Wedding Proposal at Sam Day Studio, August 29, 2013

Sometimes the simplest jobs are the sweetest. This client brought his girlfriend in to the studio to have their caricatures done, and when they left, she was his fiancé. It was all prearranged, of course, and it happened just as planned. After drawing their faces, the last thing I drew was his body down on one knee, and then his hand presenting the ring, which he pulled out of his pocket just as her face showed that she suddenly understood what was happening. 

Stiebers-Edwards Wedding, Alderbrook Resort, Union, Washington, August 17, 2013

This was the fourth time I’ve painted at this great retreat, and I look forward to many more.

The two favorite ways for guests to arrive at Alderbrook Resort are by float plane, or by yacht. We vendors take the third, least expensive option.

We boarded a ferry in Seattle, then drove. The Kitsap Peninsula is shaped like the head of a cuttlefish, cradled on the east by the arms and fingers of Puget Sound, and on the west by the long, bent arm of Hood Canal. Some fifteen miles from Bremerton, we reached the muddy tip of the broad Canal (technically a fjord), and tooled fifteen miles more past the vacation homes that line its oyster caked beaches. It’s a woody, meandering road, smelling of fir, cedar, and saltwater. The hundred year old Alderbrook is suddenly there on the right.

You could say this wedding was a marriage of blondes and beards. I got to paint plenty of both. There were the two year old twin boys, dressed like the little Dutch boy on the paint can, with blue pacifiers, who walked down the path bearing a sign that read “Here Comes the Bride;” there were the blond, freckled flower girls, in sparkly silver-grayish taupe summer dresses that easily accommodated their spontaneous soccer playing, and their sparkly feathery pink flapper skull caps pinned at a tilt. There were feathers in the flower arrangements too— the bride’s family supplies hundreds of thousands of chicken eggs a day for the region’s breakfast tables. I guess with that many chickens, you get feathers everywhere.

The well-whiskered groom, who’s family is in the boat business, turned out to be an amiable conversationalist, as he stood for his portrait. His equally well whiskered best man/brother stated in his toast that the groom could “talk to anybody about anything— he could talk to you for half an hour about your belt buckle.”

It was an unhurried wedding, in an unhurried place. It feels like a vacation every time I paint here. You can bet I swam in the Canal before we left.

Scholten-Howard Wedding: August 11, 2013 The Pickering Barn, Issaquah, Washington

A barn is always a nice place for a wedding.

This particular barn is an important part of the history of Issaquah, a couple of lakes east of Seattle. It is now owned and maintained by the city, which restored it at generous expense.  

The couple were married outside on the lawn, where cocktails followed. The reception then took place in the renovated dairy barn. 

Jackowski-Wainscott Wedding, Private Farm, Snohomish County, Washington

About an hour’s drive north of Seattle, there is a small farm growing hay and working a few cattle in bucolic pastures on either side of the Snohomish River. The river flows sleepily here, not many miles from where it empties into Puget Sound. Pebble beaches and cottonwood trees line its winding banks. And on a bend in the river next to such a beach, the family maintains their private campground, shaded by cedars, pines, and those enormous cottonwoods.

They gather here every summer for a reunion, lining up their RVs and tents around an open air dance hall, made from the timbers of the old dairy silo. A carefully stoked bonfire burns in a steel half-ton mortar from a nearby rock quarry, once used to crush local stone. The kids twirl sparklers at the river’s edge, guided by tiki torches from camp to beach and back.  Sloppy Joes and s’mores are the traditional cuisine.

This year, one tent was decorated differently: the words “Just Married” were spelled out on a hand made sign.

The farm is connected to the bride’s family. I am connected to the groom by way of having painted his brother’s wedding in 2006. None of us can remember how the first couple found out about my services.

I have been to some very elaborate weddings. I’ve been to weddings where a lot of money and effort is spent on creating an appearance of simplicity. But I’ve never painted at such a straight-forward, come-as-you-are, downright joyous celebration. The groom’s mother made an arbor of curly maple and flowers from Michael’s. The bride’s brother went out and got a license so he could marry them. They said the plans grew from there; four groomsmen wore sand colored suits with coral ties and boutonnieres, four bride’s maids wore coral dresses and teal necklaces. The groom’s ten year old son wore a teal bow tie and suspenders with a white shirt and shorts that matched the men’s suits.

