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Two Beautiful Brides for an Ecofriendly Same-Sex Jewish Wedding in the Redwoods, Old Mill Park, California, USA

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Margeaux and Zoe, Old Mill Park, California, USA

How can you not love a wedding featuring California redwoods, two brides in matching Teva sandals, and a bouncy house? Just one of those things would be enough to set our hearts aflutter  – and the fabulous Jewish wedding of Margeaux and Zoe included all three, and so much more!

It’s hard not to fall for a wedding with as stunning an outdoor setting as this one – and we love that Margeaux and Zoe worked with Rachelle of Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor The Delicate Brush to design a custom nature-themed ketubah reflecting their big day. Featuring some favorite flowers, plus greenery in honor of the venue, it’s an absolute stunner – and how cool is it that these two wrote their own ketubah text in English and Hebrew?! Don’t miss it in the exquisite photos by photographer Hellena Cedeno!

We’re also pretty smitten with the brides’ attire – not just their dresses from BHLDN (Zoe) and Jenny Yoo (Margeaux), but their comfy footwear too. Yep, the couple really opted to wear matching Teva sandals the whole day! Such a fun personal touch – and how great must they have felt to dance in?!

There’s so much more to say about this very special Jewish wedding, but we’ll leave it to Margeaux and Zoe to fill you in on the rest…

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How we Met

We are both rabbinical students at Hebrew Union College. We met at List College, the undergraduate program between the Jewish Theological Seminary and Columbia University.

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A BHLDN Bride for a Desert Jewish Wedding at La Quinta Resort, California, USA

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Darah-Yoni-La-Quinta-Country-Club-California-USA

Here at Team STG, we love a good desert Jewish wedding… and even better when it’s a full-on wedding weekend full of sun, palm trees, and mountain views for days. So naturally we’re pretty obsessed with our Brides Club member Darah Wagner Boaz’s wedding to groom Jonathan (aka Yoni).

Darah, a television producer and certified coach, and Yoni, director of alliance partnerships for Shure Inc, opted to make things official right where they spent their very first weekend away as a couple – lucky they picked somewhere as gorgeous as La Quinta, right?!

The pair planned a wedding weekend so their guests could retreat into vacation mode and take in the surroundings, just like Darah and Yoni had on that first magical weekend. And honestly, who wouldn’t be thrilled to spend a couple of days in such stunning environs, captured perfectly by our photographer Michael Segal?

You can tell we’re pretty taken with the scenery, but that’s far from the only noteworthy aspect of this wedding! The day was full of special personal touches – for instance, the couple wrote a personal thank you note to every guest that they could pick up along with their escort card! – and we also love the Israeli-style aisle badeken, where Yoni came to meet Darah halfway down the aisle.

Oh, and did we mention how absolutely ravishing Darah looked in her gown from BHLDN?!

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A Desert Getaway

Darah, the bride: We absolutely love the desert and La Quinta was our first weekend away together when we first started dating in the summer of 2019. We stayed overnight at La Quinta Resort and over brunch the next morning we looked at each other and both said “ I could get married here” and we weren’t even engaged yet! So when we got engaged, we both knew where exactly we were meant to have our special day. 

We invited all of our guests to stay with us at La Quinta Resort and Spa and had our Welcome Party at the La Quinta Brewery Taproom and our wedding at La Quinta Country Club, just across the street. We kept it very La Quinta local! We wanted a weekend event where our guests felt like they were on vacation and could enjoy themselves and get to know each other poolside, playing golf, tennis all while sipping a Margarita. 

We loved the La Quinta Country Club for our wedding day  and what won us over was their mountain view and the gorgeous pavilion. Getting married under the mountains of the desert at sunset was our vision. Not to mention their incredible hospitality, the delicious  food and the gorgeous space. Our guests enjoyed our ceremony at sunset, cocktail hour under the stars continuing by dancing the night away with us. Continue ReadingContinue Reading

A Winnie Couture Bride for a Boho Chic Jewish Wedding on the Beach at Mahayana Tulum, Tulum, Mexico

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Amber-and-Elliot-Mahayana-Tulum-Beach-Mexico

How gorgeous is the beachy boho Jewish wedding of California couple Amber, who works for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, and Elliot, the owner of Golden State Corals?! This travel-loving pair opted for a destination wedding weekend in Tulum.

Amber had always dreamed of an intimate, laid-back celebration with the couple’s nearest and dearest – and fortunately, she was able to make that dream come true despite getting married during the pandemic. The couple’s fantastic planner, Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Lucy Gallagher, helped them bring it all together – which is no easy feat when planning from abroad in the best of times, let alone during COVID.

We love the relaxed California vibes of the day, and Moni Adri Photography’s wonderful pics make us feel as if we were right there with Amber and Elliot.

