Calla Lilies, Hydrangeas, One Shade of Sage: How a Charleston Couple Kept the Palette Short

Ava and Kyle wanted their wedding to start with the ease of an afternoon among flowers and finish fully dressed up. They chose The Gadsden House in Charleston to hold both moods, a historic building that rises three floors in the city's traditional style. They limited the flowers to two: calla lilies and hydrangeas. They used one color, sage green. For anyone planning now, that short list is the most useful thing here. A calla lily is sleek and upright, and a hydrangea is full and soft, so the two together cover both the relaxed tone and the formal one without a third bloom. Sage is a quiet green that can stand next to flowers and old architecture without competing with either. A building on several levels also gives a planner more than one floor to work with, which matters when the day is supposed to change character partway through.

With reporting from Style Me Pretty.