Beach Picnic <3
Images by Mel Carrero
We love setting up a picnic on the beach – but it isn’t all roses, it takes a lot of work! But they are so worth the work, there is something really special about gathering with girlfriends for a gorgeous sunset picnic on the beach.
When we found out the beautiful Leonie Hanne, of Ohh Couture blog was coming to Byron for a fleeting visit, we wanted to gather some of her online friends who are based in Byron, who have been speaking for years! They always kept missing each other by a hair when travelling, and now they were all in the one place and finally able to meet! SO of course, we had to do it Byron style, and make a luxe beach picnic for her welcoming party!
Here are our tips to making something this beautiful, as we discussed, it takes a little bit of work to make a beach picnic gorgeous:
- Gather your favourite rugs, cushions and a little coffee table or two, if you can fit them into your car! Be prepared, all of this stuff is going to get lots of sand on it, so get your muscles ready to shake it all off and maybe even vacuum them before returning them to your home.
- Take as many people who will lift to help you set up. We only had three of us setting this one up, and lugging heavy rugs to the beach is a good workout, hehe! It is good to have someone to mind things at either side so no one pinches your fave cushion!
- Place down the rugs, we took two so we had ample room for all the girls. Then scatter the cushions or poufs around so people have a place to sit. Then add the coffee tables. We took two coffee tables (one was just a coffee table top not the whole thing), and one wooden tray that could sit on its own on the rugs.
- The spread, the most important part! We are really digging an Italian style spread that is somewhere between a burrata board (without the burrata cheese) and a Caprese salad, adding basil, fresh tomato, fresh balls of mozzarella together (we dusted with dukkah) and drizzling with balsamic glaze, delicious! Then we had sun-dried tomatoes, olives and crusty bread to keep with the euro feels. We did a mini #spellspread of cheese, local fruits and quince paste, and then had a gorgeous plate of raw desserts from local raw chef Heidi Flora. This spread was not only plenty of food, but a really good mix of everything for people to nibble on!
- And of course, our main tip is to consider the environment! Yes, it can be annoying lugging dishes and cutlery to the beach and cleaning them up when you get back home but why use plastic? We took down actual wine glasses, cutlery and some of our favourite ceramics in a basket, wrapped in tea towels (or you can get picnic baskets that have wine glass holders too!) and just cleaned it all up when we got home! We want to have these beautiful and special moments, but making sure we don’t leave a huge footprint once we’ve headed home.
Bon Appétit!