Joan Rivers: Celebrity Wedding Planner

When the world looked at Joan Rivers, they saw a pioneering comedienne.  Me too, but I also saw the woman who pushed me into a career in wedding planning.  How could an insult comic I never met set me on the creative path that’s landed me as a wedding planning, etiquette and fashion authority at the top Palm Springs florist? Here’s how.

In 1998, Melissa Rivers, Joan’s daughter, got married.  Joan swung into action as a celebrity wedding planner, seeking out the services of innovative event designer Preston Bailey to create a glittery snow garden inspired by “Dr. Zhivago” with 30,000 white flowers for the wedding at the Plaza Hotel in New York City.

Inspired by Dr. Zhivago, Russian opulence permeated the wedding.
Inspired by Dr. Zhivago, Russian opulence permeated the wedding.

 

The magazine photos live in my brain to this day. When a client says “winter theme” that’s what I see.  That extravagant celebration showed me what was possible, what creativity could imagine and what opportunities were there to be a part of such events.

Thank you Joan, for your inspiration towards stylish entertaining – and being entertaining.

Be well and love well.

Dinah

 A lovely post script: Joan officiated at the wedding of Preston Bailey and his partner Theo Bleckmann on Valentine’s Day in 2013.

Lauren Bacall’s Bouquet Toss

In honor of her passing, TheWeek.com posted this priceless footage of Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart on their wedding weekend – including a classic bouquet toss. Back in the forties, the bouquet toss had yet to devolve into the single-woman shaming exercise that it has often become today (we at My Little Flower Shop are advocates of the bouquet presentation- a very sweet tradition.)

I am guessing that this was all staged for the cameras.  Movie studios had a way of capiatalizing on a good love story, making stars under contract “date” each other, so a re-enactment of these events wouldn’t surprise me.  But, somehow I don’t think a couple that much in love would have allowed cameras at the real events. In noir parlance- I bet you dollars to donuts that kind of dame would have been looking for romance.

RIP Lauren Bacall.