The offbeat bride: Lea Vendetta, Tattooist/Artist

Her offbeat partner: Dave “Bastard” Archer, Tattooist

Location & date of wedding: Smathers Beach, Key West, Florida. April 1st 2008

What made our wedding offbeat: We got married in 1995 at the courthouse with no ceremony and no pictures. It was just the two of us, we were broke, and it was lame. Our 13th anniversary was coming up and I wanted to do something to finally be able to remember our wedding as a fabulous real wedding day! Of course we decided to do something 2 weeks before, so we improvised and everything ended up working perfectly! …like it was meant to be…

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The offbeat bride: Kristen / Retail Manager, but trying to get out

Her offbeat groom: Todd / Production Assistant

Location & date of wedding: Miami University Campus, Oxford, OH. Oct. 13, 2007

What made our wedding offbeat: It started with Todd proposing without a ring, saying we should pick one out/design it together. And that began the trend for the whole wedding, a DIY eco-friendly nuptials that really told all our guests who we are.

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The offbeat bride: Elisa, Secretary/Adjunct Professor/Grad Student cum Rock Star

Her offbeat partner: Evan, Sound Engineer/Guitar Player

Location & date of wedding: Friend’s home in Miami, FL. 2/29/2008

What made our wedding offbeat: Evan and I spent the whole day together with our bridal party, bucking tradition. We also had a Pagan handfasting, complete with broom-jumping. The reception was a BBQ buffet with karaoke and a Super Mario Brothers-themed wedding cake.

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The offbeat bride: Carissa, hairstylist/sometime burlesque dancer

Her offbeat partner: Adam, casino chump and art student

Location & date of wedding: Riverside, CA @ Cafe Sevilla. March 29, 2008

What made our wedding offbeat: We tried to go DIY with all we could. I have a love of all things antique so I went with a birdcage theme — I had them for centerpieces, on the DIY invites, I wore a birdcage veil, etc. I opted out of flowers galore and only got some for myself, the girls, and the guys wore single daisies. We had cupcakes, and no formal dinner. I let my girls wear what they wanted, I just said I’d prefer black. I walked my mother and grandfather down the aisle (to Cat Power’s “sea of love!”) to their seats.

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The offbeat bride: Angela - Notary Public/Office Manager

Her offbeat partner: Chris

Location & date of wedding: 1/19/2008. Ceremony was at The Marston House’s rose garden in Balboa Park San Diego, CA. The reception was at another favorite our neighborhood bar, LEI Lounge.

What made our wedding offbeat: We have been together for a decade and I never thought we were going to get married. We wanted a very nontraditional wedding and basically a big party — or as our friends say, “Another A&C Production!” I knew right away I was going to wear a RED dress, no questions asked. And of course a tea length dress so you can see the fabulous shoes — everyone knows my obsession with shoes!

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Those of you who have read the book will remember Ben & Joriel. They had a wedding on March 20, 2005, but opted not to get legally married because of concerns with marriage inequality. Yesterday was their third anniversary, and they celebrated by making their commitment legal! I was proud to be a witness at their Seattle courthouse wedding:

So, why did they decide to make get legally married after all these years? The short answer: Joriel is pregnant. The longer answer is eloquently written out on Joriel’s blog:

We still feel strongly that the institution of marriage is not what we wish it was … We can only hope that the institution of marriage will continue to evolve and that perhaps we can help that process along by continuing to challenge homophobia, gender role assumptions, religious persecution, and other forms of oppression in our relationship and in our lives. [read the whole thing]

The offbeat bride: Kirsten, RN and baby catcher (See Kirsten’s page on the OBT!)

Her offbeat partner: Ebony, woodworker

Location & date of wedding: USO building, Fort Worden, Port Townsend, WA. 1/12/2008

What made our wedding offbeat: I had a white dress…that’s where the tradition ended! We agreed at the outset that we would not pay ANYONE to do ANYTHING. We invited our friends and family to “bring what makes them who they are” to share. We had no idea what our wedding would look like — we were not disappointed.

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The offbeat bride: Brit, Admin

Her offbeat partner: Cecilia, Accountant

Location & date of wedding: Historic building outside Boston, MA, October 13, 2007

What made our wedding offbeat: We made the decision early on that we would keep whatever traditional wedding elements we liked, and ditch those we didn’t! This meant the white dress was out, along with “tossing” of anything, but the ceremony and reception with all our friends and family were in. We had a modest budget, and incorporated lots of DIY. I made all of our paper products, centerpieces and my bouquet. We also used rented audio equipment and mix cd’s for the music and did all the decor ourselves. Other things that puzzled our families included walking down the aisle together, not having a bridal party and planning the entire thing ourselves.

