Documentary Inspired Las Vegas Elopement

Felix Russell-Saw

May 26, 2018

There’s something about a Las Vegas wedding that I just can’t get enough of, and Tamara and Chris’ November wedding is no different. With a budget of £7500 they flew to Sin City from he UK and had the Rock n Roll elopement of their dreams.

They had their ceremony in the chapel at The Wynn. “Our wedding was an elopement done our way”, began the bride. “We wanted to make it all about us, travelling and seeing new places together and making amazing memories. The inspiration for our wedding was our photographer’s documentary style photography.”

The bride tried on lots of dresses, but it was only after she asked for Chris’ advice that she was finally able to find the dress of her dreams. “One of the most unique things about our wedding was that Chris chose my dress! I went to six different wedding dress shops on my own and with friends and did not go get that ‘wow’ from any of them other than the one I put a reserve on. The day before I was due to go back and pay for the rest of the dress and collect it, Chris was in the bath and I sat next to him on the floor and showed him all the photos of myself in all the different dresses I had tried on. The ones I thought he would like, he hated, and the ones I thought he would hate he loved! He said he really disliked the dress I had actually reserved so I decided to cancel it.”

“A little while later, on my 29th birthday, Chris and I went up to Wed2b in Bristol and Chris chose my wedding dress which was called ‘ Paige’ . I tried on 10 dresses with him there and the one I chose was the last one I tried on.” Her shoes were vintage, “They had had belonged to a 70 year old woman before me! My veil was my mum’s and as she was not going to be there she wanted me to wear it.”

The ceremony itself was simple, but magical. “I stood outside the Lavender Suite door in the wedding salon at The Wynn as they began to play Adele Make You Feel My Love“, she explained. “After the first verse, the doors were opened and I walked down the aisle to Chris. I was looking down until I got half way down and then I looked up to see him there looking so handsome and happy, smiling at me. He walked to meet me I held his arm and walked up the rest of the aisle together. We held hands throughout the entire ceremony and my eyes welled up as I fought back the tears listening to Chris say his vows.”

In hindsight the only thing the bride wishes was different about their experience was the pre-wedding stress! “I got to marry my best friend and the kindest man I have ever met in my life”, she said. “But wish that I had stressed a lot less when planning the day and figuring out what I would wear. On the day it didn’t really matter how I looked or what we did, just the fact that we were there and I got to hold my best friends hand while we made promises together. That was all that mattered. It still doesn’t feel real that we actually did it some days!”

“The hardest part of the planning was the hidden costs that we weren’t made aware of when we booked. We booked the trip to Vegas and the wedding through Virgin Holidays and trying to get someone to give us a simple list of all the things we had to do was like pulling teeth at times!  We found that Virgin had lots of different departments that were all dealing with our wedding however none of those departments appeared to communicate with each other so we found ourselves going from one to another with the simplest of things!”

After the ceremony they walked around downtown Vegas for their photos and their ‘reception’ was going for pizza. “Walking around downtown Las Vegas in our wedding clothes with all the naked people around us was so much fun! Chris, bless him, didn’t know where to look and was being very polite trying to look as though he wasn’t looking at everyone! Our biggest cost was the flights and hotel but we saved money by not having a reception in the hotel and going for pizza instead, and also by not decorating the ceremony room with flowers and candles (they were an optional for an extra cost).”

“The best thing about our wedding was that we didn’t have to think of anyone but ourselves and we didn’t have to plan our wedding to please anyone else. We could just do it our way which was amazing. We even got to go to a gig which we would never have been able to do if family were there!”

“We are also very grateful to our photographer, Felix, for making us feel so comfortable. I was very emotional on the day about how pretty I felt despite being a tattooed bride. I am met with people who openly tell me how much they dislike my tattoos on a daily basis at work as well as having members of my family who really don’t like them to the extent that when I see them I have to cover them up… Sometimes I almost feel ashamed of how I look. Therefore feeling pretty on my wedding day and feeling as though I didn’t have to cover up my skin meant a lot to me, as did marrying a man who never makes me feel ashamed of myself and how I look. He has made me feel like the luckiest woman in the world.”

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