Maya & Adam's "Starry Starry Night" wedding #Real Weddings: Southern US#astronomy#austin#blue hair#couples of color#mismatched-bridesmaids#multicultural#museum#stars#tattooed bride#wings Updated Oct 12 2015 (Posted Sep 30 2009) Offbeat Editors The offbeat bride: Maya, Musician/artist/massage therapy student (and OBT member "Mama G") Her offbeat partner: Adam, computer engineer Location & date of wedding: Austin Museum of Art, in the community room — 8/8/09 What made our wedding offbeat: I'm new in Austin and Adam also has friends all over the country, so people flew in from everywhere to join us. We had to have a cool party, but on a budget. The community room at the Austin Museum of Art was a perfect little chapel for us! And it fit the "Starry Starry Night" theme we were going with! Adam and I are both sky/astronomy geeks (his first gift to me was a high powered telescope, because he wanted me to have the stars). I handmade the invites, blue and gold and arty stars. Our ceremony Backdrop was a mural we painted together. The groom's one request for the party? "LASERS." (Love him.) Adam's brother/best man works at the US embassy in Uganda and presented us with an African fertility statue during his speech. He also had the guys' jackets made by a tailor in Uganda. The minister was one of my best friends from NYC who's a poet and got ordained just for us and ROCKED it. Love the mis-matched bridesmaids with their blue hair pieces. The bridesmaids were given the color midnight blue and told to do their own thing entirely with dresses. We had a "Starfairy" instead of a flowergirl, complete with wings. Cross-cultural nods in the ceremony: We jumped the broom AND broke a glass. Also, I used to DJ, so it was important to me to be in charge of music. I put together the playlists ahead of time and we plugged a laptop in to the soundsystem. I didn't leave the dance floor all night! Our biggest challenge: Aside from money (even on a budget, its still hard to swallow spending so much on a party)… The guestbook. All my bridesmaids and my minister flew in from NYC. Nobody in NYC drives, really, and I didn't take into consideration how much driving around and chauffeuring I was going to end up doing. Between airport and hotel runs and trying to figure out how and where to entertain everyone in such a short window of time with not much energy or sanity left by the time they got here — it was overwhelming and frustrating. It was a sweet wonderful blessing to have my friends with me, but I would have planned out the logistics of that much differently given the chance to do it again. So many cool things in this photo: blue hair, ribbons, beautiful tatt, cool gloves & hair flower. My favorite moment: The whole thing was unbelievable. You can see in the photos where it looks like i'm holding my breath because of all the gasping I was doing that day. But the most unbelievable moment came right after the ceremony which ended around 6:45pm. Adam and I were walking with the photographer from the museum to the capitol building for some pictures, and as we crossed the street we saw over downtown, seemingly right over the museum where our ceremony just took place, a RAINBOW. At this point Austin had been in the middle of a drought that lasted the whole summer so there hadn't been any rain. My offbeat advice: Even if you are planning something different or simple or low budget, be sure that you are planning. And whatever you are wearing, know what it is well in advance. The most common wedding anxiety dreams, that both my husband and I were having, had to do with whatever part of our wardrobes hadn't been sorted out yet. Care to share a few vendor/shopping links? Photographer: Tanya Saenz Enough talk โ show me the wedding porn: PREVIOUS Catherine & Jeffery's Dia de los Muertos festival wedding NEXT Should I shave my armpits for my wedding day? Show/Hide comments [ 22 ] Besides everything else, I LOVE!!! your dress! Reply Echoing Brigitta–the dress is scrumptious! And so perfect for the beautiful bride. Reply What a great wedding! I love how you carried out your theme. Your dress is indeed beautiful but I think my favorite part is the stars in your hair! Reply This looks so awesome and you two look soooo happy together! I love the Starry night theme and am doing something similar with my wedding. Reply I absolutely love your guest book idea. It's so different, and something I've never seen before! And AMOA would be such a beautiful place to have a wedding. I