Event Planning Ideas, Trends & Inspiration

Last week we headed up to Nashville, TN to see what The Special Event Conference had in store. Between classes, the trade show floor, and celebratory parties, we managed to get lost only a few hundred times inside the 29th largest hotel in the world – The Gaylord Opryland Resort and Convention Center. Here’s a look back at the sights and sounds of our time in Music City- some we posted on our social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram) and some we saved for you just now!

-William Fogler
WM Events

We recently designed an interesting and offbeat after party at the Marriott Marquis that took haunted to a new level. This Macabre Victorian Carnival was a sexy and whimsical period-styled affair that amazed attendees. Circus-style sideshow entertainment, elegant and mysterious vignettes, and energetic dance music transported the guests to another world.

After rocking through dinner with the Temptations, guests exited the dining room and were greeted by a ghoulish Tree Man. Victorian entertainers led attendees downstairs to the after party’s chilling entrance way- complete with fountains, fog, and gothic garden statuary.

Inside, multiple residential furniture groupings and tall communal tables offered guests the chance to mix and mingle. The Austrian and fiber optic drapes were book-ended by two 14′ Magnolia trees and set behind an eerie sculpture garden. Innovative activities like digital silhouette artists and fortune tellers were tucked away in sheer fabric alcoves, while a Zoltar machine, interactive candy bars, and two stylized photo booths were scattered throughout. Guests could also try their hand at vintage carnival games and root for the winner at the hermit crab races.

See below for some terrific photos from PWP Studios!

-William Fogler
WM Events

Planning the perfect office holiday party can be tricky business, especially when you’re trying to please a diverse workforce. Traditionally,  a holiday party is a time for your company to celebrate its employees and their accomplishments. While many people excitedly await the company holiday party, some employees would rather hide under their desks than participate in the festivities. If your business seems to be filled with too many Scrooges, you can still turn things around and make sure that this year’s holiday shindig becomes something the whole office will enjoy. Here are four tips for taking your office holiday party to the next level.

1. Be Adventurous

If you’re trying to find a new way to celebrate your employees, group activities are right on target. Depending on your employees’ interests, outings like bowling or ice skating give employees some space to enjoy each other’s company. To create even more team spirit, staff members might enjoy working on a volunteer project together. Follow any of these activities with a happy hour or cocktail party, and you’ve got a pretty memorable event!

2. Enlist Out-of-the-Box Entertainment

Hosting a successful holiday party means understanding who your guests are and what they will enjoy. For diverse groups, this can be challenging, but unique entertainment options like lawn games and roaming performers will gain almost anyone’s interest. Roving magicians or costumed performers can approach randomly divided groups of employees and encourage socializing even across department lines.

3. Don’t Wait for the Sun to Set

If you’re not lucky enough to have an unlimited budget at your fingertips, consider a daytime event. You’ll find that you can save money on the venue, the catering, and the bar.  Daytime parties can also be family friendly, which will be an incentive for some of your employees to attend.

4. Rethink the Food

Make sure the food is recognizable but still special.  Go for high-end versions of traditional holiday favorites. For a more sophisticated crowd, you might begin with passed hors d’oeuvres and champagne, and then offer winter dinner selections of lamb or sea bass.

Need more help with your holiday planning? Check out these ideas from WM Events and William Fogler.

When Anne and Colin first came to us, we very quickly became ecstatic to plan their Boho Chic wedding at Canoe’s beautiful riverside restaurant. We created a custom birch archway for their ceremony with coordinating floral aisle markers with whimsically colorful wildflowers. The cocktail hour overlooked the flowing river and the floral accents really made the space their own.

Guests were able to find their table assignments on an over-sized chalkboard display piece as they entered the tent through stylized guestbook, family photo, and cake tables. Three different designs made the dinner tables uniquely inviting and stylish. Pops of lighting transformed the tent, while twinkle lights on the surrounding bushes and trees gave the space an enchanted, romantic aura that kept guests dancing the whole night.

Take a look below at the spectacular photos from StephandDavePhotography to see how it all turned out. Or visit the gallery to see even more!

