Ever wish you could combine your love for the outdoors with your desire to bring friends and family together in an accessible location to celebrate your love? Well… you can! When thinking about wedding locations, don’t skip on the idea of having your wedding at one of the many gorgeous parks our states have to offer!

This particular wedding was at the Millersylvania State Park in Olympia, Washington. This park was the perfect backdrop for Sydney and Tristan’s intimate micro-wedding. The Millersylvania State Park offers up quite a few great features that are worth considering when you are planning your state park wedding.

Getting Ready Location

One thing you definitely want to think about is… where will you be getting ready? Most brides prefer to have a designated space to gather with their bridal party and take some time before the wedding to get ready together. If you are having your wedding at a state park, check to see if they have yurts or glamping tents, like this one!

These rustic tents made for the perfect home base as the girls all gathered together to get their hair and makeup done for the wedding. There were even outlets to plug in hair tools and makeup lights!

The groomsmen also got ready in one of these reservable tents, just on a different site so the girls could have their privacy.

First Look Under the Trees

If you are doing a first look prior to your ceremony, think about where in the park you would want this to be. Sydney and Tristan knew they wanted their first look to be close to the ceremony location so they could easily meet up with family and their wedding party after for photos.

Every state park is different, but at this park there was a gorgeous tree-lined path that followed along the lake. It was relatively private with not much foot traffic, so that was where we all decided it would be best to do their first look!

Ceremony: Decor and Privacy

One of the many perks of having your wedding at a state park is that the natural landscape is most of the decor! Instead of having to spend money on little odds and ends to fill your venue space, you can bring your focus to more intentional small silhouettes around your wedding.

Sydney and Tristan decided to have their ceremony under the towering cedar trees of the park. They made a custom backdrop that fit the style of their woodsy wedding and kept the rest of the decor pretty minimal.

Important! Remember that although you can reserve a group space within state parks to host a wedding, it is still public land. You cannot keep park visitors from enjoying the park around your reservation site. For most people this isn’t an issue, it’s just very important to keep that in mind!

Reception and Catering

Because it was the heat of the summer and these two were gifted a beautiful sunny Washington day, their reception was able to be held just outside of the covered area they reserved. The covered site made for the perfect place to set up the dinner buffet, catered by Mama Stortini’s.

P.S. There is an ice cream shop at this state park right next to where their reception location was! So fun!

If you choose to have your wedding at a state park… here are some other things to keep in mind…

• This is public land, practice Leave No Trace
• There will be other visitors at the park, and that’s okay!
• Follow the park rules and respect those around you
• If you are wanting to dance the night away, remember to check sound ordinances in the area

We DID end up having to cut the reception for Sydney and Tristan early (oopsie!) because this specific park sits directly across a private neighborhood. There ended up being noise complaints, so the bride and groom had the option to either turn down the noise or head to another location to party-on and well… they chose to hop right into the after party as Mr. and Mrs!

Overall, these two had a BLAST celebrating their love at together at this state park! I hope this blog post gives you some fun ideas on how to make your dreamy woodsy wedding a reality!

x, Aliyah