Fun Offbeat Fact: Stasha's brother-in-law Dave Tusk's wedding was previously profiled on Offbeat Bride. I'm sure most all of you will remember Lucifire & Dave Tusks bright red circus wedding! As Stasha put it, "We're just one big freaky family!"

The Offbeat Bride: Stasha, Gal Friday

Her Offbeat Partner: Rob, Student

Location & date of wedding: City Center, Redwood City, California — July 23, 2008

What made our wedding offbeat: We didn't stick with many traditions at all and, with the help and contributions of our friends, we did the entire thing for under $600 (and that includes our clothes)!

Continue reading "Stasha & Rob's Vintage Goth Wedding with Bubbles" →

Allow me to introduce Jillian Venters, also known as The Lady of the Manners.

Jillian is the pre-eminent expert on goth etiquette. She runs gothic-charm-school.com and is the author of the book Gothic Charm School: An Essential Guide for Goths and Those Who Love Them.

Today she joins us with a guest post with etiquette tips for goths who've been invited to weddings both gothy and more white-dress-frothy … but her book includes a whole section dedicated to goth wedding etiquette for both guests and hosts.

If you're planning a gothic wedding of your own, Offbeat Bride and Gothic Charm School have teamed up to to give away both a signed copy of Jillina's book AND a print of the custom "gothy wedding" artwork that's in the book. Details at the end of the post!

Goth Wedding Tips, by Jillian Venters

October is always filled with gothy (and even non-gothy) couples getting married. And before any of you start making off-hand remarks about what a cliché it is, goths getting married on Halloween, hee hee hee, oh how spooky; firstly, that’s the Lady of the Manners’ own wedding anniversary you’re chortling at there, and secondly, it’s no more of a cliché than other couples getting married in June (Midsummer anyone?). It really isn’t — in fact; there isn’t any month that doesn’t have some sort of cliché stigma for weddings. The Lady of the Manners is going to stop herself before she wanders down that tangent much further, and get back to the topic at hand. Yes, there are weddings in October. Gothy and non-gothy themed weddings, each of which has its own set of unique etiquette concerns.

Continue reading "Goth wedding etiquette, by Jillian Venters" →

I am DYING to know more about this dark and sexy wedding. I'm already harassing the bride to get the full scoop for y'all soon.

The Offbeat Bride: Andrea, District Credit Manager (aka Drea on the OBT).

Her Offbeat Partner: Brian, Medical Collector

Location & date of wedding: Bartlett Hills Golf Course, Bartlett, Illinois — October 10, 2008.

What made our wedding offbeat: We did everything ourselves and planned ahead just right!

Continue reading "Andrea & Brian's Gothic, Horror Movie Wedding" →

Part of what I love so much about Offbeat Bride is that I feel like it's all about finding inspiration outside of my little aesthetic bubble. For instance, I'm soooo not a native of the goth/industrial/fetish scene, but I can find about 10 inspiring things in the wedding photo below, which is from Severina & Seraphim's Seattle handfasting:

(photo courtesy of gak photography)

… In what unexpected places have YOU found inspiration?

(Thanks to the lovely ladies of the OBT for finding this photo!)

The Offbeat Bride: Rachael, Neurobiology grad student and researcher (and hard-workingOBT mod)

My Offbeat Partner: Dustin, Writer and English major

Location & date of the wedding: Wyndham St. Anthony Hotel, San Antonio, TX — 06/07/2008

What made our wedding offbeat: Those that know us personally, really got it. Allow me to explain: Dustin is the very essence of a hippie writer, but taken in the tradition of Hunter S. Thompson, and I have always been the crazy Asian goth (I play with brains all day — it doesn't get any more gothic-mad-scientist-y than that!).

Continue reading "Rachael & Dustin's Goth Buddhist Wedding" →