As many couples do, they wrote their own vows. The groom’s were so earnest and thoughtful as to inspire me to strive to be a better husband. One line of advice from the officiator will always stay with me. He urged them to support one another’s dreams, “and if those dreams don’t come true, keep supporting until another one comes along.”

And when they kissed, the party began. The dancing went well into the long, warm, starlit night. But by the time of this writing, the couple will have decamped for their honeymoon in Maui.

Garza-Ginther Wedding Reception, The Ruins, Seattle

This couple, both local television producers, tied the knot in a very private ceremony in Paris, in July. But they wanted to bring home a bit of Europe for their family and friends, so they held a stateside reception at The Ruins in Seattle. This hidden venue is tucked away in an old industrial space. Knowing the address, one finds a concrete building with a non-descript metal door, and a doorbell. But once inside, we are transported, as it seems, to a villa in France. There are vine draped courtyards, and room after room of elegant furnishings and art. The most formal of the dining rooms is framed in gilded trim, and features floor to ceiling murals which took artist Jennifer Carrasco three years to create.

 This is the third time I’ve painted in this room, and I hope to do it again. The place is magic.

Having dressed my canvas in some semblance of Ms. Carrasco’s nature scenes, half a dozen chandeliers, and some Venetian lamp posts, I was ready by the time the guests arrived to paint the most important features: the people. As they trickled in from cocktails in the adjacent room (to the right of my canvas), I caught a six year old girl peeking through the curtains. She was the first. Then came the couple’s teen age daughters, preteen son, and the array of parents, grandparents, siblings, and friends. Off in the distance, behind the cake, the Prague-born pianist Luke Doubravsky tickles all the keys. And shimmering in the center are the sophisticated couple. 

The Duval-Thommes Wedding, Santa Barbara Historical Museum, June 29, 2013

Santa Barbara has always been a city of romance. Now it is a city of weddings.

I set up my easel in the north corner of the courtyard of the Santa Barbara Historical Museum, under the veranda’s golden chalice vines. The space was elegantly and rustically decorated, much as it might have been in the Mexican colonial era, when some of these adobe buildings first baked in the California sun. A fountain burbled at the far end of the yard, and a light breeze darted under the old timbers. The band was just setting up, and catering brought me lemonade.

The couple were married in the mid afternoon in the old Presdio chapel, two blocks away. A mariachi band then lead the guests to the courtyard of the Casa Covarrubias for cocktails. From there, they made their way to the dinner tables within my view.  At 6:00 the couple made their grand entrance into this larger museum courtyard as husband and wife.

By that time, I had painted the setting—with the sky a little darker, in anticipation of evening— and was beginning to lay in the figures of the guests.

But the couple still had not been told that I would be there painting, and eventually the bride’s grandmother brought them to my corner to see what I was doing. It was her gift to them. I painted them quickly as they watched, and then they returned to their guests, delighted. 

For all the work of gifted planners, designers, and other wedding professionals, what makes a wedding wonderful are the couple and their friends and families. This was a convivial company, and they joyfully filled the dance floor, shaking brightly painted maracas until the grand exit at 10 pm.  

I was finished an hour before they left.

And when they left, they left in grand style, as you can see in this little vid from my phone:

Inset photo by Melissa Musgrove.  Marvelous wedding design by Tonya Szele of Soinge Productions. 

Ron and Bruce, Hilton Garden Inn, Issaquah, Washington

This was one of those weddings where the couple has been together for thirty years before tying the knot. As more than one person said in more than one toast, “It’s about time.”

It was also one of those weddings where I was asked to paint the ceremony— I usually do the reception— and it only lasted fifteen minutes. The solution to this seemingly difficult task, of course, is easy. I arrived early enough to paint the room and backdrop before the ceremony, and was therefore able to focus on just the couple during those crucial few minutes that they faced each other in front of the judge. Then the chapel seating was pulled away and the tables were pulled out, and I had a few leisurely hours to paint the assembly at dinner.

One of the grooms’ nieces was there early as well, and she stood at my left elbow every minute she was allowed. Other nieces can be seen across the room, doing what teenagers do at weddings these days: texting each other.

It was an intimate family wedding, and I hope I’ve painted it in an intimate, family way.