new barn venue

the barn's lovely surroundings

Look at these doors - your guests would enter these fine doors and proceed upstairs to your wedding. Caterers can work downstairs so you wouldn't even see them!

The entire barn is made out of reclaimed barn materials found from all over Canada and the US

Just one big open, raw blank slate...and the whole side slides open onto a patio - hello!

The builder has these really awesome antiques in there and he lets you use them. For instance, this old antique wagon is the bar!

Beautiful windows that the owner made - this is on the way downstairs and out the marvy doors...

The barn has these lovely antique wagon wheels hung all over as chandeliers - you can put your candles inside for a romantic candlelit effect

AAnother little corner of the barn

The property on which it sits.

The Bloomers got to visit a new, potential barn venue only a few weeks ago, and boy oh boy was it a marvy piece of parvy (i don't know what parvy is but it just came out of my fingers!). Take a look at some of the pics. Just located just outside the GTA, and really close to the 401, this barn is so beautiful and raw. It's like a Martha Stewart Weddings magazine barn just waiting to be decorated...by us!! You can only access by giving us a call - so if you're interested, let us know!

honeymoon year: 1st stop NYC

D. and I just got back from the first leg of our "honeymoon year" which is what I've coined this next year of trips! For my Tea Party bridal shower, my dearest friends all donated to our "honeymoon fund" and told us that we needed to go on a trip and we couldn't use the money for anything else! What an awesome idear! So while we were deciding where we should go, wondering how we were going to get the time off work after our 3 week wedding trip, we realized that there were a bunch of little places and trips we always mean to go to that we never make the time for. Soooo....this is how we decided to use up our Honeymoon Fund! A Porter Airline seat sale made the first choice easy...NYC was our first destination! D. and I had a lovely weekend of shopping, eating, catching up with friends, play watching, eating and shopping some more!

We were very excited to have tickets to see the highly anticipated "Hamlet" with Jude Law! Jude Law was spectacular, and pretty and really does deserve all the rave reviews he is getting...but besides watching the deliciously designed Jude Law, little did I know what a deliciously designed show I was going to watch!

I was taken away by the completely modern approach they took. Based in modern-day Denmark, they created a set that was so simple in design and yet so stunning to stare at. It was covered in dark grey tiles that depending on the big doorway at the back of the stage, either resembled the outside walls of a castle-like building or a gorgeous grand hall. The door changed between a huge, heavy wood door that when opened, framed a beautiful, old brick wall of a neighbouring outdoor building or with a booming woosh of sound the door would be replaced by lovely, royal drapery that immediately allowed you to imagine you were inside the castle in a grand hall. So simple and yet so well done! And the lighting was incredible too. As seen in this picture below, they opened the big wood doors slightly and lit it so it looked like you were inside a chapel in the castle! How are people so clever?!

Look at the beautiful brick wall they had at the very back of the stage. You only got to see a part of it through the big open doors but it looked so old and European! And then the light snow fall, and the white carpet of fake snow - it looked so real!! And doesn't Jude look dreamy standing there all sad and broken-hearted? Like I said...he too is very well designed!


This scene is where Hamlet sees the ghost of his father. Again, the lighting and fog was so perfect it truly looked like a ghost but not in a cheesy way at all!

But on top of all of that, the costumes were to die for! They wore the most gorgeous outfits all in dark colours like smokey mauves, charcoal greys, blacks and browns. All of the best cuts and fabrics...I was absolutely fascinated!! They had the nicest jackets and scarves...I wish I had a chance to look at the wardrobe backstage...although I think I would have been tempted to grab a few pieces for myself!

fleurs in can!

Looky at what I found online - a cute little wedding favour or gift if i do say so myself, and one that would be a good decoration all at the same time. Flowers in a can! Well, fleurs in a can sounds more fun to me, but either way, I think it's really cute! You can order them on Fred Flare.

a colour story: violet + saffron

While driving the other day, I saw the most beautiful colour combination right there in front of me - in a field of autumn weeds of all places. Nature really has the best colour combinations, doesn't it? I would have never thought of pairing purple and yellow together and yet look how pretty it is! Move over Martha...I don't think you've claimed this colour combo yet! Wouldn't these be lovely colours for a wedding? Or a room? Or an outfit?

Photos:
1. inBloom Event Design
2. Rebecca Thuss
3. Style at Home {Gluckstein Home vases}
4. inBloom Event Design
5. Lindsay Landman Events

and a bloomer bathroom reno...

