While the Spring season should be filling our days with sunshine, and blooming color… sometimes mother nature throws us a curve ball. This winter has been brutal and never-ending, but the Easter weekend and so many other Spring festivities are coming fast. So, we welcome bright color palettes, pastel trends, and the beginning of wedding season.

To get into the Spring spirit, our creative design team at Art of Imagination decided to let the light shine into Room 1520 and break out the china. The vintage china, of course. Similar to Friendsgiving, our team built an entire tablescape around the idea of hosting multiple friends for an Easter weekend dinner. We introduced a Spring color palette featuring a soft purple tablecloth with lavender, pink, soft butter yellow, and sage green details. The beautiful chinaware from Tablescapes resembles a pattern from the French Royalty, and compliments the beautiful colored glassware.

Our event planners  also came up with a few kid-like traditions that are sure to make your adult guests smile. Guests can dye eggs during the cocktail hour, to later be used as place cards on the table. A colorful candy buffet is not only a trend that’s booming, but also a great reason for guests to make up their own Easter baskets.

Special Thanks to our friends at Tablescapes and Private Label Linens for the beautiful tablecloths and napkins. Art of Imagination provided all chinaware, glasses, decor and liquor. And, a special thanks for these amazing photos by Room 1520’s own Stephen Hamilton for the photos!

MARCH MADNESS is here!!! The brackets are announced; let the games begin! …and the party fun! Here are some of our favorite quick snack and party ideas to keep your own team of “players” happy throughout the tourney!

Bite-sized treats are the perfect snack, as you and your friends cheer on your team through the bracket. Mini-Sliders and Wings are the #1 crowd pleasers and hearty option with so much variety, from the meat to the toppings. The spread shown below features grilled chicken, bison, beef, and veggie sliders; the plethora of Wings from Output Lounge in Chicago.

Popcorn is another great option for a snack that packs a big punch! Serve the easy-to-make munchy in individual servings by using cute popcorn props from your local party store. Create your own signature mix or host an entire buffet of flavors, salts, and other great toppings. Chicago loves their popcorn so be sure to grab your favorite local variety at Garretts, Marianos, or Wells Street Popcorn.

Be sure to have some fun with the desserts! These basketball cake pops from  Elysia Root Cakes could feature your team name for a more personalized option! Display them in a unique way, like a handful of everyone’s favorite gummie worms!

The table decor was an easy DIY project, using plywood from Home Depot. Our team placed contact paper on it, and used a white marker to draw the lines of the court. Simple and Easy!!

Special Thanks to Output Lounge for the delicious menu! We’d also like to thank our friends at Elysia Root Cakes for the beautiful desserts. Art of Imagination provided all of the chinaware, glasses, decor and liquor.

Deborah loves the lovely ladies at WCIU’s You & Me In the Morning, Melissa Forman and Jeanne Sparrow! We were so excited to join them this morning to talk about all things Oscars!!! For this home-party idea, we were inspired by three of this year’s Best Picture nominees: Gravity, American Hustle and Wolf of Wall Street. We let our inspiration guide us in decor, menu items and even at the bar.

Special thanks to The Caterist in Evanston!
Check out more of the cocktail recipes inspired by this year’s top movies here!

From Behind The Scenes:

From Deborah’s Instagram:

Superbowl Sunday is coming up fast and it’s time to grab your astroturf and masking tape… we’re making a table fit for a football champion. WomensForum.com’s Andrea Metcalf stopped by Loft on Lake and asked our own, Deborah Weisenhaus to showcase some fun tips and tricks to decorate and enjoy a Super Bowl party of your own. We’ve posted a few quick shots here, but you can watch the entire segment at WomensForum.com/Super-Bowl

Decor

With a few pieces of PVC pipe and some yellow paint, you can create a field goal to anchor your table top decor. Looking for a fun way to display your menu? Use chalkboard paint and markers to draw out the culinary game plan for the evening.

Food & Treats

Aside from decor, food is the all-important element to your Superbowl Party. Our team of designers teamed up with personal chef, Markus Ford to bring you a sophisticated menu chocked full of comfort food favorites, like a trail mix station. Guest can fill their own goodie bags full of popcorn, nuts, pretzel bits, mini chocolate candies and more to bring back to their front row seat for the big game (a.k.a. your couch)! Check out some of the great photos from our mini photo shoot with Andrea from Women’s Forum

Red is the color of passion, desire, and love. Thus, it is a perfect color to be included in your wedding design plans. Whether it has a primary presence in your color palette or you offer your guests pops of red color in the small details, red is a very emotionally intense color.

• Light red represents joy, sexuality, passion, sensitivity, and love.
• Pink signifies romance, love, and friendship. It denotes feminine qualities and passiveness.
• Dark red is associated with vigor, willpower, rage, anger, leadership, courage, longing, malice, and wrath.
• Reddish-brown is associated with harvest and fall.

Wedding Design evokes feeling and mood for your guests to envelope themselves in while they focus on you, your marriage, and the love affair that’s in the air. Using red tones in your wedding designs can…

Pops of Red Color

Festive Red Details

Lush Royal Red

Modern Reds

Deep Deep Reds

Light & Soft Reds

Reds & Golds

Red Elegance

 To see more red inspirations, visit our Pinterest board just for you!

Our decor ideas were recently featured on ABC7 as part of their DIY Oscar Party planning segment. Click image to watch the segment or scroll through for our decor ideas.

1. Creating the red carpet and backdrop with props next to it so they can add special touches:
– take photos with guests’ smart phones and post to Instagram
– Winner will be announced for Best Dressed by whoever gets the most likes and/or comments
– Have a red runner (pick up from a party store); backdrop

2. Décor: Candles – candles and more candles
Make custom candles with printed velum inside listing the movies up for Academy Awards.

These are the items you need:
– 1-12″ clear glass cylinder
– 1-frosted vellum paper that already has a color copy of the Oscar statue printed on from a home printer
– LED light which you can buy at a craft store or even Home Depot
– scissors
– double-sided tape
– pencil

Instructions:
You take the vellum and wrap it around the outside of the cylinder to determine the size needed then mark it with a pencil- cut it evenly and with the double sided tape adhere it to the front of the cylinder. Place the glass cylinder upright then drop in the LED light and voila…you have your own illuminate Oscar for the night which can serve as a take home gift!