This Couple Brought Southern Charm to the California Coast for Their Garden Party Wedding

Lizzie and Cody met in 2012 while working at the same tech startup in Santa Barbara. They were friends at first, but after a conversation about a Coachella set they had both seen, sparks began to fly. Eventually, Cody worked up the courage to ask Lizzie out on their first date. “We’ve been together ever since,” Lizzie says. In the summer of 2019, after a long bumpy drive to a remote campsite in Big Sur, Cody proposed on a cliff overlooking the ocean. “I was admittedly car sick and a bit disheveled when he proposed with the most thoughtful letter on the cliff overlooking the ocean,” Lizzie remembers. They spent the rest of the weekend celebrating and dreaming up their perfect wedding.

When the big day came around on August 28, the couple celebrated their wedding with 100 guests at Klentner Ranch in Carpinteria, California. They knew they wanted to host their nuptials in Santa Barbara, since it's where they both attended college, met, and fell in love, and once they saw Klentner Ranch, they fell in love with the property and its ocean views. “We loved how private it is and that we could transform the space however we wanted to,” she says.

The couple envisioned an intimate garden party with Southern flair, and they chose a color palette of white, mossy greens, and lavender with bold accents of coral, persimmon, and mulberry for their day. "While searching for inspiration, I was consistently drawn to traditional, southern weddings I saw online," Lizzie notes. "I loved that the couples weren’t shy with color and pattern and the number of personal details woven throughout. To make it ours, we based our décor around a romantic, intimate garden party aesthetic with an underlying traditional, southern feel."

To bring a taste of the south to the Golden State, Lizzie and Cody worked with Jessica and Camille at Crowned Events, and they tasked their planning team with personalizing the day as much as possible with special touches. The result? A bright, colorful wedding with an illustrated family crest, custom party crackers, and a surprise silent disco. Simply put, you won’t want to miss the photos from this couple's wedding day, as captured by Anya Kernes.

Shortly after getting engaged, Lizzie reached out to Julie from Julie King Studio to discuss big-day stationery. “I had admired her work for years and knew I wanted her to create an invitation suite that was unique to us,” Lizzie says. “Julie hand painted a custom crest using our initials that we used throughout the wedding weekend.”

Since the wedding day, Lizzie and Cody have created napkins, pillows, and stationery featuring their wedding crest, which has served as a lasting memory following the big day. The couple intentionally used a more muted color scheme for their invitations to mimic the ceremony flowers, which they thought felt more "bridal." The suite incorporated deep purples and reds, butter yellow tones, and pops of deep orange. 

Lizzie shopped for her wedding dress with her sister, niece, and two best friends of 25 years. “There was lots of champagne and only a few (happy) tears,” she remembers. The winning look? A strapless Carolina Herrera wedding dress with an architectural bow on the back. "I knew I wanted a dress that felt timeless and streamlined," she says.

As a wedding gift, Lizzie's sister bought her a Peter Langer veil with embroidered lace flowers around the edge; the two plan to pass it down to their own daughters one day. Her "something borrowed" was a diamond tennis bracelet on loan from a friend, and her "something blue" was a handkerchief embroidered with the couple's names and wedding date, a gift from her future mother-in-law; she carried it down the aisle with her bouquet of mauve, lavender, and berry-colored clematis and garden roses.

The bride finished her look with light pink Tabitha Simmons sandals, pearl Jennifer Behr earrings, and a "lived-in" low bun hairstyle. 

Lizzie spent the morning relaxing with her sister, niece, and bridesmaids; they lounged by the pool and enjoyed a quiet catered lunch. “Getting ready with my girlfriends is always the best part of any night out and my wedding was no different,” she says.

The group wore mismatched dresses in a range of different purple hues, advised by a Pinterest board the bride put together in the lead up to the wedding. "They really nailed it,” Lizzie says. “I love how beautiful they all looked together.” Each woman held a small bouquet tied with blush and ivory ribbons. 

Cody and his groomsmen spent the wedding morning playing beach volleyball and grabbing a casual lunch. After, they went back to their hotel to get ready together.

The groom wore a navy J.Crew tuxedo, which he paired with velvet tuxedo slippers. He gave his groomsmen cufflinks with the "shaka" hand gesture to wear with their tuxes. “It was fun to see the fun, casual cufflinks set against their classic tuxedos,” Lizzie says. They each finished their wedding day looks with a boutonnière made of clematis and greenery.

Lizzie and Cody shared a sun-soaked first look ahead of their ceremony, which was both a practical and emotional decision. “Logistics aside, a first look also meant we could mitigate a lot of the pre-ceremony nerves,” Lizzie says. “We got our tears out of the way and were able to relax a bit before the ceremony, just the two of us.”

The couple chose to exchange vows on the venue’s private polo field overlooking the ocean. “It’s a stunning space, so we kept the ceremony décor simple,” Lizzie notes. “Our only request was a statement arbor that was tall enough to fit Cody who is 6 '8!”