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The offbeat bride: Stacey, Figure Skating Coach & Graphic Designer

Her offbeat groom: Joel, Motion Capture Specialist

Location & date of wedding: Strathcona Park Lodge between Campbell River and Gold River, BC. August 25, 2007

What made our wedding offbeat: My job as a Graphic Designer was at a wedding invitation design studio. My whole life had been filled with other people’s wedding plans for years. I’d always been the one dishing out advice and helping people with their taffeta filled or very alternative plans. So when it was my turn I had lots of ideas but I also knew that everything had to be different from anything I had worked on for a client. Having helped with a few hundred weddings, that was very difficult but it also pushed me to try things I wouldn’t have otherwise.

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The offbeat bride: Dawn Hajnos (Doula/Artist/Student Midwife)

Her offbeat partner: Jason Keil (Woodworker/Artist/Painter)

Location & date of wedding: Honeymoon Island State Park, Dunedin Fl & The Spirit of the Suwannee Music Park Live Oak, FL. Oct 9th and 13th 2007.

What made our wedding offbeat: Our wedding belonged to Us. We invited only our best friends who, thankfully are married to each other and our close family friend officiant. We got married in a tide pool at Honeymoon Island State Park in Dunedin Fl. After we said our vows the four of us island hopped along the gulf of mexico. Our plans were not popular with some of our friends and family but it was what we wanted and we refused to settle….It was the most relaxing loving, perfect day with NO stress.

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You’ve seen Fancy Pony Land on offbeatbride.com before — now here’s the story on Lorna’s own wedding!

The offbeat bride: Lorna Leedy, fashion designer and creator of Fancy Pony Land

Her offbeat partner: Peter Maggio, Park Ranger

Location & date of wedding: 7/8/6, The Gould Community Center in Gould, CO (North-Central Colorado)

What made our wedding offbeat: We had a Frontier Pioneer themed wedding in the North Park area of North-Central Colorado, where my family has a fly-fishing ranch. It’s one of the most gorgeous places on earth.
The wedding was supposed to be at my family’s cabin on the Ginger Quill Ranch, overlooking the North Platte River, but torrential rain forced us to have the wedding in the reception hall, the Gould Community Center. It’s an old wooden building with exposed beams and a giant fireplace. We had 175 people packed in there and the crowdedness made it really intimate and wonderful. We couldn’t have planned it better.

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The offbeat bride: Annalise, Makeup Artist

Her offbeat partner: Adam, Carpenter

Location & date of wedding: Minneapolis, MN, November 3, 2007

What made our wedding offbeat: People loved to remark that our wedding was “our big, fat, vintage, native-american, Dia de los Muertos wedding.”

We got married in a Native American church, using the traditions such as smudging, a water ceremony, and a quilt ceremony with our elders, and my husband spent some time in the teepee with our elders before the ceremony.

We also managed to fit it in with our favorite holiday, Dia de los Muertos, and my love of all things vintage into it.

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The offbeat bride: Bree, Hairdresser

Her offbeat groom: Damien

Location & date of wedding: Army Navy Country Club, Fairfax VA, October 6, 2007

What made our wedding offbeat: We wanted to be different and rock a roll — but still very elegant. I walked down the aisle to a Johnny Cash tune!

Our biggest challenge: We really had very little difficulty — we planned well in advance and stayed in our budget. Being understanding, compromising and remembering that it’s supposed to be a fun and special time kept any disagreement and difficulty at bay.

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Wai-Ching’s wedding dresses are the stuff of legend here on offbeatbride.com — but what about Chrissy’s OWN wedding, exactly a year ago today?

The offbeat bride: Chrissy Wai-Ching Fashion Designer/Fiber Artist

Her offbeat groom: Vasili Zolotov, Software Engineer

Location & date of wedding: The Gallery Inn, Old San Juan, Puerto Rico, 12/31/06.

What made our wedding offbeat: Our wedding was offbeat because I made and designed my own gown, the groom’s outfit, my mother’s dress, and my mother in law’s dress! We had the wedding in the courtyard of an art hotel.

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The offbeat bride: Madame Strange, educator

Her offbeat groom: Sensei Strange, Magician

Location & date of wedding: A friend’s yard, Austin Texas. 10/28/2006

What made our wedding offbeat: I was a geisha, he was a pirate, it was a costume wedding right before Halloween. It all began when we lived together in Japan, and he bought me an antique wedding kimono. It was so gorgeous, when he asked me to marry him I knew I had to wear it. And if I was going to wear it, I had to do it right, so I went all in. I had a friend make me a hair piece, dyed my hair black to go with it. He got to shoot the objector, another scurvy pirate. We had another magician tell our story prior to the pagan ceremony, followed by a hand fasting.

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