Brandy & Dan {Yesterday Spaces}

21 Aug Brandy & Dan {Yesterday Spaces}

Posted at 13:34h in Uncategorized by Gulfstream

We titled Brandy and Dan’s feature in the inaugural edition of Asheville Wedding Guide as “A Groovy Kind of Love,” and once you get a peep of their images and learn a bit about their backstory, you’ll quickly understand why. It may be bold of us to say, seeing we have never met Californians Brandy and Dan, but we feel like they are the type of people that spread joy wherever they go. Brandy’s smile is infectious (we can just hear her giggle) and Dan’s eyes radiate kindness. And we can’t forget about Dan’s knack for grand gestures—like the golden bench he revealed to Brandy mid-ceremony on the grounds of Yesterday Spaces. Wait until you hear this one—you may even well up it’s so darn cute. Safe to say, we are crushin’ hard on these two and their, in the bride’s words, “extended family reunion where we just happened to get married.” Take it away, Mr. and Mrs and folks, prepare to be captivated by this pair and their awesomely cool autumn Big Day.

Asheville Wedding Guide: How did you all meet? We want to hear everything.

Brandy: This is one of my favorite stories. We met through our mutual friend Grant. Grant was originally trying to set up Dan with one of my best friends. Grant brought Dan over to my apartment so that we could all have drinks before going out. I don’t know if it was the fact that he was soaking wet, from biking to my apartment in the rain, or if it was the massive beard that he was sporting but I was instantly attracted to him. Respecting my friend’s “dibs,” I kept my feelings to myself. Once we are at the bar, my friend ended up partying a little too hard so we had to to put her to bed. Once we put her to bed, we realized that the night was still young. Dan, Grant, and a few of our other friends continued to hang out at my apartment. Dan and I ended up talking for most of the evening and I knew that I liked him. The next night, Halloween, dressed as Prince (the artist formerly known as) and a Lumberjack, we shared our first kiss on a plastic gold bench in Grant’s backyard. We’ve been together ever since.

AWG: So charming. And the proposal?

Brandy: The proposal happened in Tulum, Mexico, during a joint 30th celebration for us and a bunch of our friends. We went to dinner at this delicious restaurant and were walking back along the beach, to our villa. Our friends ran off ahead as we slowly strolled, looking up at the stars. I remember Dan putting his arm around me and telling me how much I mean to him. Honestly, I can’t remember the details because as soon as he pulled the ring out of his pocket and got down on one knee, my brain started to malfunction. I started screaming profanity after profanity at him because I couldn’t believe what was happening. It was one of the most beautiful and love filled moments we have ever felt, outside of our wedding day.

AWG: We wish we could have been there to witness it, expletives and all. OK, the florals. Do we spy a cabbage peeking out?

Brandy: Our wedding planner and florist, Michelle LaCosse, was instrumental in bringing our vision to life. She helped us find the balance in our color scheme and used stories from our relationship to help build the overall theme and concept. For example, I told Michelle that when Dan gets me flowers, he usually incorporates a cabbage or kale. When she handed me my bouquet the morning of the wedding, stuck right in the middle was a tiny cabbage. I told her that Dan and I had a succulent garden at our apartment. On our sweetheart table at our reception, were four tiny succulents. It was those little details that kept us smiling all day long.

AWG: Sigh. Now on to the bench. We can’t hold off any longer. Dan, spill.

Dan: I wanted to have a special surprise for Brandy during the ceremony. The Gold Bench has been a source of many jokes and stories for us over the years. I traveled all over the Asheville area on a secret mission a couple days before the wedding, looking for a simple plastic bench we could paint gold. I struck out on several locations, finally finding one that wasn’t perfect but would work. On the way back from picking up the bench, my father came across a random house with the perfect plastic bench in the front yard. He asked this stranger if he could buy the bench. With southern hospitality in full swing, the man gave the bench to my dad without a second thought. Our close friend, Nihir, painted the bench and Michelle added a few flowers to take it over the top. I will never forget the look on Brandy’s face when the bench was unveiled.

AWG: The cutest ever. Brandy, besides the incredible bench, what else would you say about the ceremony?

Brandy: We got married outside in a field underneath a giant tree. The sun was shining and it felt like the tree was giving us this giant hug, which made the ceremony feel more intimate. Michelle, our planner, decorated the altar with old wooden crates, lanterns, and seasonal floral arrangements. Whiskey barrels topped with large cascading floral arrangements were placed at the the ceremony entrance. The rest of the décor was left up to mother nature herself. It felt as though those arrangements and other elements had always been there. I still get goosebumps when I think about them.

Keep those cursors moving to see the rest of this wedding (and the vendors involved). We promise, you’ll dig it.