Hello ladies! Sorry for the long silence – I’ve been busy and happily designing away. To keep you in the loop – apart from very exciting brand design projects for wedding professionals and a sweet wedding illustration commission, I’ve been busy developing new exclusive design items.

Get this – I just created my first scarf design!

I found a fashion fabric house who works with me on creating high quality fashion scarves in quantities as low as 10 pieces. So now I can offer custom-illustrated scarves for brides and their bridesmaids or guests. I cannot say how excited I am about this! Imagine, your very own design, captured on your own limited-edition fashion scarf, to accompany you wherever you go, reminding you of your happy wedding celebrations. To keep, forever. And you (and whoever you gave it to as gift) will be the only one to own it! SWOON, right?! I can’t wait to design one for one of my next brides! For now, here are some mood board teaser images for you of an upcoming engagement photo shoot in New York, for which I created such a fashion scarf. 

This will be the upbeat summery color palette of the photo shoot:

this is the kind of fabric my scarf will be made of:

(click image for image source and credits)

and we’ll also have new clear perspex items in our fashion-inspired wedding shoot

- as you may know by now, I love designing with clear materials!

custom illustrated drink stir by Astrid Mueller Exclusive - photo by AndreaAndMarcus.com

See the full mood board for this inspirational photo shoot here on my pinterest account

Sign up for my news to be in the first row when I’ll reveal the photos!

Recently, I created several design items for a modern, SATC inspired bride & girlfriend photo shoot in NYC. Today, it was featured on the most popular wedding blog of all times, Style Me Pretty! Here are a few sneak peeks… get ready – there are some illustrated design items and unique wedding celebration ideas that I have never made before!

The bride and her girlfriends having a ball at Gabriella New York bridal salon. I particularly love the white gown in the middle, with the gem patterns – it’s so unique, isn’t it! And it looks absolutely ravishing on the bride. Bridesmaids gowns by Two Birds Bridesmaid. Custom-made perspex rings with tailor-made illustration: yes, I made these for the bridesmaids! If you’re interested in more design items like this, visit AstridMuellerExclusive.com or email me.

As you see above, I also made matching illustrated perspex drink stirs for the occasion. For the concept of the gem illustrations as glamorous NYC style element, I drew inspiration from the recently auctioned Elizabeth Taylor jewelry collection. What inspiration that was!  I also created several hand-debossed velvet design accents, which featured the designs. You see above a napkin ring and a glimpse of another debossed fabric piece. I had also made a velvet scarf, chokers and hair accessories, as well as a tailor-made matching perspex clutch (not shown).

All of my design items you see above are tailor-made to order. If you’re interested in accentuating your celebration with your own unique design pieces, and in new wedding design accents and gifts that may have never been made and seen before , visit AstridMuellerExclusive.com for initial inspiration, or email me directly.

Hope you enjoyed the glimpses above! See more in the Style Me Pretty blog feature here and browse the full gallery with all photos here!

CREDITS:

Photography: Andrea & Marcus Couture Wedding Photography | Second Photographer: Helga Schaefer | Locations: Gabriella New York Bridal Salon + Tribeca Rooftop | Floral Design: Cornucopia Flowers | Illustrated Drink Stirrers, Rings + Debossed Velvet Accents: Astrid Mueller | Stationery: The Pink Orange | Furniture Rentals: Party Rental Ltd. | Linens: Nuage Designs | Table Styling: Swank Productions | Wedding Gowns: Legends by Romona Keveza, Marchesa + Jenny Packham via Gabriella New York Bridal Salon | Bridesmaids’ Dresses: Two Birds Bridesmaid | Hair: Keila Sone + Cha Cha Savoy | Makeup: Tanisha Faye | Fashion Styling: Lakeniya Kelly of The Dapifer

The Italian magazine Oggi Sposi just featured some of the design items I created for Moscha’s magnificent wedding in Venice! Warm thanks to the wonderful wedding professionals who helped make everything happen, to Moscha from StellaAndMoscha.com for commissioning me to design for her wedding, to Andrea from AndreaAndMarcus.com for amazing photos, and big thanks to Andrea Naar Alba from Wed Couture Italy for her event design (together with StellaAndMoscha) and for making the press connection.

 See more photos of Moscha’s wedding and all the design items I created for her by peeking at my recent newsletter here.

