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Amanda and Jake are finally getting their fairytale wedding, but with two weeks to plan it, they’re going to need a lot of help. That’s where Production Designer Jim Jones comes in to create the romantic wedding of their dreams. Here, Jim talks about how he used flowers, lights, fabric and more flowers to achieve the perfect look for Amanda and Jake’s special day.
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Bridal Guide: How would you describe Amanda and Jake’s wedding style? What kind of look and feel are you going for?
Jim Jones: Like any wedding we’re trying to adapt to a given space. In this particular case, the wedding takes place in the yacht club café. Stylistically, there’s a lot of architecture on this particular set, awnings and some nice fluted columns. We had to try to soften some of the architecture in clever ways and obviously it’s all about flowers. Some of them were actually real. I think it ran about 80/20, artificial versus real flowers.
We had this arbor that went around the bride and groom and it had smaller flowers, baby roses and some wisteria, and lots of greens. We decorated the railing in nice garlands with white lilies and twinkle lights. Even though it’s a daytime wedding we still used a lot of twinkle lights because it makes everything kind of special. We had about two dozen large flowers arrangements and that’s where the majority of our silks came into play, the stuff that was a little farther away from the camera. It was all whites and creams and blush-colored hydrangeas, peonies, sweet peas, agapanthus.
We took some blush-colored organza and draped it over these pairs of columns that go throughout, then we gathered them and made a bow in the center and accented it with a flower.
We intended to add a tiled dance floor, but once it was in place it just intruded on the space too dramatically. We added some tall bar tables so we could have people standing and see the action going on beyond them. They were draped in white cloth and tulle that had little tiny rhinestones. We gathered the whole thing at the bottom of the table. We did something similar on the lower tables where people were sitting. It just added a little depth to it and you get that little sparkle that makes it a little more festive. It created more of a party atmosphere.
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BG: It seems like the bulk of the décor was flowers.
JJ: It really was because like I said there was so much architecture, you really just wanted to play to the architecture. It was a very limited space so we couldn’t get too grandiose. When you have 18 principals and then extras, it gets tight on stage.
I think we estimated that there were 35,000 blooms brought in, many of them not real but just the same that’s still a lot of flowers. Most of them were in arrangements that were placed strategically around the yacht club café.
We used a lot of flowers on the cake as well.
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BG: Was it a fake cake?
JJ: No, it was real. It was a three-tier square cake. It was quite an attractive cake. Each tier was decorated with roses and ferns--that looked really nice on camera.
They actually did eat the cake. We had the obligatory scene where Jake and Amanda cut the cake and they feed it to each other. I think we got that in one take, which was a very good idea because cakes are expensive as we all know.
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BG: What about the bouquet?
JJ: That’s kind of a tag-team effort between the art department, Mr. Zyla and the florist. It really wasn’t much bigger than her two hands put together. It was white roses and peonies--very pretty. Our florist Toyo Griffith Park Florist did a very nice job with it.
BG: Any other special elements you wanted to incorporate?
JJ: We were pretty much trying to create as romantic and interesting a wedding as we could in the given space, which I believe is like a lot of weddings.
BG: So the biggest challenge of the wedding was the space?
JJ: Yes, and bringing it under budget.
BG: Where did you have to cut corners?
JJ: Normally we would do a lot more real flowers. Like everybody, we know where our money is best placed. You want to put the money on the tables where everybody can see and touch and feel it, and that goes with us too. We want the actors interacting with real flowers because it’s going to be the closest to the camera, and with HD cameras that’s definitely a concern.
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BG: What kind of arrangement do you have on the tables?
JJ: It was white roses, sweet peas and some mums. There were some greens in there too for contrast. We utilized some existing lamps and added some egg-shaped glass votives. They weren’t crystal but they looked fabulous.
BG: Where did you find ideas for the look of this wedding?
JJ: We had a jam session with the producers. It was pretty much my department and the producers. They have things that they want to accomplish and we kind of take the ball and run with it.
BG: Did any crazy ideas come up during the jam session?
JJ: Not this time. The deeper you get into these things and the more you marry people, yes, you do kind of get some wacky ideas, but we were trying to keep it kind of traditional yet contemporary. They’re a young couple and we didn’t want it to get too stuffy. We’re catering to our viewership as well. We’re trying to create something that’s accessible to them that they might draw ideas from as well. Unless Opal gets married again, I doubt that we’ll be pulling any giant rabbits out of our hat.
