I am over the moon, like literally floating around in outer space for Tamar + Rob’s wedding at the awesome Dana Powers House in Nipomo, CA. It is so, so, so beautiful- and speaking of beautiful, look at Tamar! Just glowing! (Sidenote: Tamar also happens to be a fantastic photographer who I featured a few years back, here + here.) By the way, last Friday marked Tamar + Rob’s 6 month anniversary, so let’s all wish a very happy belated anniversary to them:)

 

 

Here is a bit more about the big day from the bride, Tamar…

 

 

“When Rob and I started planning our wedding, we wanted to make sure it felt very intimate, special, personable, and fun. Our idea was that if a wedding was just about us, we would have just eloped. Since our friends and family were all spending time and money to join us, we wanted to make sure it was as fun as possible for our guests.

 

We decided to find a venue outside of Los Angeles, but within driving distance. We wanted to do this so our wedding would feel like a destination, and also because we were only planning on inviting our very close friends and family, so a smaller wedding would be more possible outside of Los Angeles. Through a mutual friend, we found the perfect venue in a small town called Nipomo, CA- The Dana Powers House. The Dana Powers House is a victorian-looking home which has the perfect garden for a casual shabby chic ceremony. There is also a barn in the back that would be used for our reception. Although we aren’t very rustic in our style sensibility, the chandeliers and antique decor added just the amount of personal style we were looking for. Another major perk of the Dana Powers House was the proximity to the Madonna Inn in San Luis Obispo. It was a hotel we had wanted to stay in for ages, and this was the perfect time. We were thrilled to have almost every single guest stay with us at the Madonna Inn! Anyway,  once we found the venue everything else fell in to place.”

 

 

 

“We designed tote bags to hand out at the Madonna Inn, which included things like Emergen-C, coconut water, our favorite candies, sake, Pop Chips, and finger monster puppets.”

 

 

 

“After trying on dress after dress, I wasn’t finding one that was unique or special enough. I did love the fit of a Vera Wang dress, but couldn’t justify spending so much money on one dress. I ended up finding the same dress online on Oncewed.com, used, for a fraction of the price. Then, I had my friend Tashina (an insanely amazing wedding dress maker and stylist who styles many of my photo shoots) use the frame of the dress and rework it to create something very unique. We decided to add victorian lace to the dress to go along with the antique, garden theme of the wedding. Tashina hand-painted lace in different shades of blue and sewed them to the bodice and the bottom of the skirt. She also made a beautiful long sash in dusty rose, to complement the colors of the flowers we had chosen. I found very simple iridescent Brian Atwood shoes to wear on my feet, since I was wearing SO much dress. I wore a necklace from my late grandmother on my mom’s side. I had found a wonderful custom jewelry designer to make earrings for me out of hummingbird skulls.”

 

 

“The invitations and Thank You notes were designed by Rob, who is a creative director. We found an old movie poster and he changed the actors faces to resemble us.”

 

 

“We wanted our ceremony to feel very personal, so I had my brother officiate, we wrote our own ceremony and vows, and we had our best friends speak during the ceremony. The ceremony was in the garden of the house and it was so beautiful. My friend Tashina, designed beautiful lace panels for the ceremony.”

 

 

“The reception was so pretty…The barn at the Dana Powers House is gorgeous. It already had a ton of lights and mirrors and vintage pieces, so we just added more of our own personality with the little trinkets and lace-covered vases, and skull bottles we had collected during the year. Tashina and our parents helped us with all the decor. As far as drinks went, we had wine, beer, and our own signature drinks. We had three different food buffets, each with a different type of cuisine: mediterranean, california, and asian.”

 

 

“To enhance the personal feel, we put indoor furniture outdoors, to make it look like there was a living room outside. We used garden flowers that were beautiful but not super polished. We used herbs and lavender to add a nostalgic smell of our childhoods. I was so happy with how everything came out!”

 

 

“We also had a s’mores set up with reese’s cups since they are Rob’s favorite candy.”

 

 

“The cake was absolutely insanely good, and we had little taxidermy mice dressed up as us for our topper. The entire wedding felt so casual and so very “us”. It couldn’t have gone more perfectly.”

 

 

 

Vendors:

 

Venue: Dana Powers House
Dress: Vera Wang + Miss Tashina
Wedding Styling: Miss Tashina 
Photographers:
Ceremony + Cocktail Hour Band: Sista Monica Parker 
Reception DJ: Kris Zaycher
Catering: Sea Shanty 
Cake: Cake Cathedral 
Bouquets: Lori Boe Floral 
Photo Booth: Bluebird Photo Booth 
Makeup: Erica Davidson 
Hotel: Madonna Inn