While I don’t recommend to make your wedding stationery too fashionable (you still want to love it 20 years from now), why not take inspiration from fashion that you can’t take your eyes off?

For example, you may love the filigree details of a head piece or dress…

Josephine Skriver at Valentino FW 11 (Source: deus-e-x-machina)

…or the bold geometric elegance of a gown…

Valentino FW 11 (Source: deus-e-x-machina) beautiful geometry

…or a particular shoe design that just knocks your socks off:Temperley London Fall Winter 2012

…or maybe you’ve always been smitten with bows?

 Bow ankle cuffs. jdotdesigns. Etsy.

…or you are drawn to the look of a particular fashion era?

unknown photographer, around 1950

Don’t worry if you don’t know what to do with all this inspiration. Just have fun collecting your favorite images, then show them to your stationery designer as reference. You’ll be amazed at what they can create for you!

When I design for couples (portfolio: AstridMuellerExclusive.com), I always try to first get to know them as much as possible, so that I can create designs that reflect who they really are, and their personal style. In addition to a personal phone call and receiving personal photos, I love working with pinterest. Brides can collect a wealth of photo inspiration there, and then simply share their favorite photo collections (called ‘boards’ on pinterest) with me – it’s easy and a lot of fun (and addictive)!

I’m quite obsessed with my own pinterest collection – it’s my personal and ever-growing treasure-chest of inspiration. Are you on pinterest yet? If not, just email me and I’ll gladly invite you. See you there!

Excited to announce thatI just launched my first official Astrid Mueller newsletter! It will always be showcasing the latest from my design atelier, with a sneak peek into how I work, brand new design items that I developed, and lots of eye candy! Interested? Come see, come sign up!

In this newsletter, I was able to show amaaaaazing photos from Andrea and Marcus, with permission of the couple Moscha & Nikos. Moscha is a wedding designer, specializing in exclusive Greek Island weddings (www.StellaAndMoscha.com), and she got married in beautiful Venice, Italy. Can you imagine how gorgeous everything was? I’m thrilled that I was able to illustrate and create unique new design items for her and Nikos!

Sneak peek (click here to get to the actual newsletter):

  If you’re intrigued, make sure to sign up! What news from me would you be most interested in?

Last fall, I shared a sneak peek with you of an exclusive new design item that I’ve recently developed: tailor-made illustrated drink stirs. Couture wedding photographer Andrea from AndreaAndMarcus.com offered her talent and created a lovely styled shoot with the swizzle sticks I had made for her. I’m super excited that the beautiful vintage-inspired wedding blog Love My Dress from the UK just featured lots of eye candy from the photo shoot!

Enjoy a few sneak peeks from the Love My Dress blog feature:

unique event design element and conversation starter: tailor-made illustrated drink stirs

special design accent for the cocktail bar: a matching display and keepsake item

I think these drink stirs are a lovely and very personalized design element for engagement parties, bridal showers, the bridal cocktail bar, or even the reception. A great conversation starter and guest favor too!

Since I’ve first written about them, I’ve received a lot of inquiries. A bride I recently designed for had also spotted them, fell in love, and commissioned me to design swizzle sticks for her own wedding. She got married in beautiful Venice, Italy (how romantic!!!), and celebrated in the magnificent Ca’Sagredo Hotel right on the Canale Grande. I just saw the photos from AndreaAndMarcus.com yesterday (still top secret), they are G.O.R.G.E.O.U.S. and will be featured on Style Me Pretty shortly. I can’t wait! Stay tuned, I’ll share glimpses here when they’re online!

To see more photos and inspiration from this lovely shoot, visit The Lovely Dress Blog. For further unique wedding ideas or if you’re interested in couture swizzle-sticks for yourself, visit AstridMuellerExclusive.com or email me – Looking forward to hearing from you!

How would you incorporate the drink stirs into your own festivities?

PS: If you’re a wedding designer or blogger and would like to blog about them too, email me, I’ve got more photos that haven’t been published yet.

One for the ladies! (As if everything else I write hasn’t been haha)

I’m currently creating items for a styled photoshoot in New York, with a bunch of incredibly talented wedding professionals, like Maya Kalman from SwankProductions, Andrea from Andrea & Marcus, Rebecca Ashby from ThePinkOrange stationery studio… here are a few sneak peeks from our mood board!

