It’s no secret that we at Nüage Designs are huge fans of Engage! We’ve been lucky enough to work with Rebecca and Kathryn for the past eleven summits and each time we come away with new knowledge, and reinvigorated with more love for the wedding industry. This time we were especially swept up in the magic of Engage! with the summit being held in our very own sunny South Florida, hosted by our friends at The Breakers. While we could seriously write a book about our favorite moments, we sat down and came up with the top things that really gave us the feels this week.
So many of us come to Engage! to center ourselves and rediscover the essence of our work in the company of our friends and those who have become our family. In our search for great design, beautiful events and gorgeous photos, we become swamped by “inspiration” and lose the true meaning of the word. It was really inspiring to hear from some of our design role models on where they look to get their creative juices flowing. From Jes Gordon we learned to keep our eyes open, and look up constantly. Seeing her take pictures of NYC garbage and transform them into backdrops and ceiling installations at her events was just incredible! And from Matthew Robbins, our favorite hunter gatherer, we learned that inspiration, which we breathe in and feel throughout our soul, is different from the visuals we mood board on Pinterest, which should be seen as tools that help us explain our vision.
And with great inspiration follow great events. This time around at Engage! we found ourselves with big, goofy grins plastered on our faces the entire time, and can you blame us? From waking up in New Orleans with beignets and a bloody mary bar to an emoji-fueled lunch break where we may have had more than just one happy pill, the fun did not stop! The icing on the cake? A purple rain themed after party à la Prince that topped any dance party we’ve ever been to. Seeing experiences from our real day-to-day lives translated into these awesome parties lifted our spirits to new heights and is something we can’t wait to experience more and more in our own work.
Even the best theme has to be handled with great execution, and The Breakers Design Studio, along with their creative partners, did not fail! For starters, we were just in love with the coral color palette. Call us Floridians if you want but there’s just something so lovely about this shade of red that makes everything look amazing! Combining coral hues with patterns of pink and mixed metal elements, the look and feel of Engage!16 was deeply felt throughout every event. It was all about the details too – from the intricate laser cut sea fan menus from Two Paper Dolls to the personal dry-erase boards from Gifts for the Good Life and the croquet lawn decor (who doesn’t love a bright pink flamingo?), not one opportunity was missed to imbue each event with personality!
Of course, a party is only as good as it’s entertainment, which was incredible at Engage!16. The level of talent and creativity was unlike anything we’ve seen yet. Truly nothing kicks your day off with as much energy as a jazzy soul-infused band from Louisiana. The guys behind Equinox Orchestra quite literally blew our socks off! And just as we were hitting an afternoon slump, AA Musicians showed up with a gospel choir that had us hands-in-the-air yelling out “Hallelujah!” The entertainers at night were equally unbelievable. From a psychedelic candy party hosted by Elan Artists’ gorgeous girl band, Pretty Retro, to the Uptown Mix Orchestra from Vali Entertainment that set the mood at the gala, and a surprise performance by opera singer Fernando Varela, not a moment went by that we were not having a blast!
But of all things, all the inspiring words we heard, the delicious treats we snacked on and the dances we shared, our favorite thing was the sense of camaraderie and authenticity from our Engage! community. We listened to so many of our event mentors talk to us from a real place of vulnerability and truth on the things that scare them and the ones that lift them up. Preston Bailey wonders if he will be relevant in five years, Lynne Easton risked her family home to grow her business and Mindy Weiss wants to quit every other Sunday. These incredible event professionals inspire us to work happier, risk more and evolve, not shrink away, in the face of fear and adversity. To hear that we are all in it together and to imagine the heights that we can take the wedding industry together was just brilliant!
In the true spirit of Engage!, we feel rejuvenated and more full of energy than ever before. With great ideas and a lightness of heart, we left The Breakers ready to take on the world…or at the very least our next wedding.
Host Resort The Breakers Palm Beach | Presenting Partners The Knot, Gold Calendar, Style Me Pretty, Minted | Graphic Design Trisha Hay Design | Event Branding, Branded Gifts and Accessories Gifts for the Good Life | Event Linens Nuage Designs | Nametags, Itineraries, Day One Agenda and Lunch Menus TPD Design House | Production Support and Custom Printing Checkerboard Ltd. | Audio Visual, Lighting and Sound Palm Beach Staging and Production | Hashtag Photo Printing Luster | Official Photographers Carla Ten Eyck, C10 Studios, Love Life Images, Cameron Clark, John Cain Photography, Jeremie Barlow | Official Videographers Ray Roman, I Do Films, Party Slate | Engage! 16 App Appy Couple | Social Media Support Maid Of Social | Decor and Florals The Breakers Palm Beach | Candy Bar Sugarfina | Draping Swag Decor | Pool Letters and Fire Pits Event Effects Group | Furniture Rentals Nuage Designs, AFR Event Furnishings, Bubble, Events on the Loose, Classic Party Rentals, Great Hire, Signature Chandeliers | Entertainment Elan Artists, Equinox Orchestra, Vali Entertainment, Fernando Varela, Rock With You, The Powerhouse Group | Dressed to the Nines Beglammed Beauty Bar, The Styling Suite, The Black Tux, Rent the Runway | Stationery Alpine Creative Group | Pop Up Boutiquerie The Gilded Group