In a perfect world the task of choosing wedding colors would be as simple as choosing your favorite combination and leaving it at that. Unfortunately, we do not live in a perfect world. Neither do we live in a vacuum. And the practice of choosing our favorite combination forgets that our wedding colors have to work in our wedding venue... as many brides have discovered after it was too late to do anything to remedy the situation.

Let me illustrate with the story of some friends of ours who were looking to redecorate the interior of their house (stick with me; this is incredibly relevant to your choice of wedding colors). They started off where everyone says you should start, by dreaming about what they wanted. After much discussion the settled on a color scheme, but there was just something that still did not feel quite right so they found a local company that provided free access to a design consultant.

The meeting with the design consultant was a real eye opener. The colors they had chosen went beautifully together - but not in their house! If they were building a new house or renewing absolutely everything in the house the combination could be stunning - but those colors would not work with the red oak flooring of their house, or the tile work, or....

Likewise, you can choose an incredible combination for your wedding colors but if you have not taken into consideration the colors already present in your wedding venue then you run the risk of creating a look that you would not wish on your worst enemy's wedding, much less your wedding day.

Remedy for This Wedding Color Dilemma

As illustrated above, the process of choosing your wedding colors begins with incorporating the colors, tones, and shades already present in your wedding venue. This can be accomplished in one of three ways:

Choose your wedding colors before you choose your wedding venue and then search until you find a venue that will accommodate your choice of wedding colors. Unfortunately, unless you have years to dream and search this is often not very practical.

Take as many pictures of your wedding venue as possible so you have a record of the specific shades and tones of everything that will be in the venue when you are getting married. Of course, if the venue provides a sample kit of painted or stained woods, fabric swatches, etc it is worth your while to make full use of it in choosing your wedding color scheme.

Build your own wedding venue. That way you can control the color scheme for your wedding from the start.

You want your wedding to be stunning. Something you are going to look back on with fondness for years to come. You do not want something as simple as your choice of the color of the bridesmaids' dresses to make your wedding visually unattractive. So prevent that wedding stress by choosing your wedding colors is relatively easy - as long as you consider all of the colors that will be present.