Glitter inspiration:

image via pinterest via Maya Kalman via wedding chicks …

Liz Taylor’s jewelry as inspiration for my illustrations:

one of Liz Taylor’s amazing jewelry pieces – recently auctioned at Christie’s

one of our muses for modern New York fashion groove, winter feeling and materials:

New York style impersonated – Sarah Jessica Parker (image via Pinterest)

one of the materials we’ll work with is velvet:

velvet roses – image via pinterest - as inspiration for velvet material

See our full inspiration board here on my pinterest account!

I’m super buzzed about the photo shoot, I know it will be so glamorous, so much eye candy! Swoooooooon! I’m creating a bunch of design accents with my illustrations that I’ve never made before. With velvet! And cast acrylic! I’m really excited about these as well. Stay tuned! Come back!

In harmony with the Holiday season, I just worked on a very festive design project: a bride commissioned me to illustrate a baroque ballroom photo backdrop for a bridal photo shoot! The bride will be sitting in front of the backdrop, on an actual baroque chaise, and it will look as if she’s sitting in front of a magnificent Louis XIV inspired ballroom. Isn’t this just a super neat idea?

Here’s a sneak peek of the 16 feet tall tableau:
illustration by Astrid Mueller Exclusive – intended to be used as bridal photo shoot backdrop

I’m in love with this idea of a photo backdrop with an illustration, custom-tailored to the style of the celebration – I mean how unique is that? I can picture this to be extremely fun for a bachelorette night too – I bet they’d love to be photographed princess-style!

Are you dreaming of getting married in the wonderful Mediterranean, on a Greek Island? Then this inspiration may be just perfect for you. Through my brand design atelier, I recently had the opportunity to develop and design the new brand for Stella and Moscha (formerly known as Weddings in Santorini). They are really talented top notch Greek Island wedding designers, and it was a pleasure to help them do their work justice with a custom-tailored new brand design. I’m so excited for them: their new website and Greek Island Wedding Inspirations blog went live this weekend!

A sneak peek of their new website:

www.StellaAndMoscha.com – brand design by Astrid Mueller Boutique Branding

and their new blog:

www.GreekIslandWeddingInspirations.com – brand design by Astrid Mueller Boutique Branding

This is some of the inspiration I worked with when designing for them:

I collected these images (and more, see my mood board on pinterest) in light of their unique expertise and brand characteristics – each image holds special significance:

1. Inspiration: Aphrodite, Greek goddess of love, and Greek art history. Image via pinterest
2. Last century’s designer to the stars: Madame Grès, whose muse was classical greek fashion. Image via pinterest
3. Moscha from Stella and Moscha asked me to be inspired by the classical Greek Meandros pattern, as seen in this piece
4. The wedding designers’ work is top notch, they work with designer hotels and for international brides – these Louboutin’s signified this for me
5. Grace Santorini Hotel, one of the boutique hotels Stella and Moscha work with
6. This image visualized their brand feeling for me: Celebrating, warm Mediterranean sea breeze, warmth, luxury, joy of life! Image via pinterest
7. Greek Stefanas, traditional wedding crowns. Moscha loved these as inspiration, and we played with the thought of using them in the design!

I’ll share more details soon! In the meantime, start dreaming of a vacation in Greece – like I am right now! – and indulge in Stella and Moscha’s beautiful event design galleries.

Happy weekend everyone!

I bet you are all super crazed at this time – the end of the year is almost upon us, the holidays, and what with the cold weather! At least where I am (shiver). Here’s  bit of wedding inspiration to shake you out everything that’s on your mind these days:

As Annie Lee from daughter of design (one of my fav wedding designers!) says (see point 3 in these style tips from her): “Your inspiration can come from anywhere.” It can be one little thing that you love, which will get all your inspiration going. Or one big thing. How about PUCCI?

Pucci – Inspiration from Italy

In my book, this designer is a god of patterns. Just looking at them makes me think of ornamental accents for a wedding stationery suite. How about you? Another muse could be the materials you see above. Wouldn’t the gold embroidery be a lavish design element to use in your celebration? Or lace that’s brought to modern times through fashion inspired patterns like you see above?

If you’re in inspiration heaven now, fabulous! If not and you like help, contact me any time (specializing in sophisticated illustrations and celebration design accents, I’d be delighted to create a unique concept for you – click here to learn more).