Natural Sonoma Winery Wedding

Two words: wine cave. We need not say much else about this gorgeous wedding on a Sonoma, California winery, but we will, because it’s full of beauty… and elegance … and charm. Margaret and James were fittingly inspired by the surrounding wine country for their neutral & lavender affair. The ceremony overlooking the vineyard and intimate reception in the dimly lit cave are fairytale like, especially when Megan Welker captures them. Here’s how the bride put it into words:

James and I decided that Sonoma would be the perfect place for our wedding on an annual wine country trip over Labor Day. Finding the right venue was the best part of the planning process, we knew we wanted to find an intimate venue with a wine cave which helped us quickly narrow down our options. As soon as we walked on the Thomas George Estates property we knew we found our venue. From the overlook, oak grove and wine cave we knew this would be the perfect venue to have the wedding of our dreams. Inspired by a recent trip to the south of France, I wanted an elegant event with lavender, olive branches and many wine country touches like grape bunches and cork.

Since James and I are East Coasters most of our 65 guests flew from across the country for the event. We wanted to make it a special and memorable weekend for everyone traveling. This started with the welcome bags and a full weekend of activities. We wanted the wedding to be more than a wedding and instead an escape from the city and highlight all of the reasons why we love wine country. Guests left that weekend starting to love Sonoma as much as we do.

We loves a good photo booth but costs seemed high. Instead we borrowed a Polaroid camera and found a great vendor on Etsy to build a Polaroid frame photo booth. Wedding guests took Polaroid photos and left a note in our guest album. Going through the book the next day and reliving so many of the memories was one of our highlights from the wedding weekend.

Florals were a huge focus for the wedding weekend. Miss Meliss worked with the us for welcome reception and the day of wedding florals. Melissa understood the direction we were going and totally blew our expectations out of the water. The ceremony outlook with wine country touches, olive branches and rose petals left all of our guests speechless. The transformation of the wine cave was completed by an overhead floral chandelier and a floating arrangement above the bride and groom at the head of the dining table. Smaller arrangements and candles throughout the cave made the space feel intimate, romantic and most importantly left the space smelling amazing.

Our friends love to dance so we knew we wanted to transform the wine cave into a real dance party or “rave cave” as we called it. The rave cave quickly came to life with the help of ATL lighting who completely transformed the space with light pods and free standing strobes. In addition, we gave out glow sticks, necklaces, and rings mid way through the dance party to get guests in the “rave cave” spirit.