Tom and Geneva have a metaphor for their relationship: ‘a collision of galaxies’. “We swirled around each other our whole lives,” the bride told us. “He played at the venue I stage managed and we had all the same friends, yet we don’t recall meeting until the time was right years later. Once our gravitational forces took over, we were inseparable; we started dating while I was working SXSW festival, which was crazy because I worked hours like 9am-2am that week, but I still wanted to see him after!”
They played up the star theme as much as they could for their July wedding day; from Geneva’s veil to her earrings, the stationery and the signage down to the ray guns for their grand exit photos. She knew she didn’t want a white wedding, either, so used blue a lot instead.
Together with 20 of their closest family and friends, Claudia and Maxime finally tied the knot in May of this year in an intimate elopement in the middle of the Las Vegas desert. “We met while I was studying in France,” Claudia told us, “so the best thing about getting married was finally getting to be together after spending so long in a long distance relationship!”
The bride’s sister is a florist, so they had a jumpstart on planning the proceedings. “I’ve always envisioned a desert elopement-style wedding after seeing some of the amazing ones by sister works on for her business Flora Pop.” Of course she provided Claudia’s bouquet for the occasion, and sister also officiated proceedings too.
An elopement, just like a wedding, can be anything you want it to be. You may think that if you’re eloping it’s go to be all about doing things quickly and without fuss, but that doesn’t have to be the case… As today’s wedding proves!
Niky and Vlad, who were married in July in Montana, had a full day of celebrating – from before sunrise to after sunset. The kicked off by waking up before dawn and hiking up their favourite trail (in full wedding garb!) for their sunrise ceremony. Afterwards, they did photos, stopped off at a skate part for Vlad to show off his moves, had burgers for lunch and then went back up the mountain for a sunset picnic complete with cake and pizza!
“Our inspiration came from what we do on the weekends”, the bride explained. “We love hiking on a favourite trail, Vlad finding a skatepark wherever we go, good food and and low pressure. We just wanted to do what we wanted. It felt like a vacation all day, it was so easy.”
Emma and Will rented a house for their June wedding and the bride’s father married them on the beach. Their friends sang to them during ceremony, Emma’s niece was their flower girl and she choose sequin dresses for the bridal party because she wanted everybody to sparkle!
The bride has a deep fascination with French history and style but getting married in French chateau was not an option so they replicated the look in Maine. “The theme started as Marie Antoinette goes on a picnic, so pale pink, French blue and gold”, Emma wrote. “I collected French porcelain and planned out all the details. Over time we added in more details like cherry blossoms that symbolise hope for us, and we incorporated nautical touches with lobster cookies and oyster shell name cards.”
Lydia and Nico met through Bumble – “Not the most glamorous of relationship starts,” she laughed, “but I’m sure similar for a lot of couples these days! I was known as ‘Lydia ?’ in Nico’s phone for at least a year – which had a double meaning when it came to designing our invitations. I used the iconic bee from the mosaic floors in the Battersea Arts Centre, our venue, but one bridesmaid thought it was to represent Bumble! A happy coincidence.”
The beauty of Battersea Arts Centre was all the couple really needed when it cam eto deciding on a theme for their July wedding. It was also important to the bride to have as much vintage in the day as possible – her outfit was a picture of vintage and family heirlooms, and all of her bridesmaids wore vintage dresses in gorgeous sunset colours. “The floral embroidery in my 1919 jacket provided a starting point when choosing the flowers for my bouquet, the bridal party and the decor on the day. The jacket was originally worn by an English gentleman marrying his Indian wife, which was more than appropriate as my husband is half Indian! Too perfect for words.”
Marissa and Nick bonded over their mutual love of Dashboard Confessional on Twitter in 2014. They finally went on their first date just before Nick left for Warped tour with his band Vanna, and the rest, as they say, is history!
“We knew we’d be on our annual beach wedding when we wanted to get married,” Marissa told us, “so we decided to get married there too. Everything was super relaxed, and due to covid it was just as an our families present. It was so nice to have something that felt normal in the midst of everything.”
Our real bride columnist Rachel got married in September this year. We’re following her journey of planning a feminist meets rock n roll wedding.
I’m sad to say I’m the only person I know who has ever been “fired” as a bridesmaid. I was eighteen and the bride was in her early twenties. As the big day came closer, I realised I was expected to pay for my own no-so affordable bridesmaid dress, shoes, hair, make-up, travel and accommodation over the wedding weekend, and for the hen weekend, including all the activities and meals out. I absolutely could not afford to do this, and neither could one of the other bridesmaids who was also in her teens.
