Between the neutral wedding colors, the poolside vows, the greenery-forward decor, and the DIY donut board, Chelsea and Garrett’s New Orleans wedding at Race & Religious was as charming as it gets! The couple created elegance in its simplest and most authentic form, infusing their own brand of romance into every detail. Their soft, simple, and sweet bride and groom styles were total summer wedding style goals, as well! Rebecca Taylor Photography didn’t miss a beat in capturing this special day, from the bride’s extra fun getting ready moments with her girls to the couple’s spontaneous late-night dip in the pool!
The Couple:
Chelsea and Garrett
The Wedding:
Race & Religious, New Orleans, Louisiana
The most important factor to us planning our wedding was that everyone had an absolute blast. We wanted a wedding that had tidbits of New Orleans charm but, more importantly, we wanted to make sure everyone danced, connected, and just let loose for the night to celebrate with us!
The most memorable part of the day was the time I got to spend alone with my new husband. We ate dinner away from everyone else so we could have a private moment — I would recommend this to any bride-to-be! And I had a letter that was supposed to be delivered to Garrett 30 minutes before I walked down the aisle, but that didn’t end up happening in the chaos of the day. Still, it was such a special moment for us to share as he read it while we were together and we just basked in the joy of being a newly married couple!
Garrett is a 6’6”, a certified giant. I’m 5’4”. I thought it would be fun to poke fun at the height difference…so I had my maid of honor hide a stool under her chair during the ceremony. When the officiant said, “You may now kiss the bride,” I said, “Wait!” My maid of honor then handed me the stool to step on. Just my little way of putting my silliness into the ceremony! We also surprised ourselves by jumping in the pool at the end of the night! We did NOT plan on doing that.
My best advice is to allow your partner to help as much as possible with wedding planning. I couldn’t have done it without Garrett! We each took the elements that we were better at and ran with them. For me, that was the aesthetics of everything in the wedding from the venue to the flowers to the outfits to the invites and beyond, the bigger vision of the feel we wanted, the DIY of the signs, and anything that required a creative eye. For Garrett, it was the logistics, the scheduling, the bookings, and the timeline. (Fun fact: I never looked at our Knot website once. He managed the whole thing!) Of course, we also made lots of mutual decisions, such as the music, the food, and the venue. But it was nice to split the duties and not feel the pressure all on one person.
The Wedding Team:
Photography – Rebecca Taylor Photography
Venue – Race & Religious
Floral Design – La Paris Floral Designs
Videography – Nathan Willis
Congratulations to Chelsea and Garrett, and a special thanks to Rebecca Taylor Photography for sharing this beautiful neutral wedding! Love this subtle color palette? Take a peek at this ultra glam neutral-colored wedding at Solitaire Homestead in Western Australia!
Love this wedding.
Stunning wedding, more like this please.
Where are the bridesmaid dresses from? I love them!
Gorgeous details. Thanks for sharing.