event planner « Paisley Petunia

Posts Tagged ‘event planner’

Let’s play dress up…

Thursday, March 18th, 2010

Remember when you were a wee little kid and playing dress up was the most fun you could have in an afternoon? I remember riffling through drawers full of my grandmother’s extravagant costume jewelry and just layering on so many pieces I could barely stand up. It wasn’t a wearable look for sure but it was my 5 year old version of “concept” and the love of creating conceptual looks has lasted well into my grown up years. I love to play dress up with my tables almost as much as I like to play dress up with my clothes! As an event planner, I often have the opportunity to turn a space into something completely different; a ballroom into an outer space galaxy or a garden into an pink butterfly wonderland. I never run out of ideas; I’m only limited by time and budget (which of course, tends to be limiting!)

Recently, along with my friend and new business partner, Erin and my friend and fab floral stylist, Lauren we had the opportunity to create two concept tables for a photoshoot. We immediately decided one would be garden and the other would be, well not garden. Sadly, the weather didn’t cooperate and our outdoor garden shoot had to be moved inside. Luckily, I found these amazing boxhedge panels from Town and Country Event Rentals and it helped bring a little of the lush green from outside in. We wanted a traditional, elegant table where two ladies might have lunch to discuss their upcoming benefit event. I might add that since we had a limited budget for these tables everything shown is either thrifted or pulled from our own cabinets. I made the faux linen overlay with a $10 piece of fabric (an iron and some stitch witchery is all you need.) This was our result:

For the next table, I was thinking modern, almost industrial and Lauren came up with the title “Park Ave Punk.” That was all we needed to start our creative juices flowing. I immediately thought of 60s NYC with the glam edge of Warhol’s Factory. I enlisted the super talented girls from Make/Shift to stud some faux grey suede napkins (again, I bought the fabric and ironed the edges to look like a real napkin for the purpose of this shoot.) I found the perfect sweatshirt jersey for the placemats in the remanent bin. We used a mix of vintage jewelry as napkin rings and filled all the empty containers with bulk nails and screws from the hardware store (these were promptly returned post shoot because while I can justify keeping a lot of stuff, 10lbs of nails is not one of them.) My husband said, “why are there nails in the glasses?” Oh boys, it’s not a real life dinner party, it’s a concept and we wanted to carry that look throughout the table. So, clearly if this was applied to a real event, we wouldn’t serve nuts n bolts in the glasses. Here is what we came up with:

Photo credit for all these images goes to the lovely, talented and patient Leslie Rodriguez whose beautiful photography can be found by clicking here.

Tags: 1960s, be Make Shift, event planner, los angeles, nyc, tablescapes, the Factory, Town and Country Event Rental, Warhol
Posted in Social, Style | 3 Comments »

Party Hardy

Thursday, June 4th, 2009

I’ve thrown a few parties in my day as I have been a professional event planner for 11 years; there is hardly a type of event I haven’t produced (except for weddings (besides my own) as I am def not a wedding planner) This past year, I produced about 75 events for work and about 10 for personal reasons plus attended dozens more as a guest… whew, I’m tired. But, I love a good party and have pretty much been that way my entire life though it never occurred to me I might end up an event planner. That just sort of happened.

I have a pretty extensive portfolio of event pictures, tablescapes, etc. and I get a fair amount of requests to put some of the pictures up so I decided to post some of my favs. The majority of these are for personal events as I don’t want to plaster client pictures all over the internet without talking to them first and that takes a lot of time. Most are just snapshots taken by me or an assistant as we race around in the last crazy minutes before guests arrive. Some of them are from a professional photographer and I have indicated that (though I’m pretty sure you can tell the difference between their work and mine.)

I’m always looking for a reason to throw a party…friend’s birthday? let’s have it at my house….holiday party- oooh I’ll do it at my house….Easter Brunch-yes! my house. That is undoubtedly one of the reasons I love my house so much. It is a perfect space for throwing parties. After having done so many parties for other people it’s fun to do it just the way the client wants- when that client is ME. I’ve got a few party ideas for the summer so if you happen to find yourself strolling around Bev Hills looking for a good party…drop me a line. I probably know where a good one is…

{Campaign Kick-Off Gala for work- Todd Cheney photo credit}

{Valentine’s Brunch @ home}

{Garden Party @ home}

{Annual Gala for work}

{Birthday Dinner for J @ home}

{Saturday Brunch @ work- Todd Cheney photo credit}

{Thanksgiving Dinner @ home}

{Holiday Party @ home}

{Gala table-scape for work}

PS: anyone who knows me will know the one reason why, as an event planner, this picture drives me BANANAS, but everyone else probably thinks it looks lovely

Tags: beverly hills, Entertaining, event planner, event planning, los angeles, parties
Posted in Life, Social | 9 Comments »

An afternoon with Preston Bailey

Sunday, March 8th, 2009

I’m an event planner and have been for the past 12 years. I have done events through the dot.com boom when the challenge was finding the most expensive and extravagant, and I’m doing events now, which needless to say, is an entirely different challenge. For most event planners, it’s a dream to produce a Preston-esque event. That being said, most of us will never have a six figure floral budget and I don’t really miss the over-the-top days when that might have been a possibility. But, I find inspiration everywhere, even from pie-in-the-sky ideas, so I was excited to spend the afternoon listening to Preston talk about his sources of inspiration and his love of creating the beauty of the “ahh-haa moment.” That moment when you first step into an event and forget that you are in some ballroom, in some city, living in a country in the middle of a recession; that moment when you have been transported to a magic place that is someone’s two dimensional vision, brought to three dimensional life. If you’ve been to an “ahh-haa event” you know what I am talking about. It is a beautiful thing.

Still, it’s tough in this economy to see the beauty and even tougher to create it. Let’s be honest, it’s ugly out there and that presents a real challenge when your job is producing events. It was nice to hear Preston, the godfather of flamboyant, talk about practicing restraint and keeping things in good taste in the midst of a gloomy, global recession. Preston and I certainly agree on this point: events are not only about $500,000 of flowers or about out-doing the last party you attended. They are about the organic beauty in bringing people together to share the joy of friendship; to celebrate milestones in life; to connect with others for a compassionate cause; to celebrate the success that there is and the success that there will be. Because, in the end, events are really about taking a moment, in a not so beautiful time, to soak up the beauty that is right here, right now.

So, I say….. plan a party. Put some spaghetti sauce on the stove, your favorite playlist on the ipod, a bottle of Trader Joe’s finest in a decanter, some daisies in a vase and invite the people you love to join you for the evening. Trust me, it will be an event and it will be beautiful.

To read more about Preston Bailey visit his website at www.prestonbailey.com or check out his blog at http://www.prestonbailey.blogspot.com/

Here’s a picture of me, Preston and my friend Erin.

Tags: event planner, events, floral, society, weddings
Posted in Social | No Comments »

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