I constructed a careful message to the bride, explaining that we simply didn’t have the money and asking if we could maybe talk on the phone about how to make it work for everyone. Minutes later, I received an all-caps response telling me “THIS IS MY WEDDING DAY!!! NOT SOME BIRTHDAY PARTY!” and that I needn’t worry because I was no longer welcome at her wedding… “OR HER LIFE!”.
When I responded, she didn’t reply and we haven’t spoken since. I now realise that this probably wasn’t about me at all, there was clearly a lot else going on and she snapped, plus we were all very young. I still think it’s sad that one day became more important than years of friendship, though. I still think it’s sad that when her marriage ended a couple of years later, we were no longer friends.
When it comes to writing this column, there are a thousand directions I could take. I’m going to stick to the thing I’ve known since that experience when I was eighteen… that my friendships with the people I ask to be part of my bridal party are more important to me than one day of my life, even if it is my wedding day.
In Japan, it is traditional for couples to have a set of formal pre-wedding photos where the couple will wear their wedding attire and pose for formal pictures. “They are different from engagement shoots in the West,” photographer Mao told us, “as they’re still quite uptight and traditional. My concept is to shoot these in a fun way that convey the couples’ personalities and to make the day of the shoot as memorable as the wedding day itself.”
Ryo and Peco were the perfect couple to take on the challenge – Ryo bought a book by David LaChapelle to their first meeting so Mao knew they’d be open to creativity! “The groom is very into bright colours and has a unique sense of style, so I wanted to bring this out with a little twist to convey an more softer, bridal version of his idea. The final result came out as a pastel mix of unicorns and rainbows.”
When asked how they met, Laura and Girts always joke that they met on the internet, but really that’s just the beginning of their story. Girts had placed an advertisement on a local musicians page, looking for a rock band to join as a guitar player. Laura saw this and asked him why he would want to join an existing one, why don’t they start a new one instead.
“Soon after that a few more musicians joined our crew, besides me, the drummer and Girts – the lead guitar player,” Laura told us. “Very soon something more than just a friendship developed between me and him. The band unfortunately didn’t last, but both our love story and friendship with fellow musicians did.” A decade later and the couple find themselves celebrating their wedding online, which is a nice full circle of events.
The couple planned the two-day celebration themselves, taking inspiration from ancient Latvian pagan culture and infusing it with boho and rustic aesthetics to match their personal style. Laura wore a Katya Katya London dress with Lilimill boots and a flower crown by Marta Egle, who also provided the bouquet and decor flowers. They spent €15,000 with most of their budget allocated to catering and location.
Their ceremony started with the official part of the proceedings at Dundaga Castle, purely for signing the wedding papers and making their marriage recognised by law. In Latvian tradition, the maid of honour is commonly married to the best man, who were the only people who attended this part of the ceremony.
They then moved onto the meadow next to their guest house for an ancient pagan ritual which can be literally translated as an Alignment ceremony. “Accompanied by a bagpipe player we entered a marked circle around the fire and a large stone,” Laura told us. “Only the closest family members, and the best men’s couple were able to come in that circle. The ritual of exchanging the rings was led by keepers of Latvian pagan traditions and in the end, we stood by each other’s side as married equals. Girts is a member of student fraternity FraternitasImantca hence his friends arranged a small ritual with roots in ancient chivalry. When we went out of the ceremony circle, they formed the gates of honour by using their rapiers for us to pass.”
Before their reception, the best man and maid of honour had organised some surprise time-out for the couple, which was much needed time to themselves in the hustle and bustle of the rest of their big day. They too a roofless car ride along the beach and a small picnic afterwards, before joining the rest of their guests for a beautiful candlelight reception.
“In Latvia it’s common that guests come with gifts and flowers but since we had the wedding far away from home and we didn’t want the flowers to go to waste, we encouraged our guests to bring self-made cakes or pastry. Hence, we didn’t have to order a wedding cake, but we had about 30 different delicious and unique cakes and sweet snacks instead.”
In retrospect, the only thing the couple would have done differently is hire a wedding planner. “As we planned our wedding ourselves it was a challenging and sometimes also a tiresome journey, especially doing so during a pandemic, but on the other hand we really enjoyed the small accomplishments and the process was often fun and rewarding as well. Meeting our best friends frequently and traveling around the country looking for the perfect place was our favourite part of planning. My advice for future couples is that everyone, especially parents and friends will have an opinion about what kind of wedding you should have. Listen to them, but ultimately do as you want because it’s your day!”
