Emily & Elias {The Venue}

01 Oct Emily & Elias {The Venue}

Posted at 11:44h in Uncategorized by Gulfstream

Hands down, October is our favorite month of the year over here. Who is with us? The leaves are starting to change, you’re greeted by crisp mornings (finally), lattes are getting spiced up, puffer vests are coming back in season . . . all just so divine and a change we are all seeking after this hotter-than-hot summer. In connection with that, we also adore fall-themed weddings. They just make ya feel all warm and fuzzy inside. To kickstart that feeling, we wanted to share with you one of our gorgeous real-life weddings from the inaugural issue of Asheville Wedding Guide. These two darlings, Emily and Elias, have such a relatability about them that is hard not to fall head-over-heels in love with them from the start. And if their adoring smiles weren’t enough, then ummm, might we mention their reception at The Venue had a biscuit bar. Y’all, our Southern hearts are beating just a tiny bit faster. Read on for Emily’s take on her Big Day and see all of the glorious imagery captured by A.J. Dunlap Photography.

Asheville Wedding Guide: We want to hear some about the love story. How long did you two date?

Emily: We dated for somewhere between four and five years before we got engaged. We never decided on an official anniversary, so our count was always an “ish” sort of number. I definitely knew Elias was the one first. He was so easy to talk to. We both really valued our independence-being able to do the things we enjoyed, and we built our friendship and then our relationship around being two different people who liked to be together. As we worked with Asheville Officiants to write our ceremony, we definitely wanted that element of our relationship to come through. If I had to choose a moment where I really and finally knew, though, it would be when I realized I wasn’t embarrassed to sing my heart out (tone deafness and all!) in front of Elias.

AWG: Too funny! Tell us some about the design and concept of your wedding.

Emily: We decided we were looking for a rustic fall feel for our wedding-beautiful and lovely, but not too formal or fancy. The Venue is really stunning without much decoration, and we wanted to take advantage of that. When we talked with Lissa from Flora, we discussed using lots of greens in the décor, and pumpkins where we could. We wanted the wedding inside and downtown, but we also wanted a farmhouse feel. Lissa’s designs were absolutely perfect and brought it all together with elegance. The greenery that was draped across the ceiling beams was my absolute favorite touch.

AWG: Well, it looked great. Did you all also host a rehearsal dinner anywhere?

Emily: One of the best things that we did was have a welcome party at Wedge Brewery the night before the wedding. It was so laid back, and so much fun to just get to hang out with our family and friends who were already in town, drink great beer, and snack on Luella’s Barbecue! It was a great way to be together, and to share more of Asheville with our people.

AWG: Such a good idea and so very Asheville. Now tell us, why Asheville?

Emily: My family is from the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania area, Elias’ family lives in Greenville, South Carolina, and a lot of our friends and our jobs are in Columbia, South Carolina, where we live. There was not going to be a way to make our wedding convenient for everyone, so we chose a destination we thought would be a fun fall getaway for those who could make the trip. We thought about the idea of doing two separate parties, but decided that having our family and friends all together for our Big Day was our top priority. Asheville is gorgeous, and we also knew our guests would enjoy the great restaurants and breweries. A lot of our family members visited the Biltmore while they were in town, too!

Curious what vendors played a role in this wedding? Zoom on down to the end of the post to see.