The wedding dress is unlike any other dress you will ever wear. When you walk down the aisle all eyes will be on you and your dress. I love seeing the dresses that our brides choose to wear! When I walked into Amanda’s Hyde Park Bridal store I knew that I was in for a treat. With pink and white décor and amazing dresses everywhere you turn – it is a magical place! Amanda helped pick the most incredible dresses and details for our styled photo shoot. Her design sense and fashionista eye were so helpful. I asked her to share a little more about her store and background.
What is your background?
I was born and raised in Cincinnati and I always had a love for fashion and knew one day I wanted to open my own store. I graduated from the DAAP program at The University of Cincinnati in 2012, majoring in Fashion Design Product Development. I explored a variety of fields in the fashion industry while working at Luxottica in Sunglasses Hut marketing, Abercrombie & Fitch corporate in men’s tech design, Glamour and Elle magazine fashion and accessory closets before finding my calling in life in the bridal industry. I worked at a couple bridal boutiques and decided that I was meant to open my own bridal store!

When did you first realize you wanted to work with weddings?
I realized that very early while working at the bridal boutiques that everything just came very natural for me. I had grown up collecting bridal magazines and once I worked in bridal there was just no turning back. I have had my wedding planned almost my entire life! I had gone with many friends and family members to get their wedding gowns in Cincinnati and their experience wasn’t anything I felt it should be. I saw an opportunity to open something special and unique for the brides in Cincinnati and beyond.


How long have you been in business? Where are you located?
Hyde Park Bridal opened just this past September 2012 and I couldn’t be more thrilled with support that we have received so far! The boutique is located in Hyde Park, 3319 Erie Avenue to be exact! The boutique is in East Hyde Park and is in a beautiful 1930’s Victorian home that has been completely renovated!

Why did you start your business?
I started Hyde Park Bridal to give brides something different, an experience that I feel every bride deserves. The experience is everything at Hyde Park Bridal and something you can’t find anywhere else. We close our entire boutique for our brides for two hours at a time so they get that personal and one on one attention while searching for their gown. The bride and her guest are also treated to reserved parking spots, champagne and cupcakes! We are a full service bridal store that can help the bride complete her look with not only her wedding gown but her veil, jewelry and bridesmaid dresses!

What is your favorite part of a wedding? 
My favorite part about a wedding is seeing the bride in her gown! I just love the moment that she walks down the aisle and her fiancé sees her coming down the aisle in her gown for the first time! I love seeing the smiles on the bride and grooms face and knowing how special that moment is for them!
Where do you go for inspiration?
Having a background in fashion I feel that it is very important for me to stay on top of bridal and fashion trends to always offer my bride the next big thing. I think my love for fashion allows for me to truly select a beautiful assortment of wedding gowns each season and gowns that brides are looking for. To get inspired I’m constantly on Pinterest or wedding and fashion websites and watching every bridal show on television!!

What are your favorite upcoming trends?
There are so many bridal trends that are in the market now and will be making more appearances soon that I just love! The major bridal trend right now is lace, lace, lace! Brides are loving lace because not only is it gorgeous on it is a very classic and timeless look! Along with the lace trend, we are starting to see a lot more lace straps, caps sleeves, boleros and off the shoulder looks on gowns…very Kate Middleton! One of my very favorite trends right now are belts! The world of bridal belts has taken off and can really add a unique touch to a wedding gown for the bride and give her a way to make it her own. Color is another big trend that we will be seeing more of in bridal gowns and bridal accessories!

Anything else you want to share with us?
Not only did I graduate less than a year ago from college and opened my own bridal boutique three months later, I’m also planning my own wedding! My fiancé Joe and I have been together for 10 years and we getting married next May 2014 in Key West, where he proposed. I have been working with very talented bridal designers to design my perfect one of a kind gown (or maybe 3 gowns)!

Hyde Park Bridal
3319 Erie Avenue | Cincinnati, OH
www.HydeParkBridal.com
p. (513) 321-1800 | (513) 321-1820

Chocolate is my weakness! So when I hear the words Cupcake Crazy, I know I am in for a treat. Over the past year I have really enjoyed getting to know Lisa and her daughters through many wedding events. They recently created a custom made cake pop wedding cake for photo shoot that I absolutely loved!

What is your background?
I worked in my family bakery as a teenager and then went to college and studied nutrition as I have always loved to work with food. I ended up becoming a registered dietitian. While I was in graduate school I worked at a bakery in Ridgefield, Connecticut and also worked in catering with them. It was a really cute French Bakery and they also served lunch and catered big parties. I loved all of this. I worked a little in my field and then had the luxury of staying home to raise my children. As my kids got a little older I was able to help my husband with his businesses with accounting, marketing and all of the aspects of business so I really learned a lot that I am able to apply to really running any kind of business. Without all of the business knowledge I would not be able to do this. I finally got bored with sitting behind the desk and needed a creative outlet. With two daughters who are very creative it was so much fun to get into this.

My daughters and I are all owners of this business and I want to make sure this is not all about me so:

Lauren, who is 23 was away at college at the University of Dayton studying Art Education when Kristen and I started baking cupcakes for friends and then friends of friends so it started as just the two of us just for fun and Lauren close to graduating and not sure what she was going to do. We decided to open the retail store as it was getting out of control in our house. We opened the bakery in June and have had a tremendous response. We have continued to steadily grow and are looking forward to celebrating one year in June! Both of the girls loved to bake and have found ways in the business to use their specific talents. We started creating different recipes for a restaurant and that really sparked Lauren’s interest and she has gone on to create over 100 recipes to date. She is really in charge of the cupcakes. Each day we have different flavors and each week we create new ones as well. It keeps things fun to do different things. We sell so many cake pops that Kristen is in charge of all of them and creates amazing designs. She is busy overseeing all of these orders. Some weeks she will make thousands of them. We do have other employees to help us get everything done as we have gotten into making a lot of cakes and then always have fun things out on the counter for sale such as cookies and other snacks.