love it there. Congratulations! Reply The theme, and especially your backdrop are so beautiful! Reply how gorgeous- love the board you created for people to sign- very on theme- beautiful! Reply What a beautiful wedding! I love your concept and the dress and the colors! Wonderful job! Reply ohmygod i want this wedding!!! soooo beautiful!! Reply maya! you look so beautiful! joy and i are so happy to see you so happy!! we come to texas often (houston), but would love to detour to check you out. looking at those wonderful pictures, i couldn t help but wonder what the soundtrack was like? who dj'd? what song did you dance the first dance to? i m thinkin there must have been some prince , perhaps a little tina marie…. Reply wendy!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!! yonimaya@yahoo.com !!! Reply oh this is just stunningly gorgeous ๐ Reply What a lovely wedding! I love the theme! I'm also delighted to see someone else doing what I plan to do with the bridesmaids' dresses–I haven't decided on a color, but since my bridesmaids are all different shapes and sizes, I want them to be able to get dresses that will flatter them individually, not to mention ones they can wear again. I can see how lovely it looks with your bridesmaids, especially with the matching accessories and flowers. Reply Beautiful Dress and very cool guest "book"! Reply <3 thanks guys! still starry eyed and glowing over here~ honored to be able to share in this excellent forum ๐ Reply congrats! Lovely dress. Reply GORGEOUS!! I love you both and the pictures are amazing. Congrats all over again! ๐ Reply Woot Austin! I love love love your dress. And the tats! And the cake… And, er, everything. Congratulations! Reply Love the star fairy instead of flower girl idea! How cute! Reply very very beautiful !! congratsss Reply WHat kind of dress? very beautiful! Reply Beautiful, unique idea. Honestly, I have been on Offbeat Bride before, but I guess I didn't spend enough time here because these weddings.. seriously out of the park. Reply Join the conversation Cancel ReplyYour email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *Comment Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Sign me up for your offbeat awesomeness newsletter! No-drama comment policy Part of what makes the Offbeat Empire different is our commitment to civil, constructive commenting. Make sure you're familiar with our no-drama comment policy. Biz owners & wedding bloggers Please just use your real name in your comment, not your business name or blog title. Our comments are not the place to pimp your website. If you want to promote your stuff on Offbeat Bride, join us as an advertiser instead.
What a great wedding! I love how you carried out your theme. Your dress is indeed beautiful but I think my favorite part is the stars in your hair! Reply
This looks so awesome and you two look soooo happy together! I love the Starry night theme and am doing something similar with my wedding. Reply
I absolutely love your guest book idea. It's so different, and something I've never seen before! And AMOA would be such a beautiful place to have a wedding. I love it there. Congratulations! Reply
maya! you look so beautiful! joy and i are so happy to see you so happy!! we come to texas often (houston), but would love to detour to check you out. looking at those wonderful pictures, i couldn t help but wonder what the soundtrack was like? who dj'd? what song did you dance the first dance to? i m thinkin there must have been some prince , perhaps a little tina marie…. Reply
wendy!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!! yonimaya@yahoo.com !!! Reply
What a lovely wedding! I love the theme! I'm also delighted to see someone else doing what I plan to do with the bridesmaids' dresses–I haven't decided on a color, but since my bridesmaids are all different shapes and sizes, I want them to be able to get dresses that will flatter them individually, not to mention ones they can wear again. I can see how lovely it looks with your bridesmaids, especially with the matching accessories and flowers. Reply
<3 thanks guys! still starry eyed and glowing over here~ honored to be able to share in this excellent forum ๐ Reply
Woot Austin! I love love love your dress. And the tats! And the cake… And, er, everything. Congratulations! Reply
Beautiful, unique idea. Honestly, I have been on Offbeat Bride before, but I guess I didn't spend enough time here because these weddings.. seriously out of the park. Reply