Dana & Whit: A Middleton Place Charleston Wedding

Middleton Place is one of our favorite destinations, and quintessentially Charleston as well! Dana & Whit had their wedding here among the lovely spanish moss, wandering sheep, and everything else that makes it one of the most charming spots to get married in the south. Let’s take a sneak peek at their day, and hear from them on why chose to get married in the south …

from the photographer, Catherine Ann Photography: “Dana works at the Wall Street Journal so there were a few nods to her career peppered throughout the day. They had a custom made announcement made to look like a newspaper & their wedding programs were made in the same way. Their gorgeous ceremony took place at the Butterfly Lakes with Whit’s dad being the one to marry them and at the end of the ceremony Dana’s young nephew came up and announced their first kiss! It was so adorable!”

How did you two meet?

We met the old fashioned way — on a dating app. We connected in February 2017 and a long texting courtship ensued.

Because of conflicting travel schedules, we didn’t actually have our first date until March at Hudson Clearwater restaurant in the West Village.

What’s your proposal story?

Getting engaged to anyone is stressful as you want to have the right level of surprise and preparation. This is made all the more complicated when that person is one of the world’s top journalists with a “good nose” for when things are amiss.

Whit crafted a plan to propose while in the row boats at Central Park. It was something that the couple had on their New York bucket list, but hadn’t been able to do yet. He contacted some of the couple’s closest friends and even arranged a photographer to hide and capture the moment.

However, nature wasn’t in our favor. On the day of the engagement, the row boats were closed at the last minute. Whit crafted a new plan and got down on one knee while on the Bow Bridge in the middle of the park.

Tell us about the vision for your wedding!

Since all of our guests would be traveling for our wedding, we really wanted to showcase what we love about Charleston so that they could get a great feel for the city. For many of our guests, this was their first time in Charleston. So, we had most of our wedding day outside, under Charleston’s beautiful oak tress with hanging spanish moss. We wanted the wedding to really showcase the beauty of Middleton Place, so we picked four very distinct parts of the plantation to feature throughout the day — welcome cocktails in their Octagonal Garden, the ceremony at the Butterfly Lakes which has the most dramatic, long aisle to walk down, cocktail hour at crane lake and then dancing outside under the stars.

Dana wanted vintage touches throughout, so was very excited to partner with French Eclectic on their vintage furniture and other pieces like mid-century bar carts, gilded cocktail trays and other bits.

We also loved having three events over the course of the weekend. Our welcome dinner was on the water at the Charleston Yacht Club and our brunch was at South Carolina Society Hall, which is a beautiful historic home.

What was the most important thing to you while planning?

The setting was already so beautiful, so we wanted to really splurge on the band and the bar, since those are the two most important factors to guests having fun!

Also, we love candy — specifically gummies — so we had a very elaborate candy bar that resembled English high tea with gummies arranged on tea stands.

What was your favorite memories of the day?

There’s so many. We loved just seeing all the people we loved in one place celebrating over an amazing weekend. Our nephew — who is two and a half — made the announcement for us once we were married and perfectly delivered his “Kiss the bride” line and Whit’s father officiated the wedding. We loved dancing with all of our friends and family. At one point Whit stage dived, which was amazing.

Brent Deitrich

Publisher at The White Wren | + posts

Publisher at The White Wren and Bajan Wed, Award Winning Photography + Videographer at Live View Studios, Dad, 80s music lover, crunchy health advocate