Lois and Luke’s love of alternative culture and a desire to stand out from the crowd meant that they had plenty of different ideas to work with for their July wedding day. “I always thought we would have an all out themed wedding,” Lois told us, “but as we have so many interests we couldn’t settle on just one so we decided to incorporate some elements from each.”
They started with sparkly and iridescent as a colour scheme, mixed with pink to match Luke’s shoes and tie. They then took things from some of their favourite interests; like a Lord of the Rings ring box, a Harry Potter sign, Beatles pocket watch and a matching badge that they both wore to represent their favourite band, IDLES. And that’s how you come up with a wedding theme that’s completely unique to you!
At Rock n Roll Bride, we’re firm believers in finding beauty in the every day, but finding beauty in a laundromat might be a first even for us! Bare with us though, as you’ll see from the images that with the right styling, literally anywhere can be a vibe when you throw enough rock n roll at it.
Together with photographer Anne Letournel, Matthieu from Marions Nous Dans Les Bois wild wedding films wanted to create some original wedding inspiration, choosing a vintage laundromat in Rennes, Brittany as their location; a place with an authentic atmosphere that perfectly juxtaposed their disco theme for a completely crazy wedding.
You’d have to be living under a rock to notice that the world is kinda on fire at the moment! The majority of folks acknowledge that climate change is happening now and that future predictions look, quite frankly, pretty terrifying. The good news is that taking action is the number one way to counter any anxiety or despair you might be feeling and there’s heaps of ways to do this on your big day.
Happily, it’s never been easier to be a change maker because there are now so many badass green alternatives out there. You really don’t need to be planning a hippy boho wedding to be putting on a spectacularly sustainable do, and you never know, you might just inspire other couples to do the same! (As an additional added bonus, you might find that putting the planet first can actually SAVE you money, see our tips below).
Let’s get one thing clear, we can’t recycle our way out of the climate emergency. Reports from the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) emphasise that the real push for change this late in the game needs to come from governments and big industries, so join a local lobbying campaign and hassle your local leaders to take faster stronger action. However, consumer power is real. Use your voice by choosing wisely where to spend your hard-earned dosh.
Shannon and Emma were supposed to be married in Hawaii, but when COVID scuppered their plans not once but twice, they decided to change tact and organised a backyard DIY wedding instead. Armed with lots of inspiration from Instagram and Pinterest, they organised the whole thing over about 6 months, and spent just £3,500.
“Covid really scuppered our original plans but we managed to pull of a beautiful, unique wedding with our closest loved ones anyway,” the brides told us. “It made us realise that you don’t have to spend a lot of money to have a beautiful wedding.”
For their May wedding day, highschool sweethearts Lorenzo and Erica wanted to celebrate their love in nature, surrounded by their closest friends and family. “In Italy, there really isn’t much outside of the norm for weddings,” Erica told us. “Even if they’re not religious, most people get married in a church for traditions’ sake, which didn’t suit us at all.”
Their wedding theme was very much inspired by Celtic traditions instead of religious ones. From celebrating everything in nature to hand fasting, jumping the broom and drinking hydromel from a shared chalice, the couple based their choices on keeping everything as simple as possible, but with an eye to celebrating the beautiful, too. They paired blue, bordeaux and blush for an ethereal colour palette and used apples as a symbol throughout – writing Norse Gods’ names on them for table names and choosing crockery with apple motifs.
Our real bride columnist Rachel got married in September this year. We’re following her journey of planning a feminist meets rock n roll wedding, culminating in us sharing the big day in our last issue of the year! This month she’s been thinking about wedding traditions.
I thought I had a handle on the major bridal traditions and the gripes many of us have with them. Lots of you reading this may have already decided to scratch out the word ‘obey’ from your vows, for example. A lot of modern brides also wrinkle their noses at the idea of ‘being given away’ and what that actually used to mean (that the literal ownership of the bride was changing hands from father to husband). Many have even come to believe that the first dance is tired and unnecessary. Not me, though – it’s my one chance to feel like I’m on Strictly Come Dancing. But I get it. It’s not for everyone.
