The St. Louis Contemporary Art Museum Set the Scene for One Couple's Modern Wedding

As a celebration on their shared love for art, Fay and Nick exchanged vows at The St. Louis Contemporary Art Museum in Missouri. Fay and Nick, "knew we wanted a modern wedding that reflected our modern love story. From our first date to the actual wedding day itself four years later, things just seemed to click. Our wedding planning process was similar. We only visited one venue, the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis (CAM), and fell in love at first sight. We both share the same sense of style that blends timeless simplicity with contemporary sensibilities and we were able to find many vendors that reflected that feeling. Getting married in our hometown of St. Louis was a natural choice due to our love for the city and its many hidden treasures. The color palette and theme of the wedding were inspired by an urban sculpture garden around the corner from our venue, previously a church, that burned down with only its walls standing. The ivy that climbs the church inspired the primarily green florals. We felt that classic ivory gowns and black tuxedos would also complement the simplistic architecture and rotating exhibits of the CAM. Everything blended beautifully on the day of our wedding and captured the essence of our relationship well," Fay says. 

As the couple began planning their wedding, they knew they wanted, "a secular ceremony so the choice to have the ceremony and reception in the same space was an easy one. We liked that the layout of the CAM allowed us to have an outdoor ceremony that easily transitioned inside for the reception. We wanted our ceremony backdrop to include 'Joe', a large, rust-colored winding spiral sculpture where we had our first look. That, combined with a view of the city, allowed us the spectacular backdrop we dreamed of. Our ceremony setup was basic with no arch or ornamentation since we wanted the space and art to speak for itself. We did not include any cultural traditions on the day but did however have a traditional Chinese Tea Ceremony at our rehearsal dinner. For the ceremony's music, we chose instrumental and string versions of contemporary songs that we both enjoy." 

Following the ceremony, Fay and Nick hosted their reception, "in the main gallery of the CAM which served as a blank canvas for us to decorate how we wanted. The size was perfect for our moderate number of guests. Our guests were seated at long tables with simple, antique and glass linear centerpieces, sprinkled with greenery, flowers and candles. We went for a minimalistic centerpiece look as we wanted to leave room for the family style dinner service. Each plate was adorned with a white linen napkin tied with herbs and a beautiful hand-lettered acrylic nameplate (created by one of the talented bridesmaids)," Fay shares. As for the floral design vision, the couple, "wanted a romantic, textural, garden-style design for our florals. We chose ivory, hues of pink, and green as our color palette. We favored King Protea, lisianthus, thistle, eucalyptus, olive, and ruscus botanicals in our bouquets and as accents along the family-style tables at the reception. It represented our wedding style well as the florals were elegant, relaxed, and timeless."

Beyond creating a beautiful wedding, it was also important to Fay and Nick that they craft a day that was all about family. "Family means everything to us so one of our favorite details was our guest book station where we displayed photos of our parents and grandparents’ on their own wedding days. One of the bridesmaids, Jenna Rodriguez, is also a very talented calligrapher and hand-lettered beautiful acrylic tiles as placemarkers. The mother of the bride, Shu-Fang Hwang, is also a talented chef and baker who made hundreds of boxes of homemade candies as favors for all of the guests. The cultural traditions of the bride were reserved for the rehearsal dinner. We had a traditional Chinese tea ceremony where we honored the union of both families by bowing and serving tea to the parents and elders and receiving a red envelope in return," says Fay.