Bright Ideas for your wedding

Vintage Wedding Photo

All brides have something old and something new on their wedding day, but more and more, we’ve seen a trend toward more fully incorporating retro and vintage-inspired elements into our NJ wedding couples’ celebrations. Whether it’s Gatsby glamour or 50s finery, brides are putting a touch of classic elegance back into their unique NJ weddings and receptions.

Whether you want a top to bottom vintage theme or just want to bring a bit of yesterday’s style into a modern wedding, here are a few tips we’ve noticed might be helpful to get you started. Read more…

New Jersey Wedding Venue at the Manor

For those who already use Pinterest, the image-oriented social media platform, you know how addictive it can be–for brides especially. By giving users a way to easily catalog their interests by “pinning” ideas, information, photos, and more found across the web or uploaded on your own to a virtual pinboard–or even “re-pinning” favorites from other users–the site has opened up a new universe where creativity and new ideas can be discovered and shared. Read more…

Kids Wedding Menu

If you think that kids’ menus at weddings consist of just chicken fingers and mini pizzas, think again. Today’s kids actually enjoy more adventurous foods in their everyday lives, so they’re perfectly happy with most of the items on your fine cuisine wedding menu. Perhaps with the exception of the raw seafood bar, and of course with parental supervision over kids’ food allergies. (Which is why we suggest placing food ID cards by each of your cocktail party menu items and carving stations.)

Here are some of the top trends in kids’ wedding menu choices:

• Sushi. Since many parents prefer cooked sushi choices over raw for their kids, arrange with your wedding caterer to provide displays of cooked-item sushi choices.
• Crab cakes, salmon cakes, lobster cakes, cod cakes…in sizes big enough to require two bites, not small balls posing choking hazards for kids.
• Hummus and pita bread
• Pastas with classic or creative sauces
• Meatballs
• Sliders, either as burgers or pulled pork, and we’ve seen requests for veggie burger sliders for the kids’ choices as well as the adults.
• Macaroni and cheese is always a hit with kids.
• Mashed potato and mashed sweet potato bars let kids create their  own creamy ‘sundaes’ with their choices of toppings.
• Chicken tenders with a trio of kid-friendly sauces.
• French fries cut in spiral styles or with unique flavors.
• Mini pizzas topped with a variety of combinations, from four-cheese to vegetables to tiny bits of sausage.
• Crudites and cooked vegetables served with fun flair at cocktail party stations.
• Fruits cut into kid-friendly shapes, such as smiles, stars, and cartoon characters. Read more…

Restroom Amenities Baskets

Offering an attractive, well-stocked amenities basket in your wedding venue restrooms allows guests much-appreciated comforts during any type of wedding celebration. At any time during your reception, a guest might get a stain on his or her clothing, and be very relieved to find stain-remover packets in the ladies’ or men’s room. In the past, these comfort amenities baskets included just a half dozen basic products, and now the new wedding trend in amenities baskets is to fill them with dozens of different items, all arranged on an elegant platter, or in a wedding theme-matching basket, even a tiered display holder fronted with your wedding logo. Read more…

Wedding etiquettemay have relaxed in some areas, but the long-held ‘rules’ still hold true with invitations. On this blog, we talked about giving guests a +1, and now we’re focusing on the art, and etiquette, of addressing your invitations.

Wedding Invitations

• The number one rule of wedding invitation etiquette is that it’s a Don’t to print out guests’ names and addresses on labels. Guests are not impressed when they see labels on the formal invitation envelopes, so be sure to hand-write yours out. Read more…

Perfect wedding photo

Add a sense of place to your wedding photography, capturing the beautiful wedding gardens, the stately mansion architecture, grand staircases and all of the other images that led you to book your New Jersey wedding location. You’ll want to remember your wedding garden in bloom, the flower petals sprinkled on the path leading to your ceremony, the beauty of your reception ballroom, the fireplaces and other details of your wedding site.

