Weddingbee PRO

A few years back I worked with this lovely couple, Jennifer and Alfred, on their Chinese-American wedding. I’ve never forgotten how adorable and sweet the wedding details were including the mini bamboo streamer favors to the lantern style table menus to the sweet pink kissing ball for the flower girl.

This wasn’t one of those over the top weddings. This was a wedding centered around family values, traditional Chinese elements and the proverbial Chinese Wedding Banquet.

The bride and groom were very sensible and Mrs. Lee, the bride’s mother, had a lot to say about the direction, floral design and Chinese concepts. I remember Jennifer’s mother coming to see my work several times to make sure that I put together the right combination of flowers and that I wasn’t using flowers that the Chinese associated with ya’ know - death.

In Chinese culture, bright, vivid colors are very important symbols. Though the bride didn’t want to do the traditional Chinese red, it was still equally important to make the pink hues as reddish as possible. The result was this beautiful wedding the blended traditional elements with modern styling.

For many us in the design world, often we aren’t familiar with the very strict elements and traditions. Being Chinese, I definitely need a culture lesson because there is a fine line between doing something that I like as a designer but could be offensive to someone’s cultural beliefs. Designing a wedding for someone with strong cultural influences means that we as designers need to be sensitive and aware. That’s why I’m incredibly grateful for the Knot for creating websites specific to one’s needs like the Chinese wedding website called Chineseweddingsbytheknot.com. Since many modern Chinese American couples are embracing the concept of The Wedding Banquet, I find The Knot’s Chinese wedding website quite helpful as one navigates through the wedding planning.

Photography by Union Photography