It turns out I had no idea about the murky origins of so many staple wedding moments. For instance, did you know that the garter removal — that moment where the groom takes off the bride’s garter with his teeth, in front of his nephews, his grandma Joyce and his new father-in-law (I’ve seen it happen from many a stage as a wedding singer and it is never anything other than excruciating, please don’t do it) is the very distant descendant of a medieval tradition that would happen at the end of the wedding feast? Right before bedtime, someone would shout, ‘GET HER!’ and the congregation would launch upon the virgin bride, ripping off pieces of her dress to help unclothe her before the naked part of the nuptials. The bigger the chunk of dress you took home, the better the luck apparently. It’s worth nothing that this gang-undressing is also considered by many to be the great, great, great grandparent of catching the bouquet, as it’s in the same family of ‘taking home a piece of the bride for luck’.
When Lily and Ian got engaged, the first thing the bride did was buy the Rock n Roll Bride book (excellent start!) and using it as their guide they planned a laid back, vegan wedding at a recording studio meets antiques warehouse.
“I was clueless about weddings but it turns out doing very little planning and having a laid back approach worked perfectly for us”, Lily said. “We kept it local by getting married a few doors down from our own vegan chocolate business at a recording studio / music venue / antique warehouse all-in-one.”
The day was a real family affair with the bride’s brother acting as celebrant, her other brother’s band playing and their friends doing all the food including the cake. Lily made the desserts and favours and ended the night by performing with her dad and the band. As post-ceremony snack they had a wall of their favourite crisps for their guests to help themselves too!
If you grew up in the 80s and early 90s you probably have fond memories of movies like The NeverEnding Story and Labyrinth. The Jim Henson fantasy film starring David Bowie and Jennifer Connelly was a particular favourite of ours, and the bubble scene and Sarah’s ball gown made for perfect inspiration for issue 40’s editorial shoot.
Great Fosters, a Tudor estate in Surrey, was the perfect setting with it’s 50 acres of stunning gardens and parkland. Whether you want to go all out 80s with a one-of-a-kind dress complete with dramatic sleeves, or you just want touches of these elements styled in a more wearable way, we hope you’ll find something to love in these photos.
Ay karumba! It’s not every day that you see a Simpsons themed wedding, but when Helen and Peege realised that Bart Simpson had been a part of their bedtime routine for the last decade, it seemed the obvious choice! “Peege can’t fall asleep without something unchallenging on TV,” Helen explained, “and The Simpsons is the only thing we agree on! The theme speaks for itself, really – we wanted a day that was fun, unpretentious and included zero faff!”
Helen wore a Pixie Pocket dress with kitsch AF Shoe Bakery wedges and Simpsons earrings from Doodad and Fandango. They incorporated more Simpsons moments in their day with the bride DIYing all the stationery and signage with as many puns as she could muster. “If anyone killed the DIY though, it was my bridesmaid Lollie – she made her own outfit, my veil and both flower girl dresses! I loved coming up with kooky references to suit our theme, but the best thing was the freedom to fantasise through a really difficult point in human history. When we were stuck in lockdown it gave us something to focus on.”
Astrid and Emilie chose their own home as their venue for their May elopement. Hiring L’Autre Saison des Fleurs, they went all out on the florals who added bright, colourful arrangements all over their home to create these photo shoot worthy images.
The couple met in school and became best friends, but it wasn’t until they were much older that Astrid confessed her feelings to Emilie. Luckily she felt the same and they began dating in 2013, “From friendship to love, we built our lives together”, they told us.
“While we were preparing the wedding, we thought all along that there were no coincidences in life, just some rendez-vous”, Emilie continued. “We learned that it was useless to plan our lives in every tiny detail because fate will always have the last say. So, for the wedding we decided to let the professionals around us show us what they were imagining for our day. All we wanted was to exchange our vows in intimacy. After all, at the beginning of it all, we never thought we could have a life together, but yet here we are!”
Bre and Collin knew that they wanted Big Sur in California to be their wedding destination, but had no clue how they wanted to go about it. With Covid, their wedding plans had to drastically change/ They started looking up photographers in Big Sur and stumbled across Flora Gibson on Instagram. “I instantly fell in love with her style and knew I had to have her as my photographer but we didn’t really know all of our options,” Bri told us. After looking over Flora’s website they saw an option for an elopement. “I was instantly curious and started my research. I found that an elopement didn’t have to be us running away to Vegas without our parents permission. Flora offered everything we wanted from an intimate setting to our picnic on the beach.”
After officially making the decision to elope versus the traditional option of a wedding ceremony, the couple know that they needed to find a way to include family. They decided to host a Zoom meeting where family and friends could join them while they read their vows to one another and had family members write them letters. For this pair, this was the perfect workaround for doing things their way, but also including their families in their big day.