-William Fogler
WM Events

Last month, artists took the streets of Castleberry Hill for the fourth annual Flux Night.  Atlanta’s Flux Projects, whose mission is to encourage cultural curiosity,  produces this night of temporary, experimental art installations. The streets of this Westside neighborhood were flooded with onlookers enjoying performance art, installation pieces, gallery exhibits, and mixed media arrangements.  A special VIP area featured “The Mural Project,” which brought together six, bi-cultural graffiti artists to create murals across the city in the days leading up to Flux Night. By taking art exhibits out of traditional spaces, Flux Night created and amazing energy and an engaged audience. Check out pictures of some of our favorite installations. We can’t wait until next year!

This summer, I had the chance to honor my fabulous mother on her 80th birthday.   The weekend long, destination event was hosted at a beautiful home on one of Georgia’s largest lakes, Lake Oconee. Immediate family and close friends gathered together to celebrate the incredible Irene and to show her how much we love her.

The five-day event itinerary included boating, fishing, storytelling, and relaxing. The weekend culminated in a birthday bash for the ages, complete with dinner and dancing. To make the house feel like a home for this very special occasion, we added to the gorgeous setting with comfortable furniture upgrades and unique, meaningful details.  Family photos and luscious floral arrangements filled the house, while each guest room featured a picture of the occupant with Irene. Custom t-shirts and tote bags for every guest added a personal touch.

For the birthday celebration, the WM Events team styled a 30-top estate farm table. Lanterns and market lights completed this picturesque and intimate setting.

Purple is Irene’s favorite color, so I made sure it was prominent in the decor design. Lush purple hydrangea were set atop purple linen runners, while the vases featured back-lit black and white images from Irene’s life. These pictures gave guests the chance to reminisce about some of their favorite memories.

An heirloom lamp given to my grandparents in the 1940’s was the accent piece for the cake table. The lamp, topped with beautiful purple hydrangea, was both a pleasant surprise and a great conversation starter for my mom and her siblings.

A blues band and a DJ kept party guests dancing all night.

The house, cast in purple light and decked out with strands of market lights, looked stunning at night. The lights let us dance and celebrate until very late. We even welcomed unexpected guests on boats and glowing paddle boards.

After sunset, the party really got started. Guests enjoyed a delicious homemade meal, stories and toasts for the incredible Irene, a movie filled with images and video clips from her life, and a decadent chocolate cake.

I am very thankful for the chance to host this birthday celebration that would truly honor this incredible woman!

-William Fogler
WM Events

Football season is upon us, and fans of the sport are gearing up to create some pretty awesome tailgate parties. If the $12 billion a year spent on the tailgating industry is any indication, sports fans are committed to making their pregame gatherings unique and fun.

WM Events specializes in adding fabulous design and planning elements that take events to the next level. You can imagine our excitement when CBS Better Mornings Atlanta invited us to discuss some of our most innovative ideas for creating high end tailgating experiences.

Plus, tailgates aren’t just for sports anymore! We’ve also given some ideas for incorporating your love for your favorite team into your corporate and social events. Check out some of the highlights from the interview!

WM Events Tailgating on CBS Better Mornings Video

William with the CBS Better Mornings team- Tracye Hutchins and Paul Ossman.

Our high end tailgate setup celebrates our local teams.

This truck bed lounge makes a chic, relaxing space for those early morning tailgaters. We used two milk crates to transport all our supplies, then flipped them over to make a coffee table for all our pregame snacks.

William details everything you need for an extraordinary tailgate.

Our Giant Jenga takes center stage on the very fun jersey linen from BBJ Linen.

Our chalkboard menu showcasing some of our favorite tailgating treats including mason jar salads, mozzarella skewers, and beer mimosas!

Special thanks to Peachtree Tents and Events, BBJ Linen, and Monte Carlo Productions for providing furniture and props for our tailgate showcase.

-William Fogler
WM Events

Allison Sparrow of C4 Atlanta recently invited the WM Events team to tour the Fuse Arts Center, a great new venue consisting of three raw events spaces with pretty spectacular views of the city. In addition to being a beautiful space in the heart of downtown Atlanta, C4 is on a mission to support local artists. The Fuse Arts Center functions as an resource center and network for local artists who rent affordable studio spaces, utilize the event galleries, and take part in classes, including how to lead successful careers in the arts. The organization also manages Atlanta Spaces which serves as a database connecting visual artists, dancers, actors, and authors to venues that can host their rehearsals and performances. Check out some of the highlights from this exciting new venue.

