Southern Weddings

Judging from the happy troupe of attendants parading down the aisle, Lizzie + Miles’ wedding at the Crane Cottage really must have been an all-out celebration. (And that’s precisely what we love most about Southern weddings!) Open Light Studio photographed the Jekyll Island Club wedding in Georgia, and Mardee Morris of Blooming Branches designed the sweet pastel-colored blooms. Lizzie added a little oomph to her tiered Modern Trousseau gown with a custom-made lace bolero – love! Another love? The bright pop of blue in the bridesmaids’ J. Crew dresses.

How did the two of you meet? Tell us your story. Miles and I met at our favorite dive bar in New Orleans, The Saint. We stayed up talking until the sun rose. We became good friends, but it took Hurricane Ivan in 2004 to bring us together. We ended up evacuating (separately) to Austin, TX. Miles, who didn’t own a cell phone at the time, spent the first two days using pay phones as he tried to track me down at the Austin City Limits Festival. He must have gone through handfuls of quarters! I was playing hard to get, but by the end of the festival, I was smitten.
Describe the proposal. Miles proposed to me in South China, a small town in Maine, where my family has owned a lake cottage for several generations. Growing up, I spent most of my summers there. One of my fondest childhood memories was going on “treasure hunts,” in which the adults would hide a treasure on one of the little islands in the middle of the lake for us kids to find. Fast-forward to August 2009: Miles, with the help of my parents, came up with a plan to propose to me in South China. Knowing how much I loved the treasure hunts as a child, they tricked me into thinking that Miles and I were boating out to bury a box of treasures for the kids in the community. Little did I know what was actually in the box.
Three adjectives that describe the day are: Charming, vintage, effervescent. Our friends called it the “Southern Gatsby wedding.”
Our favorite detail of the wedding was: Picking one detail is too hard! One: We loved the location! The Crane Cottage at the Jekyll Island Club made it possible for my whole family to be together under one roof. Miles’ family had a similar setup at the Cherokee Cottage, right next door. The close proximity made it so easy for our families to stroll back and forth between the two houses. Two: I loved that our six “flower girls” carried page wands with ribbons and skipped down the aisle to the beat of our “pied drummer” Dave, one of our groomsmen. Three: The flowers, graphics and photo booth, equipped with vintage costumes, created a whole turn-of-the-century vibe that Miles and I wanted to create.
What Southern details or traditions did you include in your celebration? What was Southern about your wedding? The location was key to keeping the Southern feel of the wedding. The Jekyll Island Club, on the Intracoastal Waterway, is filled with beautiful old southern homes and magnificent oak trees draped in Spanish moss. Also, I loved that we used a lot of family heirlooms and antiques like my great-grandmother’s linens, my grandmother’s blue and white Canton teacups, and my aunts’ blue and white porcelain.