped us stay intentional with our time and made it fun!”
