Greg & James’s Art Deco Wedding Celebration at The Fort Garry Hotel

Our Weddings

Aug 23

Greg and James celebrated their marriage on Saturday, August 23rd, 2025, with about 120 guests in the Concert Hall at The Fort Garry Hotel in Winnipeg. They came to me with a clear brief: a 1920s, art deco party full of performances, built around their two favourite colours, Egyptian blue and royal purple. Then they did something not every couple does. They handed me the design.

For Greg.

Some couples you simply plan for. And some you also get to be a part of the celebration. Greg & James were beautifully both. Greg wanted to celebrate his love with all of his people, and to show his love for James in a big, beautiful way. He trusted me (and the team) with it, and the whole day was full of their joy: the taiko drummers, the dancers, the room changing colour all night.

Greg, thank you for letting me be part of the happiest day of your life. Your love is all over these photos, and it always will be.

With so much love to James.

When a couple trusts you with the design

Not every couple is ready to let go of the design. Greg and James told me what mattered to them, then trusted me to run with it. When Greg wasn't sure he could make the florist consult, his answer was simple: work with them directly. That kind of trust changes what a planner can build. Instead of designing by committee, I could make one clear set of choices and carry them through every part of the room.

We started on a shared Pinterest board, then I built a full design board and recorded short video walk-throughs of it, so the couple and every vendor started from the same picture.

Colour on colour

The big idea was colour on colour. Rather than using blue and purple as accents, the whole room sat in them: navy linens, florals in blues and purples at mixed heights from Beyond Flowers, blue and purple votives, gold chiavari chairs and gold cutlery, LED table lamps, and giant gold glitter balls beside the stage. The table plan moved from a U to a W along the way, and the florals were reworked to fit it.

A room that changed with the night

This wedding was a bit of a show, so the lighting had to perform too. Event Light lit the stage and shifted the colour of the whole room for each moment: amber as guests arrived, light blue for cocktails, reds and golds for the taiko drummers, green for the Highland dancers, purple for the drag set, and lilac and amber for the couple's entrance. Our MC told guests that whenever the room changed colour, something fun was about to start.

Paper with a little Gatsby

Shannon at Blake Creative Co. brought the art deco direction onto paper, with a touch of Great Gatsby glamour and the same warm gold that ran through the room: the seating chart, menus that doubled as thank-you cards, bar menus, buffet labels, gold-foil monogram napkins, and wedding bingo cards. James wrote some of the bingo squares himself, including "take a pic with Anita Stallion" and "take a pic with a martini glass".

The night

Cocktail hour with the Luminous String Quartet, then a grand entrance led by a bagpiper. Through dinner came Fubuki Daiko's taiko drummers, Irish dancers, the Ena Sutton Highland Dancers, a first dance to Chasing Cars, and a friend's guitar performance of Raise Your Glass as the champagne went round. In between, guests could get a caricature or a tarot reading, watch a live painter work, try the mirror photo booth, play wedding bingo and visit the gelato bar.

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