We’re no stranger to fashion here at WM Events- even it is a little out of the ordinary sometimes. And our latest craze is eyeware made from alternative materials. With an increase in recycling, and modifying, it’s no surprise that common substances like vinyl records and skateboards transform into chic, UV-blockers. Take a look below to see the latest and greatest. What will you wear on your face next?

Proof got its start in a garage in Eagle, Idaho in 2010 when the founders, 3 brothers, used their Grandpa Bud’s sawmill to innovate the sunglasses market.  They grew up with “sawdust in their veins”, working with wood in the mill. Proof Eyewear continues to innovate providing a wide variety of products that aren’t just environmentally friendly, but unique and original.

Vinylize  upcycles vinyl records into high-quality, hand-crafted eyewear and accessories. Their production method highlights those iconic grooves and results in an extremely high quality frame. You can even order these great looking pair with your prescription! But the absolute best part of ordering vinyl record sunglasses is the amazing upcycled vinyl case.

Sk8 Shades are made from used skateboards collected throughout South Africa.  The company uses a cross-layered core, their signature design feature, to strengthen the veneers. All molds, templates and tooling is made in-house, and the glue used in the laminating process is an environmentally friendly water-based water-resistant product with low VOC’s. We love that all their waste is disposed of  responsibly. Check out their process video to get a better idea of how they work!

-William Fogler
WM Events

As a small, yet powerful, team here at Wm Events, we are always eager to show each other the latest interesting ideas and cool creations we have stumbled across. It is also a vital part of staying on the cutting edge of event design. We have even made it a required part of our Monday morning briefings so that we start the week with inspiring and fresh ideas. We thought we’d share with you some of our favorite blogs, e-zines, and photo sharing sites that get our juices flowing.

1. Imgur

Simply put, Imgur is an image hosting site full of the most recent viral images on the web, voted on by members of its site. It is also the preferred image hosting site of those that use Reddit, the “front page of the internet.” Imgur is full of all things funny and inspirational.

2. Design Milk

“Always fresh + never sour”, Design Milk is an online magazine dedicated to fresh and current ideas in the worlds of art, architecture, interior design, furniture, fashion and technology. In addition to these posts, they have a blog with 12 columns wittingly titled names like “Skim Milk”, “Friday Five”, “CMYLK” and “Unframed”.

3. Buzzfeed

From leading news stories to fascinating finds to the absolutely useless, Buzzfeed is full of things that will make you say “did you know…” everyday with your cohorts (a usual occurrence with Leigh). Buzzfeed is a great collection of trending and current information.

4. Lifehacker

Don’t we all need a few ideas to make life a little easier? Lifehacker is THE source for improving your health, finances, efficiency, and the way technology works with your life. Life Hacker is also the tenth most visited blog on the internet according to eBizMBA.

5. Architizer

Architecture is present in every facet of our daily lives. As event planners and designers, we are constantly dealing with conceptualizing within the limitations of space. Architizer is is the largest online collection of architecture and interiors projects and they are uploaded by the designers themselves. At the very least it is a beautiful collection of architectural photography.

6. BizBash

Last, but certainly not least, BizBash is a wealth of information pertaining to the event and meeting planning industry. In addition to profiling notable events, venues, and trends, BizBash offers tools and hot topics that help you stay immersed in what’s happening in the events and meetings world.

-William Fogler
WM Events

You’ve undoubtedly seen your fair share of street art. From tagging train cars to elaborate, public art murals, graffiti can be a rather complex issue with a lot of varying opinions. But what happens when you soften street art? Yarn bombing, yarn storming, guerrilla knitting, urban knitting or graffiti knitting is a new kind of public visual that we just want to cuddle up next to.

The Queen of Crochet is, without a doubt, Olek, a Polish-born artist living in the US. Her projects are uniquely surprising, mindbogglingly intricate, and boldly colorful. The notable juxtaposition between the soft, comforting yarn and the sturdy, often industrial, over-sized structures is oddly pleasant. Just look at these recent experiments she has spun her web around.

-William Fogler
WM Events

We love arranging flowers here at WM Events. But Malaysian artist-architect, Red Hong Yi puts us to shame. When she’s not playing with her food, or spilling her coffee, she’s creating these intricate avian portraits with deconstructed petals. We can’t wait to see what she does next!

-William Fogler
WM Events