Now over to the bride, who looked stunning in her custom Winnie Couture gown…

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How we Met

Amber, the bride: I’m from New Jersey and Elliot is from Maryland.  We moved to California separately, around the same time.  We both adopted German Shepherds, his a female and mine a male, around the same time.  We met at the dog park.  Our dogs became obsessed with each other first. We got engaged on the Amalfi Coast in September 2019.Continue ReadingContinue Reading

A Nouvelle Amsale Bride for an Autumnal Outdoor DIY Jewish Wedding on a Budget at Camp Holiday Trails in Charlottesville, Virginia, USA

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We could not be any more overjoyed to be featuring the gorgeous DIY Jewish wedding of our beloved Brides Club member and blogging bride Erin as our very last wedding of 2020!

Erin, a medical education coordinator at the University of Virginia, and Josh, a musician and fourth-grade teacher at a forest school, had originally planned to wed at their synagogue, followed by a reception at a local restaurant. But like so many 2020 couples, they had to retool their day when COVID hit. They were intent on marrying on their original date, but knew they needed a mostly outdoor venue that allowed for social distancing.

Luckily, Erin and Josh live in beautiful Charlottesville, Virginia, and they were able to find a spot that perfectly fit the bill in Camp Holiday Trails, which during the summer functions as a camp for children with medical needs – so not only did they end up with incredible natural scenery  requiring very little in the way of added decor (abundant fall foliage AND the Blue Ridge mountains as a backdrop? Yes please!), they were able to support a good cause too.

Erin and Josh were on a tight budget – but luckily they also happen to be super craftsy, and they ended up creating so many incredible DIY touches that really made their day pop. The highlight has got to be the ketubah they created together, featuring a gorgeous composite photo of the couple sitting by a local pond looking up at the Milky Way (with photos by the groom) – perfectly in keeping with their loose theme of “a starry fall night in the mountains.” We also love the cool copper pipe chuppah these two built – which they plan to repurpose in the future as parts for their sukkah! Don’t miss it – and all the other handcrafted touches – in the incredible photos from Steve of Photography Champloo.

The couple also had some help from their wonderful friends and family – Erin’s sister, Kaley Agee, happens to be a professional photographer, and she pitched in with some getting-ready shots on the big day in addition to manning the videography (which Erin and Josh will be editing themselves). And when Erin determined a florist was out of budget, her amazing friend and fellow Brides Club member Karisa, sent over some unused Sola Wood Flowers left over from her own wedding, which Erin dyed and hand-painted herself.

There’s so much more to say about this fantastic wedding, but we’ll let Erin tell you the rest…

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How we Met

Erin, the bride: Josh and I met how any good millennials meet – on a dating app! Josh and I had the unusual courtship of two months of talking before we ever met in person (it was the Thanksgiving holiday, then I went down to Florida to see my family over the winter holidays, and then by the time I got back, Josh was on a Birthright trip to Israel!)

We were finally able to meet in January of 2018, and we both fell hard pretty quickly after our first date at a local coffee shop (where we both unknowingly ordered the same drink!)Continue ReadingContinue Reading

A BHLDN Bride for a Classic Jewish Wedding Featuring Tons of DIY Details at Gainey Ranch Golf Club in Scottsdale, Arizona, USA

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Audrey-Idan-Gainey-Ranch-Golf-Club-Arizona

We always love seeing all the cool DIYs couples incorporate into their Jewish weddings – but Audrey, a project manager at a media company, and Idan, an investment banker, really took it to another level!

Crafty bride Audrey DIY’d just about all the couple’s wedding details, from crafting escort cards (and a gorgeous escort card wall) to writing out the bar menus (on marble!) to monograming the bridesmaids’ pajamas customizing a white leather jacket with her wedding date – and that’s just for starters!

So it comes as no surprise that this is one couple with seriously good taste – as evidenced in their choice of a seriously stunning paper cut peacock ketubah from Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Noa Attias. Even the couple’s Upper West Side framer back home in NYC – who we can only assume has seen plenty of ketubot in his time – said it’s the most beautiful he’d ever seen! And of course we’re totally unsurprised to hear that Audrey and Idan found Noa a complete pleasure to work with. Don’t miss this gorgeous work of art in Rachael Koscica Photography’s images and The Good Vibe Media’s trailer.

There are so many more cool details to share, but we’ll leave it to Audrey – who looked radiant in her Jenny Yoo dress from BHLDN – to tell you about all that…

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How We Met

Audrey, the bride: We met at the Scottsdale, Arizona Moishe House back in 2016! Shortly after meeting, I moved to Chicago for work and Idan moved to Michigan for graduate school, and we did long distance for a few years until we moved to New York together in 2019.

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