When did you first realize you wanted to work with weddings?
When we were working from home we started with weddings as we could not do enough small orders to really get started so we needed to get in front of a lot of people and weddings was a good way to do it. We love doing weddings as it is a happy time in peoples’ lives and it is always fun to be involved with planning. We love being able to help create a special memory for the couple and their family and guests. We love setting everything up and seeing the final display at the venue. It is very exciting and satisfying to do this.

How long have you been in business?
We started in 2010 at home and opened the store in June of 2012.
Why did you start your business?
We were just making cupcakes for fun and did not know what to do with them as we had so many. I was walking with friends one morning and they suggested selling them and they said they knew lots of people who would love to buy them. We started out with a simple paper flyer and then it gradually took off.
What is your favorite part of a wedding?
I love setting everything up at the venue and seeing the final display. It is so beautiful to see the tables all set up with flowers and then our display in such a grand environment. I love to see the brides and their families excitement when they see everything. I am by no means a photographer but we all love taking pictures of the final displays as well.
Where do you go for inspiration?
We are all magazine addicts and always buy tons of them, we love cookbooks and decorating books. Pinterest is great. We all love it but don’t have a lot of time for it.

What are your favorite upcoming trends?
We love that people are wanting to try new exciting flavors and don’t just want the basics. We love creating new things with cake pops like our cake pop wedding cake. People are excited to see new things. We really love that people are into unique cakes these days and we love the challenge of doing something different for everyone.

Anything else you want to share with us?
We are just so excited to be working together in this business. It is an amazing opportunity to be able to work together. It is so much fun to work with customers who are happy and excited about our product. We all are so happy when people pick up their orders and we get to share in the moment when they see what we have made!

Cupcake Crazy
513-984-1100
http://www.cupcakecrazyincincinnati.com/
7458 Montgomery Road Suite 8

One of my favorite moments during the wedding day is a reception room reveal! It gives the couple a chance to see how their venue has been transformed for their guests. At Debbie and Adam’s wedding we couldn’t wait to see everything come together – from flowers to the cake – and one of the best parts – was the lighting! The Hilton’s Hall of Mirrors room is a great room. But dim the lights and add some color and it becomes breathtaking! Goodwin Lighting has to be one of my favorite companies to see at an event. They truly are artists!

What is your design training or background? How long have you been in business?
I have a BA in Theatre from NDSU (North Dakota) and an MFA in Lighting Deign from Purdue. I have been in Cincinnati since 1988 and have run our own business since 1995.

What is your favorite part of a wedding?
My favorite part is seeing the whole room ready to go for the reception. Tables, flowers, cake, everything turned on for the lighting. Really great to see the finished product.

Where do you go for inspiration?
Inspiration comes form many sources, trade shows, magazines, seeing live performances, working on other types of events like business meetings, galas, theme parties etc…

What are your favorite upcoming trends?
Trends come and go, some are technology based and some are design based. I always key in on the interior design industry which helps define colors, textures and style. Right now the "LED" is the hot button word. but it’s like Kleenex and is becoming so common place that it’s losing it’s design appeal. One type of light is not the one solution for every design. One has to know the tools available and select the right one for the right job. That’s part of being a designer, rather than just a guy with LED’s.

How can lighting make a difference at a wedding?
Lighting is the best way to create drama, highlight decor items such as flowers and cake and make a connection to other design items by way of color and texture. It’s the binding agent which allows everything else to make sense. Lighting design it also about what NOT to light. If the room has "issues" not lighting it and letting it fall into shadows can make it disappear. Most people feel that up lights or trying to disguise it with lighting is the best approach, but the real answer is to not bring focus to it all and let the other elements within the room take priority.

What should we know about lighting?
Lighting is more than just owning the actual lights. Its having a design eye, knowing where to put the lights to do the best job, selecting the right color and choosing the right texture patterns to make the lighting look like it belongs to the event. This goes beyond the actual design, and includes the way an event site looks. We run our cables and place our equipment in a most discrete way possible. Our goal is to make the equipment blend into the existing architecture as much as possible. It’s not about the equipment but about what the actual lights do. Safety is also a big concern, any lights on the ground can become a trip hazard and suspending lights overhead takes special training to know how to do it safely. We make it look easy, but there is a lot to be considered when suspending items over head. We have special rigging insurance to cover our methods of suspending our equipment.

What makes you different from other companies out there?
What makes us different is that we trained in lighting design and are total team players. We look out for red flags from all aspects of an event and bring up potential issues such as power, color choices, and timing for installation, room turns etc… We have been known to help place flowers during a room turn, and help out others when a need arises. We also try to protect the customer from making bad decisions. We are not afraid to tell a client that their request is not a good one. Once example is we often get asked to light the dance floor in white light. We strongly argue against this. We have seen that a bright dance floor creates a psychological barrier and guests feel self conscience and will not go on the dance floor. We have a great "comparison shopping" page showing examples of what we do and what others try to do. It’s a great resource to show the difference.

Goodwin Lighting Services
859-578-0949
http://goodwinlighting.com
goodwinltg@mac.com