Burchardt-Nelson Wedding, Mount Baker Community Club, Seattle

The Mount Baker Community Club was founded in 1909, and continues to serve this gracious Seattle neighborhood. Their Arts and Crafts building, with its high, schoolhouse-style double hung windows surrounded by ancient trees, can be rented for events. (Northwest art and architecture fans, if you visit, be sure to go upstairs to see their original Sydney Laurence.)

My long time figure model, Tessa, and her partner Iowa chose this vintage Seattle hall to exchange their vows.

For almost all my indoor paintings, I begin with a wash of burnt umber— a deep, dark brown when used thickly, it mellows to a sandy amber when thinned. From that I can build the golds and browns that typify most ballrooms. But this ballroom was painted more like a room in my parent’s Craftsman home— something between beige and mauve, barely more than a light gray above the broad, white wainscoting, and a deeper saturation of the same below it. In full daylight, I was seeing a blue shade of purple. In mixing my color, I pushed it rosier. The result created this glow that fit well with the couple’s colors: lavender and sky blue.

Story about me in Santa Barbara News-Press

I'm tremendously grateful to Marilyn McMahon for the story she wrote about me in the Santa Barbara News Press, February 25, 2012. A link to the archived story is here.

The Best of Santa Barbara, at the Rockwood Women's Club

On Sunday, February 26, 2012, I was delighted to participate in the Simply the Best of Santa Barbara Wedding Show. I was invited by Bonnie Hope, whom I met in Las Vegas last September. Bonnie produces this show twice a year. It was my first trip to Santa Barbara, a town of unrivaled beauty, perfect weather, and innumerable weddings.

The event is held in the Rockwood Women’s Club, a gracious 1927 Spanish Colonial Revival

building just up Mission Canyon Road from the historic Santa Barbara Mission. The club is still the home of regular luncheons for the town’s best connected ladies, but on the weekends it becomes a sought-after wedding venue.

I painted from the stage, which I shared alternately with guitarist Gilbert Herrera and a pianist Neil DiMaggio at the Steinway, whose wife joined him at times on the flute. From this vantage I could really appreciate something one doesn’t notice in most wedding venues: the hall has extraordinary acoustics. The position also gave me a marvelous overview of the show.

I look forward to coming back to paint in this room with an actual bride and groom as the focus of my picture.

Moved as I was by the architecture, I took my easel outside after the show, and painted the exterior of the building— then gave the painting to the venue. A manager said she knew just where to hang it.

Simply the Best! Wedding Showcase of Santa Barbara

I'm off to Santa Barbara, California this weekend for a wedding show, thanks to Bonnie Hope of Music by Bonnie, who organizes two of these shows a year. I met her at the Wedding MBA show in Las Vegas last September. I'm eager to get a finger (and a brush) in this exciting wedding market!

12 Baskets Catering Open House, February 9, 2012

Twelve Baskets Catering is a catering company so well established that they have their own wedding show— or at least an open house that functions as one. Andrea Harrison, an event coordinator on their staff, invited me to be a part of this year’s event. Some familiar faces were there, such as Olga Szwed of La Belle Reve, with her spectacular line of wedding dresses, whom we saw just a week ago at Weddings in Woodinville.

The venue, known as 415 Westlake, was a pleasure to paint. Under this great arch of wood beams, a warmly colored space was easily transformed into a bright party.

Weddings in Woodinville, January 29, 2012

This wedding show was unique among the many I’ve done in the seven years I’ve been painting weddings. Instead of one venue, there were seven: COLUMBIA WINERY, DeLILLE CELLARS, JM CELLARS, MATTHEWS ESTATE, NOVELTY HILL • JANUIK WINERY, WILLOWS LODGE, and WOODHOUSE WINE ESTATES.

Attendees were ferried around from one winery to another by the fleet of Butler Transportation, which provides first class busses and limousines. A showroom at each venue was decorated by a separate, selected wedding planner. I was invited by Erin Lindeman, of Lindeman Weddings and Events, to be part of the offerings at Columbia Winery. Erin’s brilliant design featured models wearing gowns designed by La Belle Reve, who took turns modeling under a chuppah at one end of the room, and on a small proscenium at the other, surrounded by small shrubs. The painting now belongs to Ms. Lindeman, with my fondest regards.

Joint Association Mixer Bubble Ball

The 2011 JAM Bubble Ball was held December 19^th by the local chapters of the following organizations: Meeting Professionals International, International Special Events, National Association of Catering Executives (Seattle and Tacoma Chapters), Association of Bridal Consultants, and Wedding Network USA (Seattle and South Sound Chapters).

This is basically the holiday party for the Who’s Who of those who plan the parties in the greater Seattle-Tacoma area. So I was delighted to be invited to paint the event by organizers BreeAnn Gale and Adam Tiegs, who was also master of ceremonies. Adam appears in the painting as Santa Claus, on the right, near the tree. (BreeAnn is mingling in the crowd behind.)

Metaphorically serving us, front and center, is Mr. Don Boshears, Private Events Director of the Columbia Tower Club, where the event was held.

Looking down from the Columbia Tower Club’s 76^th floor is like looking down from an airplane on its approach to SeaTac Airport. The club is more than a thousand feet above the waterfront, five blocks away. With a good pair of binoculars, I could see the self portrait in the window of my studio, in the nearby neighborhood of Pioneer Square. Looking out to the horizon, there are mountains and sea for a hundred miles. I wasn’t there to paint the view, of course, and once the sun goes down it’s all just lights in the blackness anyway. But Seattleites who know this city view well might recognize a series of dots in the far window as the lights of 15^th Avenue Northwest, climbing over the horizon in Ballard, and the red radio tower lights on Queen Anne Hill. Through the window on the left we see the waterfront, under reflections of the holiday party.

The brightest lights are at the party, however— the party planners of Puget Sound themselves.