Finally with the weddings over D. and I can finally get to our much anticipated bathroom reno! We've been talking about it for 2 years now...its the last thing left to do in our condo and we are excited to finally get it started. So we became like every other typical married couple and we did the home renovation store rounds a few weekends ago. We went to look at the tubs, vanities and toilets....and would you believe we fell in love with a vanity at the first store we went to?! And to top it off, it was on sale! So after checking out other options we went back and made the purchase on the same day. It is a grey oak wall mounted vanity with two lovely drawers instead of that useless cavernous cupboard they usually have.

It's so purdy...here it is but for some reason the grey doesn't stand out as much in this picture:

So then the next weekend came along and we did the whole married couple tour again and looked through hundreds and hundreds of tile samples. It proved to be tricky since the wood is a grey wash over the brown wood. Since the vanity is so striking we thought we should pick a really neutral tile. We are thinking a matte brownish grey colour.


And for the tub we found these awesome white glass tiles that look like they glow...so pretty and shiny! We want them to be 3x6 subway tiles. They don't glow the same on the computer though...


I'm having trouble finding inspiration pics to copy but in my searches I did find these loverly bathrooms...I'm looking for grey and white small bathrooms but it isn't that easy.

Top two pictures from Decodir.com and the bottom from Katiedid Blog

A Boulevard Club Wedding

We finally got the pics back from Leah + Mike's wedding at The Boulevard Club! For their florals and decor, inBloom combined Leah's love for light and dark purple, as well as her desire for simple calla lilies, with Mike's love for old houses, to create them a style that really reflected their personalities (which by the way, were so easy going and wonderful!) And if we do say so ourselves, the venue, as well as the bride and groom, looked stunning!

In Bloom by Reese Witherspoon

Hey, Reese Witherspoon made a perfume for us!! Just kidding...but I can pretend right? Wonder if it smells nice...not usually a scenty person cause I have such a sensitive schnoz but perhaps I will give it a shot in the name of inBloom!

my living room decor

So, as I mentioned last week with my kitchen inspirations, my house is going up. Up up and up, and I can't wait. I need a place to breathe easier both figuratively and literally: there's alot of dust in my apartment right now and it does give me the heeby jeebies, but also, I need a place that will let me just relax as soon as I walk in the front door. I think the best way to achieve that for me is very straight lines and minimal clutter. And since the living room is right by the front door, I have to get this one right! You all know that I love dark wood floors so much that I could eat them, and I love the contrast with white and a little splash of colour. What do you think about some of these living room inspirations?

I love the straight lines and colours in this.

I love the rough dark hardwood floors with the white walls and plain abstract art.

I posted this living room a while ago - and I still absolutely love it! It might be in my top two. Look here for more pics of the style.

But this one is still a favourite too! Nate's living room as seen on Oprah. I also posted about it a while ago, but I love how it seems modern but comfy at the same time. I love the brown leather couches but it wouldn't work very well with chocolate floors!

A little too harsh for me, but there's something I like about it.

And this one - not so modern, but I do like the comfy feeling and the shelf in behind the couch. Perhaps I'll have to blend a few of these ideas together somehow.

{Pic 1, 2, 4 from Anne Sage} { Pic 3 from Elizabeth Roberts via Domino} {Pic 4 from Oprah} {Pic 5 from Domino mag}

a pumpkiny party

A few weeks ago us Bloomers had a little pre-Hallowe'eny get together with some friends. And since we like to make things purty, we decided that our table setting should look as purty as can be. This is easy in the fall, with so many wonderful things to work with - fall colours, drying flowers, and of course punkins! I found these little ghostly ones, used at each place settings, at Loblaws; the tablecloth is a damask sheet I got from Urban Outfitters that I've been dying to use for something; the antiquey tea set is from my mom's collection; and the colourful hydrangeas were plucked from the garden. Not too shabby for a quickly pulled together look! And, of course I gave the photos a spooky sort of vintage effect {photos just look cooler with a vintage effect, no?}.

Hoping you all have a wonderful pumpkin carving, candy-eating, dress-upping weekend. Boo!

boo and ew!

I just found a hot-spot of awesome Halloweeness! Check out these cool and clever designs I found over at little ant design!

Gross wormy sandwiches!

Beautiful but spooky candy apples!

Funny, scary-hand napkin holders!

And then over at Urban Outfitters they are selling this creepy, doll part chandelier! Eeek!