The Offbeat Bride: Amy, Web Marketing Manager

Her Offbeat Partner: Steve, Paralegal

Location & date of wedding: Stern Grove, San Francisco, CA — 06/27/2009

The happily married couples.

What made our wedding offbeat: Brian and Helen, some of our best friends, were planning to get married around the same time. We came up with the brilliant idea to have a psudo-double wedding; two ceremonies, one big party. It seemed to make perfect sense — our guest lists were essentially identical, except for our immediate families.

Continue reading "Amy & Steve's San Francisco Burner Double Wedding" →

You've seen this wedding before when Ariel raved about the "best woman's" amazing outfit. Now get the entire scoop on my friend Alex's beautiful offbeat redwood forest wedding that I was lucky to attend.

The Offbeat Bride: Alex- Community Manager

Her Offbeat Partner: Mark- Restaurant Manager

Location & date of wedding: Nestldown, Los Gatos CA (aka Paradise) — June 25, 2009

What made our wedding offbeat: Mark and I wanted to make this wedding as much about our personality and love as possible. We had a close friend become ordained in order to marry us. She did an unforgettable job!

Continue reading "Alex & Mark's Mexi-Kitchy-Chic-Forest-Wonderland Wedding" →

Not only does Alex & Mark's wedding (recently captured by none other than my Offbeat Intern Megan!) look like a slice of forest magic … but they provide a great answer to the question: when you're having a gender-blind wedding party, what should the Best Woman wear if she wants to look feminine, but still like she's a part of the groom's wedding party and not the bride's? Well, here's your solution:

A black dress with the same custom silk-screened tie as the groomsman!

To see more gorgeous shots from this Day of the Dead-themed Santa Cruz wedding, head on over to Megan's blog. And stay tuned for all the wedding details…

The Offbeat Bride: Sara, Educational Consultant and Obsessive Blogger

Her Offbeat Partner: Matt, Director of Sharing for a network of charter schools

Location & date of wedding: Sunshine Mountain Lodge in the mountains of Colorado — July 19, 2008

What made our wedding offbeat:We started the wedding planning process by declaring a strict and modest budget: $2,000 to be exact. We wanted our wedding to be about sincerity, authenticity, connection, and a celebration and proclamation of love and commitment. We didn’t want it to be about monogrammed napkins and excessive amounts of fondant. In all honesty, we didn’t want to let our wedding overshadow our relationship (and we needed to save money for the house we planned to buy four days after our wedding).

Continue reading "Sara & Matt's Summer Camp Wedding" →

Hopefully I'll have more photos and the full story from the Zimtrix California forest wedding soon, but for now I must share this photo of the wedding dress, which was designed and constructed by Jessica Hinel, a costume designer and seamstress based in the Bay Area:

If you want to know more about the dress and see the amazing Wai-Ching-inspired split train, go read the designer's blog post about her design and construction process. Jessica also did the groom's styling, which she's promised to blog about soon. I'll be waiting.