wedding color series {1}

On the assumption you are a planning bride and a follower of Utah bride blog, you likely consider yourself to be a designing bride. Need I even ask what your first decision to be made is? Colors right? This can {and often is} one of the trickiest bridal endeavors. Planning can be nearly halted without this decision made. So we have plotted out some great advice to make method’s of the color madness in a series of color choosing posts.

image courtesy of www.willyoubemybridesmaidblog.com

In honor of a reminder of how things once were lets start with a little history, its not widely known that back in the day wedding colors signified your social class and were therefor predetermined for you. How is that for lack of personal design and style? Then there was a period of time in which it was traditional for the parents of the betrothed couple to choose the colors, lets hope the majority of you have embraced your own style and uniqueness in a way that allows you to have a wedding that is about you and not your parents. But what is your style & how do you go about choosing those imperative hues?

To some this will come easily, these are the brides who have had life long admirations for specific colors, but for those of you that feel slightly color blinded take your mind off color for a moment and nail down your style to gracefully lead you into color options. What gets you excited? Is it the relaxed preppie feel that Martha Stewart type events exude? Is style Me Pretty on your bride obsessed blog roll? Does H&M make your heart pitter patter when you walk in its doors? Does the modern urban feel appeal to your senses? How do you define yourself and personal style? And how will that translate into your wedding? This should narrow down key colors that you associate with a specific style. There are no rules to that. Really think in a simple way about what color you see when you close your eyes and ponder on a theme or style that appeals to you, very literally what colors do you see?

inspiration board created by and courtesy of 100 layer cake - something similar to what you can create with Pantone tools.

Now that you have a general direction of appeal lets access some color resources to help you determine what real potential combos might be. www.colorpicker.com is a fantastic tool for those that are familiar with design or photo software and are interested in creating custom color formulations and is self explanatory upon arrival. For those that are less tech savvy www.colorschemer.com is a more of a guided tool, but works nearly the same as color picker, its a more advanced, yet is a user friendly online color scheme generator. It requires account registration but is complimentary and my favorite element is that its keyword {meaning adjective} driven. Paint stores are another great resource for palette configuration, try hitting one and spending some time looking at and collecting swatches or visiting an online resource like Sherwin Williams. other great color resources wedding by color or The Knot. Last but for sure not least is the ultimate tool in color configuration, Pantone! Pantone has teamed up with Dessy to create a 2010 wedding color guide, they also feature a my Pantone color splash tool that is priceless!

Next step: I strongly advise that you start working on your own personal inspiration board for your private use. Start using google image, bing image, or whatever your browser might be to look for inspiring images in the tones you have selected. This will help you be creative and stay focused on the style and colors as well as have that beneficial element of vision. {It also comes in handy down the line as you hire experts to contribute to your plans, it allows them to maximize your events potential & see just what it is your have in your head!} an image is worth 1000 words afterall.

inspiration board courtesy of project wedding &  alyson and davids wedding 2009 inspiration board winner!

Some color faux pas to avoid … TOO much black {or another very very dark color like brown or plum} this can really put a damper and darkness on the event. If you love black balance it out with a bold color choice or something on the polar opposite of hues, at the very least use an even ratio formulation if not less dark. Bold color choices are best utilized as accents and really make the most profound impact in a less is more element. DONT loose yourself, make sure whatever you choose feels like you! Not what you want to be you, but you .. truthfully. TOOOO many colors is a NO NO. keep it simple with either 2 or 3 choices unless you are gravitating towards all natural tones. The purpose of wedding colors is to create harmony and flow that tie it all together, getting too crazy will defeat the purpose and create chaos.

If all else fails … hire an event designer to help you find your colors. That is what they do after all, they typically are trained well to read you even if you cant read yourself.

More to come … predetermined color factors like your venue & season!