Elegant Arizona Wedding with a Traditional Church Ceremony

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Today’s real wedding is classic, elegant, and romantic, it also has some steal-worthy finishing touches.

Salim & Lara are an Arizona couple, whose love story sounds like the meet cute in a rom com (a chance encounter in the bookstore that lead to an evening of wine and non-stop conversation!). They celebrated their wedding with a traditional church ceremony and glamorous golf club reception in Phoenix.

With pretty florals, gorgeous signage, stylish lanterns, and one of the most amazing DIY lighting instillations we’ve seen (props to Lara’s dad for that one, whose first look with his daughter is pretty emotional – hit the gallery to see it!).

With photos by Jay & Jess Photography who, as always captured the day so beautifully, this wedding might be classic and traditional, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t pack in a lot of style too.

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How We Met

We met at Changing Hands Bookstore in May 2014. We started talking among the books and then decided to sit down for coffee, which turned into wine and hours of conversation.

Before we left, we picked a book we each wanted to read and exchange them. In doing so, we were guaranteed another date and also started our own personal book club that continues to this day.

As the relationship progressed, we both realized that we had found something special and on December 20th, 2015, Salim proposed in the same bookstore that we met at, a beautifully orchestrated surprise.

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The Setting

We wanted our wedding to be romantic and incorporate the beautiful landscape that Phoenix has to offer.

The hardest part was finding a venue that could offer that, but once we saw McCormick Ranch Golf Club, we knew it was exactly what we were looking for.

The floor to ceiling windows that open onto the patio that overlooks the lake, with views of Camelback Mountain in the background were hard to pass up.

The wedding ceremony was a very traditional church ceremony.

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Favourite Moments

We had a fairly large wedding, but one of our favorite moments was when we gave our thank you speech.

Just looking out at all the people who came to celebrate with us, knowing it was all the most important people in our lives, and feeling all the love in the room was something we will never forget.

The size of our wedding also made for a great party, we didn’t stop dancing until well after midnight!

We also decided to keep it traditional and not do a first look, so seeing each other for the first time in church was a very special moment.

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The Photography

Both our photographer and videographer were used by friends of ours that had gotten married before us.

We loved the way they each captured special moments and told the story of how the day unfolded. It was an easy choice!

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Advice for Other Couples

If you can fit it into the budget, definitely get a wedding planner, at least for the month prior to the wedding.

There is so much to do in that last month and it goes by so fast, you don’t want to miss a second of it worrying about the last minute things that inevitably come up.

Speaking of budget, make sure there is a little cushion built in for last minute details that you didn’t think about when the planning process started.

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The Decor & Details

Once we decided on the venue we started piecing together the details starting with the color scheme, which Lara already knew she wanted to be purple and blush.

The flowers were a very important part of the decor, and Bloom and Blueprint ran with the idea of neutral flowers with a pop of deep purple to match the color scheme.

We put the small details of the wedding together in the last couple months and couldn’t have done it without the help of Etsy and Freed Hands, who continued with the soft and romantic feel.

We loved our welcome sign and seating chart done on a mirror! Lara’s father created a one of a kind paper lantern chandelier that gave the reception a soft glow, it was perfect – thanks Dad!

We both come from a Middle Eastern background, so the music at our reception was a mixture of our favorite songs, top 40 hits, and Middle Eastern traditional music.

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The Food

The food was hard to choose, because everything we tasted at McCormick Ranch was great, but we settled on steak and grilled mahi mahi.

I usually skip the cake at weddings, too much fondant and not enough flavor, so we made sure our cake was quite the opposite.

Fleur de Lis lived up to their name and made us an unforgettable cake that had tiers of strawberry swirl (Lara’s favorite) and marble (Salim’s favorite) and whipped cream frosting – which doesn’t sound like it should be on a wedding cake, but it made for a delicious and elegant cake.