How To Give Your Hawaiian Beach Wedding A Little Sparkle

I always knew I wanted to get married near the ocean in Hawaii. We visited quite a few venues on Oahu but instantly fell in love with the Four Seasons Resort at Ko Olina because of its modern style and natural beauty. The west side of Oahu is also known for killer sunsets.

Once we were engaged, I couldn’t wait to start shopping. I bought my wedding dress before we even booked our venue. For my wedding look, I wanted something elegant and formal, but that would still work well for an island wedding. I loved the flowy train of my Monique Lhuillier Jaime dress because it reminded me of the ocean’s waves. I also wanted my hair to be beachy with soft and flowy curls. The sparkle of my Monique Lhuillier Brilliance veil and Jennifer Behr Borealis earrings reminded me of the sunlight glinting off the ocean water. I couldn’t help but ask my make up artist to add sparkles to my eye makeup, too. Everyone who knows me knows my love of cats, so I had to sneak in my Charlotte Olympia Kitty Crossbody Wallet… It was the perfect size for holding all of my reception necessities – lipstick, oil blotting sheets, and iPhone.

After scouring through lots of wedding blogs and inspiration pics, we/I decided on a romantic modern themed wedding that played on the ocean side tropical feels of the venue. To accent the natural beauty of Hawaii, we kept the main color scheme quite simple – ivory, champagne, and blush. The addition of deep cardinal red and gold accents hinted at our Alma Mater, the place where our love story began, the University of Southern California.

Our wedding invitations were letterpressed and foil stamped then hand-painted with blush watercolor and gold edges, which complimented our romantic island theme perfectly. We kept the most of our linens soft and sweet in champagne and blush colors. We added some shimmer/sparkle to our wedding reception with ivory sequin linens for our sweetheart table, gold sequin linens for our cake table, laser cut gold table numbers, as well as pearl and gold sea sponge chargers. I loved the varying textures of our gold, rose gold, and blush votives. For our “something blue” that kept with the romantic island theme, I fell in love with our sea glass place cards.

Our wedding florals combined flowers that I’ve always loved, roses, orchids, and hydrangea, with one of my new favorites, amaranthus. I was so overjoyed that even though they were out of season, my florist found some beautiful peonies to use in my bouquet. We provided leis for our parents and guests, and my aunt surprised us with special custom-made Tongan leis for the bridal party.

Our macaron favors were guava and lilikoi flavored. We also had a three-tier wedding cake. Each tier had a different flavor – lilikoi butter, strawberry guava, and haupia coconut. For the design, I wanted to keep the buttercream soft and flowy like the foamy beach waves. There was blush ombre, gold flakes, and a gold laser cut cake topper to mimic our wedding invitations. I also love macarons so much that I had to add some to our cake.

We also loveeeee cocktails. So, of course, we jumped on the chance to have some specialty cocktails on our menu. Our first drink was vodka based with passion orange guava juice and creamy coco lopez. Our second drink was tequila based, with mango puree and spicy jalapeño syrup. We couldn’t help but name the drinks after our beloved pets and commissioned our calligrapher to create our bar menu with portraits of our pets.

Having deep roots in Hawaii and with both of our families having multicultural backgrounds, our wedding was full of special and unique moments like the Lion Dance, Banzai toasts, and Hora dance.

The best part of our wedding was spending time with friends and family. We were so excited to share this special day with them and were overjoyed to hear that they loved our special day, too. All the planning and the budgeting and the stress was worth it!