Many of our top New Jersey wedding photographers say that couples are asking for more ‘setting shots,’ wanting to capture the gorgeous locations of their ceremonies and receptions. They add these photos to their wedding albums, and they even frame beautiful architectural or floral images for display in their home, with this custom artwork reminding them every day of the beautiful wedding they enjoyed. Read more…

Every bridal party wants to throw a spectacular, unforgettable bridal shower that suits the bride’s personality and style, and provides guests with fine cuisine and great entertainment. Here, we offer some of the top new bridal shower trends that can make your bridal showera stand-out crowd-pleaser that the bride will love.

Bridal Shower

• Choose a fine dining experience with the best buffet dinner or a gourmet Sunday brunch. Excellent cuisine makes a bridal party a success, and even on a budget, chefs can help tailor your menu to impress.
• More bridal showers are planned as brunches, which offers an array of delectable fine cuisine menu options, and multiple desserts, plus wine and champagne, and the earlier time of day allows guests to still have some of that weekend day to their own planning.
• There is more emphasis on food and wine pairings, with sophisticated menu options paired to great vintages.
• Offer unique bar menu items, following the top wedding trends of offering champagne and champagne cocktails, mimosas, bellinis, mojitos, prosecco, creative martinis and sangrias.
• Create a signature drink – one of the top wedding trends – and name it after the bride
• Offer not just a cake, but additional dessert items as well, such as family-favorite tiramisu, bananas foster, chocolate-covered strawberries, and other sweet treats. Read more…

Reception Menu

Wedding guests may say they couldn’t eat another bite after all the fine cuisine at your wedding cocktail party, but your excellent wedding menu they discover on your menu cards when they take their seats in the reception ballroom always seems to get them hungry again.

After your first dance and the toasts, guests look forward to the first course coming their way. Among the top trends in wedding reception menus is unique appetizers chosen to complement the cocktail party menu you provided, and raise the bar in fine cuisine as the wedding reception begins.

Here are some of the top trends in wedding appetizers:

 A Sensational Salad: Outdated wedding budget advice has advised couples to eliminate the salad course, but we’ve found wedding menu trends to embrace the salad once again. Given the gourmet menu offerings in salads, it’s no wonder. Now, you’ll find burata and citrus salads mixed with baby arugula, fennel, watercress and frisee. Mixed lettuces are now paired with red and yellow beets, aged Vermont goat cheese, roasted pears, and spiced walnuts. Salads are now part of fine cuisine, and are welcomed by guests who wish to eat lighter, healthier fare as part of a vegetarian wedding menu selection or an organic wedding menu. Read more…

Wedding menu

When creating your wedding reception menu, you’ll often begin by choosing your cocktail party stations, selecting from a wide range of delectable, gourmet spreads that guests often look forward to the most. Your wedding cocktail party sets the stage for each of the upcoming reception menu features, and a top 2012 wedding trend is surprising wedding guests with unexpected cocktail party menu items.

Some of the top cocktail party menu trends include international foods, organic wedding menu items, gluten-free menu items, and unique twists on traditional wedding cocktail party foods.

 Here are some of the biggest trends in cocktail party stations, focusing just on the Cold Stations. We’ll focus on hot buffet stations in an upcoming post:

Antipasto: Grilled marinated harvest vegetables, bocchini mozzarella, artichokes, and fire roasted peppers.

Olives: An array of colorful marinated and stuffed olives, with herb dressings. Read more…

Wedding Rings

Your wedding ring will stay with you for the rest of your life, so it’s important to give plenty of thought to matching

your ring style to your personality. With so many gorgeous wedding ring designs out there, you’ll need to explore a wide range of rings to find the one that suits your wish for a romantic ring, or a classic ring, a modern ring, or an artsy ring.

Here are the top trends in wedding rings to help you make your decision:

• Choose a ring made of metals that have been ethically-sourced, not the metal equivalent of ‘blood diamonds.’ Many of the top jewelry companies, such as Tiffany and other luxury jewelers have signed onto a ‘No Dirty Gold’ campaign that advocates avoiding any jewelry mined in unsafe, inhumane locations and conditions. Ask your New Jersey jeweler about rings’ classification, to help you avoid ‘dirty gold’ rings.
• Look into lightweight metals, such as tungsten, which is a top wedding trend for couples on a budget. Read more…