Claire & Greg’s Whimsical Dance Party Farm & Vineyard Wedding in Virginia

Images: Nessa K Photography

I‘ve been a fan of Nessa K Photography for quite some time – so you can imagine my excitement when I got a submission email from her! Her images are just stunning and have an almost fairy-tale, otherworldy feel to them which is hard to describe in words. Her images just make you FEEL all the things and the ones she sent over from Claire & Greg’s rad dance party wedding in a barn at Weatherlea Farm & Vineyard are no different. I know you are going to love them.

Claire & Greg decorated their ceremony with bits of paper maps, woven into stars and Greg’s mom put together all of their floral arrangements for their tables. They both wore sneakers the entire day, hung records from the ceiling, and they served pie to their guests in lieu of cake. Everyone felt perfectly at home and there was SO much dancing! Check out all the gorgeous images and details from the couple for this gorgeous Virginia wedding.

Details from the bride & groom:

We had a pretty long engagement (to enjoy just being together and because we both procrastinate). When we finally sat down to look at different venues we knew that we wanted something outside and low key. Claire’s sister Maggie actually found Weatherlea Farm for us. At the time we were thinking that October would be a great time of year for a ceremony. Unfortunately Weatherlea was booked solid that year. For a lot of different reasons we ended up pushing it back to the following June and figured we would try again with the farm.

They had an opening for our date and we went to visit. Pamela and her husband Malcolm were so kind and really wonderful to us. We fell in love with the site immediately. I mean—they have llamas! The whole experience and their help was truly fantastic.

One of the details we liked best was our music for the ceremony. Claire wasn’t one of those girls that dreamed of her wedding day in great detail, except for one thing: what she wanted to hear walking down the aisle: Aretha Franklin’s “You’re All I Need to Get By.” And we both feel that way about each other. Our exit music was also a little different: New Order’s “Age of Consent,” one of Greg’s all-time favorite bands and a song that sounds exactly how early June feels.

The paper stars that hung behind at the ceremony were made by Greg’s mom, Claire’s mom, dear family friends and the bride and groom over a couple afternoons in one big assembly line. Part crafts day and part planning session—that’s one of our fondest memories of the pre-wedding.

Click inside for SO MUCH MORE of this gorgeous, handmade Virginia barn wedding!

I think we landed on our colors and the idea of wildflowers in one afternoon. We sat on the couch and started talking and, while we have very different taste in things, our color palates matched up very smoothly. The barn setting and early summer / late spring date made wildflowers and a rustic theme pretty easy to decide on.

Claire can’t stand high heels so she went down the aisle barefoot and had adidas high tops on hand for afterward.

So many friends and family helped us! On the day of the wedding our friends drove pies to and fro, set up and decorated the venue, and generally overwhelmed us with their generosity and kindness. When all the flowers froze the night before the wedding, Kathleen put together an emergency team to completely reassemble the bouquets, boutonnieres, and wildflowers for the table centerpieces. It wouldn’t have happened without them and the day was means that much more to us because of the time and love they put into it.

Greg’s mom, Kathleen, was a florist for 20 years and did weddings every weekend growing up. We asked her for her help picking things out and she volunteered to do the flowers herself! Her experience with weddings was a godsend. Every time we got bogged down with planning or just couldn’t figure out what to pick she offered great advice.

We both really love to dance and love music, especially old records. A lot! So instead of traditional programs we made fans in the shape of 45’s. Greg’s mom laid them out for us and sent us the mock up. Asking what the order of the ceremony should be? Jokingly Greg wrote back: “Get married, eat pie, DANCE PARTY!” Then we realized that was pretty much what was going to happen so we stuck with it. It was a dance party too.

All the DIY wedding projects:

Our paper stars were made of old maps cut into strips – Greg is a huge cartography buff, so the maps were a nod to that and the shape of the stars (similar to a Tibetan knot) were a nod to Claire’s time in India. All the table centerpieces were antique glass bottles collected from various locations and each had a hand-drawn tag inviting guests to take one with them. Two family friends drew all the tags and added little phrases “you’re looking good!” or “take me home tonight” – we thought they were hilarious. We signed the back of each of tags saying thank you for coming to celebrate with us.

The lanterns in the barn were already in place, but the banner that hung in the barn was made out of Greg’s great-grandmother’s old linen napkins. All our flowers were done by Greg’s mom with the help of our family friends. The records hanging on ribbons from the bar were made by a family friend out of scavenged 45’s from flea markets and yard sales (the same place were all the bottles on the tables came from).

We used a lace veil that has been in the Dolan family for many generations as the tablecloth where we signed our ketubah (wedding contract) during the ceremony.

We did pie instead of cake. Cake is great and all but pie is definitely better. Dangerously Delicious in DC made them for us and they were a big hit.

Our DJ was the absolute best (DJ Stereo Faith from DJ D-Mac & Associates). He kept everyone on the dance floor the whole time. For that we are forever in his debt.