Ideas & Inspiration
for exceptional events
Together with Kelly Mier O'Hara and Jill DeVries Photography, we created some festive holiday backgrounds for your Blackbird invitations.
We think they're the perfect way to set the mood this holiday season. Check them out in the Blackbird PRO images library in our page editor. Login and start creating your invitation today.
Together with Katie Huber and team from Kenley Event Design, we hosted the Almost Holiday Party, a rooftop party to help some fellow event professionals get in the mood for the upcoming season.
We'll be passing along some of Katie's event design secrets and holiday party tips over the next few weeks, but we wanted to start by sharing some photos of the occasion.
We're pretty sure this is Grand Rapids' first rooftop bar. This space comes equipped with heaters and an awning to protect you from the elements, which was much needed during the rain we had last week.
They served up some amazing smorrebrods (translation = amazing things on bread), macarons, napoleon and a few other delectable treats. We can't recommend them enough. Their new space serves breakfast, lunch, coffee and is also available for your catering needs!
Beverage connoisseur, Stephen Curtis from Early Bird Cafe, created Strawberry Citrus & Earl Grey tea spritzers. These were delicious and were flexible enough to accommodate drinkers and non-drinkers alike, paired with Prosecco or soda water.
I'm endlessly amazed by the work of our party co-host, Kenley Event Design. Katie and her team made it seemingly effortless to transform the rooftop space into a holiday wonderland.
I mean, just look at these images. 😍
Check out our new holiday-themed banners for your holiday festivities! Styled by Kelly O'Hara and photography by Jill DeVries:
If you've used Blackbird in the past, you'll be excited to know that we've redesigned and rebuilt our entire platform from the ground up. In our new 2.0 product, you'll find an entirely new and improved user experience.
Read more about our favorite improvements or take it for a test run.
To celebrate this new milestone, I wanted to take a minute and thank some of the lovely collaborators we worked with to make this possible:
A year ago we started talking with the team at Collective Idea, a Holland, Michigan based software development team that we've have worked with for years on Sitting in a Tree, the wedding-focused product and initial inspiration for Blackbird RSVP.
We partnered with their insanely talented design & development team to create this new version (it's a custom Ruby on Rails application, in case you were curious).
Photo by Jill DeVries
Kelly is a designer in Grand Rapids, Michigan that we collaborated with on many aspects of the new product. Kelly is a graphic designer by trade but also has a killer sense of style and taste in event production.
Kelly helped us craft our new brand identity and website, as well the photo styling for our Blackbird Pro banner images.
Start Garden is a non-traditional investment fund & office space based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Over the last few years, their team has provided amazing advice, support, office space, and some startup funds to help us get to this milestone.
In addition to being home to our beloved office, Start Garden has been a key early Blackbird customer and even hosted our 2.0 Launch Party in their space.
Thanks to the team at Invest Detroit for the encouragement and direction - as well as the funds to support our development efforts!
Photo Source: jilldevries.net
Jill is responsible for shooting all the new banner images you see across blackbirdrsvp.com as well as our Blackbird Pro banner photos.
Jill is amazingly talented (check out her work on her website) and was a ton of fun to spend the day with as we sipped champagne and ate donuts (I mean, worked).
It takes a village. A huge thank you to all our early customers, beta testers, friends, and family for your help, cheerleading and feedback!
Make sure to check out Blackbird RSVP 2.0 for your online RSVP needs!
Try it out free. No credit card required. Pay only when you publish.
