The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding (where the brides burned their dresses!)

Posted by
 | Photography by Cukini Studios at Studio Reserved
Brides burned their dresses: The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding
Photos by Cukini Studios at Studio Reserved

Offbeat partner: April

Offbeat partner: Bethany

Date and location of wedding: Camp Tanager, Mt Vernon, IA, October 13, 2018

Our offbeat wedding at a glance:

The theme of our wedding was performance. We are professional performers and have lots of performing friends. We had many different performances from Burlesque, Fire, Aerial, Dance, Hip-Hop, Belly Dance, Singing, Juggling, and more.

Brides burned their dresses: The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

Brides burned their dresses: The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

Brides burned their dresses: The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

Brides burned their dresses: The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

We ended the ceremony by lighting our dresses on fire!

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

Tell us about the ceremony:

We used stuffed animals instead of floral bouquets. We had a handfasting but with a whip.

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

And of course, we lit our dresses on fire instead of doing a unity candle. Our officiant said, “You may now light the brides” before it all started. We're both fire performers so we know all of the precautions to take when doing something like this. We had a certified pyrotechnic and medic on hand just in case, but they weren't needed.

A person from my wedding party lit my dress and one from Bethany’s wedding party lit hers. We tried to get them to match evenly but mine ran up first and Bethany’s took a while but it slowly burnt up the skirt. I think Bethany managed eight seconds in hers and mine was 12 seconds before I had to drop it. We attached slow-burning duck cloth canvas to the trains of our dresses, which would easily tear away.

Our hair was up, the ground was damp ground, and we had 50+ experienced fire performers helping out. We followed all of the rules outlined in the Specialty Insurance Requirements, NFPA 160 and NAFAA Regulations. So we were very safe about the whole thing.

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

44086248 10155864043267548 7783452425163112448 o alternative wedding ideas from Offbeat Wed (formerly Offbeat Bride)

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

Tell us about your reception:

We had blue and pink themed decor at the reception. My favorite color is pink, and Beth's favorite color is blue so it made sense. For entertainment, we had jugglers, clowns, and aerialists perform during the reception.

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding

What was your most important lesson learned?

If you have an LGBT wedding, be very careful about posting publicly. There are still a lot of anti-LGBT people in the world who will comment or message you with threats of violence toward you. You can read more about this element here.

[Editor's note: here's a post to help you if your wedding happens to go viral!]

44740193 2001858766540016 685583901220929536 o alternative wedding ideas from Offbeat Wed (formerly Offbeat Bride)

Vendors

Photography: Cukini Studios at Studio Reserved, Sherry Schons, and Emi's Photography • Cake: Molly's Cupcakes • Venue: Camp Tanager

Gallery

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Follow up post…

Meet our fave wedding vendors

Comments on The hottest wedding ever: a fire & performance themed wedding (where the brides burned their dresses!)

  1. The stuffed animals idea is so cute!
    Also, your dresses in their multiple iterations, including on fire: AWESOME!

  2. YES! I am also a circus performer planning a queer offbeat wedding and I feel so encouraged by this! And now I’ve got a little more backbone for those “so if we brought an aerial rig . . .” convos. So far everyone has been super excited! Beautiful pictures. You two make my heart sparkle <3

    • ** also I love that you included ALL the safety caveats. Guys – hire professionals unless this is *literally* your job like our beautiful fire brides! Trust me, there are performers near you who would love to be part of your wedding!

Comments are closed.