Allison

In the Studio
Introducing Hand-Painted Yoga – Art inspired by yoga
- November 16, 2015
- by Allison
Blogging has been a little quiet for the last two weeks, and there is a very good reason for it. Behind the scenes I have been working on a very new, exciting project focused around one of my passions, yoga. I launched this new venture, Hand-Painted Yoga, at the beginning of November in front of holiday shopping, and have been working on setting up Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, Facebook, etc.

Hand-Painted Yoga is an online shop featuring abstract art inspired by yoga philosophy. While I have geared the artwork towards yoga, the messages resonate with all humans in a very real, raw way. This is a very personal project for me, because yoga has and continues to impact my life in a deep way.

You might be wondering why I chose to open up a yoga art business since I already have a wedding business, and what do the two have to do with each other. Well, the funny thing is that I was actually drawn to both yoga and weddings at the same time, 7 years ago. I started yoga while planning my own wedding as a stress relief as well as for physical posture reasons (frankly, I wanted to look good in my dress). While I was drawn to yoga for physical reasons, I have been fortunate enough to have teachers along the way that have instilled the philosophies of yoga alongside the physical sequences, and it is those spiritual connections, yoga philosophies that have kept me coming back and growing to a daily practice. More on what drew me to opening up a wedding business here.

In collaboration with my yoga teacher I created abstract watercolors to express visually the phrases my teacher uses throughout class that inspire me far beyond the mat. My wish is that these expressions will inspire others as much as they have inspired me. In this world of ambition and aggressive work ethics, these messages are a breath of fresh air, encouraging the reader to live with intention and naked awareness.

Go on over to the Hand-Painted Yoga website to learn more, and to shop for your loved ones this holiday season.

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Press
Dreamcatcher baby shower featured on Smitten Magazine
- October 29, 2015
- by Allison
The stunning Dreamcatcher baby shower I contributed paper for in May is featured on Smitten Magazine today! This was a dream team of talented vendors that came together and created the most beautiful, down-to-earth baby shower imagined. Inspired by the mother and father to-be’s trip to Sedona, this baby shower brings together adorable bohemian design elements like dreamcatchers, feathers, floral crowns, temporary metallic tribal tattoos, and gemstone necklace favors. And it brings them all together in one of the most beautiful restaurants in Philadelphia, Talula’s Garden, with all of its secret garden aesthetic and organic botanicals. Papertini did such a nice job incorporating the nature details of the venue in with the bohemian theme, in a sunny, joyful way.

One of my favorite parts of the shower was the custom dreamcatcher thumbprint guestbook I made as a gift from the planner of the event, Truly You Events, to the mom to-be. This baby shower thumbprint guestbook had 40 spaces at the end of strings for guest’s thumbprints, which mixed in with the feathers of the dreamcatcher.

This bohemian baby shower was also featured on Hostess with the Mostess. More on that feature here.

Photographer: Love Me Do Photography | Event Planner: Truly You Events | Venue: Talula’s Garden | Flowers & Decor: Papertini | Invitations & Stationery: Hand-Painted Weddings | Makeup Artist: Beke Beau
Real Wedding
Gallery Bridal Shower
- October 20, 2015
- by Allison
What happens when two artists, one of which is also an art teacher, plan a bridal shower together? They plan an artists inspired bridal shower! Over the weekend, my mom and I held a surprise shower at a local art gallery, and it turned out so beautiful that I’m excited to share our ideas in order to inspire other bridal parties who are planning bridal showers. We DIY’ed the decor, centerpieces, and the delicious food. I also painted and designed the invitation. We DIY’ed the bridal shower to make the event more personal, and frankly, to save money.

Let’s start with the bridal shower invitation. The design features an abstract oil painting on canvas with brushstroke white font overlaying it. The canvas texture printed really well on the textured watercolor paper I always print on. It was very exciting to use oil painting instead of watercolor on this design. The second part of the invitation is a blank recipe card that has a place for guests to write in their recipe and on the back it is branded to match the invitation while giving the guests some instructions. It was a fun way for the bride to collect a bunch of family recipes, and it is something that my mom also had at her wedding, so it was a tradition handed down. There was a recipe box at the entranceway of the gallery for guests to put their recipe cards in when the entered.

For our centerpieces, we made each look like an artist’s still life with various art supplies around it. We had a wine centerpiece with corks surrounding a few bottles of alcohol. We had a gourd table with a bunch of fun fall appropriate gourds. We also had a Van Gogh inspired still life with a bouquet of sunflowers and a mini canvas. We used items that we had around our homes already, so that saved a lot of money.

In terms of traditional bridal shower things we skipped…we decided against games and favors. In lieu of games and favors, we did a craft, which worked well with the artist inspired bridal shower theme. We gave every guest a 6″ square tile and each person used alcohol ink to splatter their own designs, which blended together similar to a bright watercolor painting, but was completely easy and skill free, for all those guests out there that say they don’t have an artistic bone in their body. Everybody loved doing a craft instead of a game, and each guest got to bring home a custom piece of art. This was also a budget friendly idea because each tile cost less than $1 and each table shared a set of alcohol inks.

A couple of other ways we brought creativity into this shower were through the DIY cut letter signs like the one saying “Bride” hanging from two easels above my sister’s spot for opening presents. I also brought in my fun graphic upholstered chair for her to sit in while she opened her gifts, making it that much more special. We enlarged photos of the bride in various locations around the world because my sister has such a heart for third world countries, and hung these matted photos on easels around the gallery.

All in all, we heard people say that it was the best bridal shower they’d ever been to, which really flooded our hearts with love because of all the work we did in planning this gallery bridal shower.