The couple’s florist, Camille of Camellia Floral Design, created a stunning floral arbor, which was filled with blooms in muted shades of blush, rose, lavender, and purple. She specifically used flowers in contrasting shapes and textures, including garden roses, dahlias, zinnias, celosia, and clematis. “The arch was so beautiful I got a bit distracted looking at it during our ceremony!” the bride laughs.

During the ceremony, the bridal party walked down the aisle to “Back in the Tall Grass” by Future Islands. Then, Cody walked down the aisle with his parents to David Bowie’s “Heroes.” Lizzie's entrance was slightly more dramatic: She walked down a steep set of stone stairs before meeting her dad at the bottom. The two then walked arm-in-arm down the aisle to the tune of Van Morrison's "Into the Mystic."

"The idea of writing and reading individual vows felt a bit daunting to the both of us,” Lizzie admits, so they took a creative approach to personalizing their ceremony: Instead of writing two distinct sets of vows, they collaborated on one set of vows they could both say. “The process of writing the vows was such a special part of the wedding planning process and hearing where we each put emphasis while reading them aloud was so meaningful,” the bride explains.

The couple’s sister-in-law, Cara, read the lyrics to Billy Joel’s “Just the Way You Are” as a way to honor Lizzie’s mom, who passed away a year prior. Lizzie grew up with memories singing and dancing to Billy Joel. “Cody and his family have helped keep that tradition alive,” she says. “Singing and dancing at many memorable Billy Joel shows together over the years.”

After the ceremony ended, guests moved to cocktail hour, where they enjoyed mountain views and signature drinks. “We served spicy margaritas and Cody’s favorite spin on the Old Fashioned called The Old Aztec, which is made with chocolate bitters,” Lizzie says. High top tables were dressed in floor-length ivory linens and decorated with petite floral arrangements.

Lizzie’s family has a tradition of having party crackers at every holiday table, so they worked with The Little Cracker Company to create custom designs featuring their wedding crest to use in place of traditional escort cards. Each cracker featured a guest’s name and table assignment and was filled with a personal note from the couple, after-dinner mints, and, of course, a tissue paper crown in their color scheme. “Lizzie’s godmother taught all guests how to properly pop them before dinner and it was so much fun to see all of our guests rocking their crowns throughout the night,” Cody recalls.

Instead of table numbers, the couple named each table after a place that is special to them, including their college town, the Coachella stage where they’ve seen some of their favorite performances, and their weekend walk destination when they lived in San Francisco.

Before their grand entrance at the reception, Lizzie and Cody took a stroll around the property with their photographer to grab some portraits.

When guests moved into the reception space, they were treated to bold, impactful color moments. "As we transitioned to cocktail hour and the reception space, we amped up the color and pattern, with the ceremony colors woven in for cohesion," the bride notes. Long tables were topped with embroidered white linens, woven seagrass chargers, lavender Limoges dinner plates, soft blue linen napkins from La Tavola, and statement salad plates featuring a floral pattern from Theoni Collection.

Those floral plates actually served as the inspiration for the evening's overarching floral design; the vibrant palette of coral, burnt red, lavender, lime, and peach and a delicate floral pattern inspired Camellia Floral Design's low, loose centerpieces, which contained a mix of textural blooms like dahlias, ranunculus, scabiosa, roses, and more.

Julie King Studio also designed custom dinner menus featuring the same hand-painted florals seen on the couple's invitation suite and calligraphed place cards with deep purple lettering. The tables were finished with textured hurricanes with colorful candles and dishes of figs and cherries. The couple’s florist even used flowers and fruits from her own garden to perfect the look.

The couple wanted their dinner menu to be inspired by meals they liked to serve to family members and friends at home, so they picked dishes like salad, locally-made bread, Santa Maria-style tri-tip, and parmesan-crusted salmon.

The newlyweds shared their first dance to “I Wanna Be Your Lover” by Prince. After, Lizzie and her dad danced to Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World, then Cody and his mom danced to “That’s the Way of the World” by Earth Wind & Fire. “Cody had essentially no décor preferences, with one exception: He wanted a disco ball over the dance floor,” Lizzie notes. So, the couple’s planners installed a disco ball trio above the dance floor for a playful touch, foreshadowing the upcoming silent disco surprise.

The couple cut into a single-tiered funfetti flavored cake (Cody’s favorite!) during the reception, then served guests cookie sandwiches from Enjoy Cupcakes for dessert. Since their venue was subject to a noise ordinance that required amplified sound to end at 10 P.M., the Lizzie and Cody surprised their guests with a silent disco, which ended up being a hit. “Leading up to the wedding, we were concerned that shutting down the music would ruin the fun, and we weren’t sure how the silent disco would go over,” Lizzie notes. “It ended up being our guests favorite part of the night!”

Following the wedding, Lizzie and Cody spent two weeks in Hawaii for their honeymoon. They acknowledge that the wedding weekend goes by in a flash, so they recommend enjoying the engagement season as much as possible. “We eventized as much of it as we could,” Lizzie explains. “For example, picking songs for the silent disco playlist became a dance party with friends in the living room and we spent a fun afternoon champagne and cake tasting. Those memories are just as special to me as the actual wedding.”