A Wedding at the Taj Hotel and China Pearl!

On Saturday, June 5th, Fiona and I were the coordinators for Bernice and Art's multi-cultural wedding. Bridesmaids wore light spring dresses from Anthropologie with lavender accents, and the bride had a total of four dresses: a Thai dress for a Buddhist ceremony at their rehearsal dinner the night before, a traditional Chinese qipao for the tea ceremony, a wedding dress from Kleinfeld's for the church ceremony, and a Melissa Sweet dress from Priscilla of Boston for the reception.

The day started out with a traditional tea ceremony at the bride's family home, followed by a wedding ceremony for 200 guests at the Arlington Street Church in Boston. The church bells were rung as guests entered, and after they were married. Bernice and Art exchanged vows by Walt Whitman, and after the touching ceremony, guests enjoyed a cocktail reception with gorgeous views of Boston in the Rooftop Ballroom at the Taj Hotel.

After cocktails and hors d'oeuvres, guests made their way over to China Pearl Restaurant for a 10 course wedding banquet. A damask print covered the escort cards along with the specialty raspberry linens from Rentals Unlimited. Purple teapots filled with loose jasmine tea from the bride and groom, acted as centerpieces, along with lush peonies. The tables were a mixture of numbers (in Chinese, Thai, and Roman numerals), and some names of places at Dartmouth College, where they are both alums. The embossed menus highlighted the symbolic meaning of some of the dishes, and were placed on raspberry bengaline napkins.

Instead of a traditional guestbook, there was a beautiful scroll that included some of their vows from Walt Whitman, where guests could sign their name in a designated box. The scroll read:

"I promise to love you without reservation, honor and respect you, comfort you in times of distress, encourage you to achieve all of your goals, and always be open and honest with you. I pledge to be your faithful partner in joy and in sorrow, in beauty and in plainness, in sickness and in health, because for me, there is no other way. I give you my love, more precious than money. I give you myself before preaching or law. I will stick by you as long as we live."

"Entreat me not to leave you, and to turn back from following you. Wherever you will go, there I will go. Wherever you stay, there I will stay." ~Ruth 1:16

In addition to this scroll, there were little notecards where guests could write a little wish to the bride and groom. At the end of the night, little packets of jasmine tea were displayed as favors for guest to take home, and they included cute quotes like "If you are excited, tea will calm you" and "If you are hot, tea will cool you".

Uplighting in shades of purple by Boston Uplights really transformed the room, and DJ Brian Delac from Murray Hill Talent kept everyone on the dance floor all night. Martin Haseman of Martin Haseman Photography, along with his two assistants, captured the entire day and were such a pleasure to work with. Professional photos will be coming later on, but for now, here some photos that we took of some details!

Bernice and Art, both of your families were so warm and inviting to us, and it was such an honor to be part of your wedding day!

~Emilie

The story of a qipao - part 2

All of my life, I had always dreamed of a western style wedding. I pictured myself wearing one gorgeous white dress to wear throughout the night. After getting engaged though, I thought more and more about possibly wearing a qipao during my wedding reception. I just thought that it would be a really nice gesture for my parents and my in-laws. It was the least that I could do for everything that they have given me in my life.

So, the search was on for the perfect qipao, and I had no idea where to start. I asked a few friends around Boston to see where I should go, and ended up trying on a few at Kim's Fashion Design in chinatown. They really had some nice designs there, but for some reason, nothing screamed that it was "the one" to me. I then remembered that my oldest sister wore a qipao for her wedding reception back in 1997, and I thought that maybe she might still have it? and she did! She mailed the dress to me, and it fit... but I just still didn't get that feeling that it was "the one."

After going to a few more stores around Boston and still not finding the perfect qipao, I started to wonder if I would ever find one. Later that week, I was at my in-laws' house and somehow the qipao hunt conversation came up. They didn't know that I was looking for a dress, and my mother-in-law asked "do you want to try mine?" My eyes immediately widened and I said "yes!" I was so excited to try it on. She brought it out and it was made of white silk with detailed red embroidery all down the dress. I tried it on and quickly found out that my shoulders were too broad to even squeeze my arms through the top of the dress. *sigh* was I ever going to find a qipao?

Then... it happened. I was on the phone with my mom, updating her about some wedding details, and mentioned that I've been searching for a qipao, but couldn't find one in the stores, couldn't fit in my mother-in-law's dress, and didn't think that my sister's dress was the right one for me. My mom asks "why didn't you ask me?" It never even occurred to me to ask my own mother for a qipao, but when she said that, I thought back to when I was younger, and I remembered that my mom had a beautiful qipao tucked away in a box on the top of her closet.

My mom told me that in Taiwan, her mother (my grandmother) had this qipao custom made for my mom to wear on her wedding day back in 1969. I got this tingling feeling because I thought it would be so special to wear the qipao that my mom wore for her own wedding day almost 40 years ago, given to her by her mother, who I unfortunately never got the chance to meet before she passed. The only question was, "would it fit?"

On my wedding day, I changed from my white wedding dress into my mother's red silk qipao from 1969, with gorgeous silver beading and sequins in a phoenix and blossom branch design. I couldn't have been happier with how it all worked out, and I definitely found "the one."

All of these photos were taken by Brittany of BKB Photography, and the last one is a picture of me and my mother dancing together at my wedding reception =)

~Emilie

The story of a qipao - part 1

I grew up in Hong Kong, so I still follow many Chinese traditions. I really wanted my culture to be represented at my wedding. One of the most common things for a bride to do in HK is to change into many different outfits during the reception, some as many as 5, 6 times. I decided to follow the idea (but not to the extreme) and wear a qipao, a traditional garment, at some point during my reception. I immediately looked to my mother for help, and looked through pictures of what she wore at her wedding. My mom actually wore a qua, which is most commonly worn during the wedding tea ceremony and looks like this:

source

My mom also changed into an evening dress. In fact, she still had both of these items stored in the house. Despite the fact that they were both not qipaos, I tried them on to see if I could incorporate either into my wedding. The answer was no, because the height difference between my mom and me made both outfits look far too short on me!

I shopped around in Boston and NYC in search of a qipao but choices were limited. Most had very similar patterns, and if you want anything slightly more unique, it would cost you much, much more. Luckily, my parents went on that aforementioned HK trip six months before my wedding. I saw that as the perfect opportunity to have a high quality and affordable qipao custom-made for me. I scoured the internet looking for measurement instructions and came across this helpful guide. Then I had my mom take all my measurements. Lastly, I gave her pictures of styles I preferred, especially one that my husband’s god sister wore for her wedding.

A month later, my parents came back from a very fruitful trip and in one of the suitcases laid an exquisitely crafted qipao. It turned out to be pretty expensive (though still less than if I had it made here in the U.S.), but the amount of handiwork is incredible and truly made it worth the price. There was so much beading all over the gown:

I was amazed that it fit almost perfectly since I was not there in person to be fitted. Full disclosure – my mom did end up altering the dress just a little bit the month before the wedding because I had lost some weight (blame it on stress!) and she also took the opportunity to make the slits on the sides not as high. I really loved wearing it for a portion of my wedding reception. I wore it for the bouquet toss and the father and daughter dance!

The qipao in action:

Photos above courtesy of Sun Photographics

Stay tuned for part 2 - the story of Emilie's qipao.
~Fiona