A Glimpse At My Winter Wedding In Whistler

When a Vancouver wedding planner becomes a bride, they know all the details that matter. So when it was my turn to tie the knot, I knew what my winter wedding in Whistler would look like down to every detail.

Leading Up To The Day

Like most couples at the time, what I wasn’t expecting was our wedding to be impacted by a global health pandemic. So, with the date set, some deposits paid and save the dates sent out, my fiancé and I made the tough decision to push forward with an intimate micro wedding and un-invite 90% of our wedding guests. As hard as it was to uninvite our close family and friends months before the wedding day, our priority was to be married and start our married lives together.

Leading up to the wedding day was a whirlwind of emotions. With tight provincial health guidelines in place, I had to realize that my dream wedding was no longer possible. I was grieving the dream winter wedding in Whistler that was initially planned and was uncertain about what the provincial health guidelines would be on the wedding day. On the wedding day, the tight provincial health guidelines had not changed. So, we went forward with an intimate outdoor wedding ceremony on Nita Lake with our parents and sibling standing at a social distance nearby.

Getting Ready

Upon arrival to their room, each guest was greeted with a custom-made wedding welcome box designed by yours truly. It was the perfect way to acknowledge our guests during our destination wedding in Whistler. Each box included a detailed wedding weekend timeline, a bottle of La Marca bubbly, our favourite treats, custom-made sugar cookies by Edible Love and other wedding weekend essentials.

On the wedding day, I got ready in a beautiful lake view room at the Nita Lake Lodge. All vendors followed provincial healthy and safety guidelines that were in place at the time. Natacha Trottier did hair and make-up for the girls while the boys headed out onto the lake to test the ice.

Being a winter bride meant additional details were considered for my winter wedding outfit. I opted for an extra layer to keep me warm under my dress and had a fur coat and white mittens on standby after the wedding ceremony. Sorrells dressed up with navy blue ribbon as laces were my shoe of preference since I would be walking out onto a freezing lake. My bridal bouquet was filled with sentiment details, including my sorority pin and lace trimmings from my mother’s wedding dress.

A Dreamworthy Winter Wedding in Whistler

It was the perfect winter wonderland on the day of the wedding, a blizzard had rolled in, and it snowed all day from sunrise to sunset. The temperatures were absolutely freezing at a chilly -6 degrees Celcius.

After an emotional father-daughter first look on the Nita Lake Lodge train bridge, we said our “I Do’s” on top of the frozen Nita Lake. It was by far the longest aisle I’ve ever seen in my years of planning weddings, a 40-50 ft wedding aisle located in the middle of a frozen lake.

After our micro wedding ceremony, guests warmed up in the Nita Lake Lodge for an intimate cocktail hour. During this time, Clayton and I enjoyed our wedding portraits on the lake and a private first dance under the Nita Lake Lodge Porte-Cochere, which was the original location of where our wedding ceremony was to take place. Before the wedding, Clayton had refurbished a vintage toboggan, and he scouted out the perfect spot for a bit of winter wedding fun! We enjoyed a post-wedding tobogganing session that was an absolute blast!

Due to covid regulations in place, a formal wedding reception was not possible. However, we enjoyed a lovely socially distanced dinner in the AURA private dining room of the Nita Lake Lodge along with our family. As wedding receptions were not allowed due to the pandemic, decorations were not allowed either. So, I worked with the hotel to repurpose florals from the wedding ceremony for the dinner tables while also incorporating custom-made activity guides for the flower girls.

With all the restrictions in place, our micro wedding ceremony was better than I could have ever imagined. Nestled in the heart of nature in a magical winter wonderland setting, I married my best friend surrounded by those who mean the most to me. It doesn’t get any better than that!