Olivia Schwartz  & Jay Crisfield
June 15, 2024 • The Dunes Golf & Beach Club, Myrtle Beach 

The first spark between Olivia Schwartz and Jay Crisfield was ignited when they met at a mutual friend’s 2017 New Year’s Eve party in Charlottesville, Virginia. However, Olivia was living in Chicago, Illinois, at the time, and Jay in Washington, D.C.

“I knew Jay was the one pretty early on,” says Olivia. “We hit it off that weekend and, within a couple weeks, we were already traveling back and forth to see each other when we could.”

The two continued to date long distance for about a year, with Olivia practicing law in Chicago and Jay at a software startup in DC, when Jay moved to Chicago in 2019 to see if the relationship could really work out. And, of course, as history shows, it did. Jay proposed to Olivia in June 2023 at his parent’s house in Philadelphia.

“Things with Jay were very easy,” she says. “We seemed to be on the same page on most things, and he’s really easygoing. I love how much he values friends and family, and we both have a bit of a work hard, play hard mentality. Starting long distance helped us both be a bit more upfront with one another from the start, and we both made sure to prioritize each other and our relationship, knowing that if we didn’t, it wasn’t going to work out with the distance between us.”

The wedding date was set for June 15, 2024, and plans were put in motion. The outdoor ceremony and indoor reception were held at The Dunes Golf & Beach Club in Myrtle Beach, a special place in Olivia’s heart, where generations of her family have been members for more than 50 years. Olivia’s uncle, a judge, officiated the short, but sweet ceremony, and her nephews were the ring bearers.

“Going into wedding planning, one of the first decisions we made was that we didn’t want a seated dinner,” says Olivia. “I felt that a plated dinner and assigned seating would take away from my favorite thing at a wedding, which is cocktail hour, and getting the chance to mingle and chat with everyone.”

She says they instead decided on food stations, such as a huge raw bar; a Southern station with chicken and waffles, pulled pork sliders, and fried green tomatoes; an American-style station with chicken parmesan sliders, salads, and beef tenderloin sliders; and a paella station.

Cake was replaced by Key lime pie for dessert, and an espresso martini bar was also a big hit.

Flowers, she adds, were also a huge design element for the wedding – especially for her mom – so oodles of blooms in bold colors to match the bold bridesmaid dresses were inserted everywhere.

“Honestly, I wouldn’t change a thing about our wedding day,” says Olivia. “A lot of my best friends had gotten married in the couple of years before me, and their advice for me leading up to our wedding was not to let anything bother me on this special day … and that stuck with me.”

The newlyweds reside in Chicago, where Olivia works as a personal injury attorney and Jay is a software engineer.

Key Vendors:
Photographer: Paula Player Photography
Planner: Steele Magnolia Events
Florals: RSG Event Designs 
Band, music: Mr. Potato Head/
East Coast Entertainment