Sarah and Andrew knew right from the off that they didn’t want to spend a ton of money on their wedding day – as they had both been married previously, they already knew that the most important thing at the end of the day, was just themselves. Armed with a $3000 budget they set about picking their destination, and their outfits – and the rest they let happen naturally!
They knew that what they did have for they wedding day, that they wanted to reflect their personalities and their similarities in style – they just wanted to be themselves! For Sarah this meant rocking a pair of Vans under her black tulle gown, which she DIY’d by combining a highstreet dress with a tulle overskirt for just $300. For Andrew, a houndstooth waistcoat and trousers, collar chain and again, his trusty Vans!
They met a decade ago while Lacey was bartending on a slow night. She was reading The Encyclopaedia of Serial Killers and Austen struck up a conversation about it while ordering a beer. When returned to his friends, she noticed he’s left his number on a napkin and although this has happened to her before, he was the first one she ever wanted to follow up with! They became friends first, bonding of their mutual love of horror and anything spooky. They’d get together regularly to watch scary movies, but only as friends. Then, a few years later, on a road trip to Vegas it became more than that… And the rest, as the old cliché goes, is history.
They decided to return to Vegas to marry on their own terms, and that meant completely alone. “We just wanted to spend some time together”, began Lacey. “I work 70 hours or more a week with maybe two or three days off a month and Austen works different hours than I do, so we don’t get much time together. All we really wanted was a small simple ceremony with plenty of time left to relax and hang out together. Austen is charismatic enough to be a cult leader, and we both love spooky stuff so we tried to dress like cult members! Our only focus for the entire thing was us. We decided that we wanted our wedding to be all about us and not making other people happy or obligated to be there.”
They had their ceremony at A Little White Wedding Chapel and picked the Michael Jordan package so they could livestream it to their friends and family back home. “From the minute we walked through the door the staff treated us as if we were the only wedding happening there that day”, she continued. “They were all so nice and seemed genuinely happy for us. They asked us a few questions about our preferences and took us in to the chapel. We chose a non-religious ceremony and walked arm in arm down the aisle. Minister Johnny performed a short, lovely ceremony and we were finally married!”
Sam and Vince both lead, by their own admission, ‘annoyingly busy lives’. They live in Las Vegas, but when it came to planning their wedding day, they wanted to do something simple, in their favourite place on earth – Jerome, Arizona.
“We frequent Jerome and the surrounding red rock of Sedona often,” said Sam. “During our first holiday together years ago we instantly fell in love with Jerome’s eerie but cosy feel. It’s this small, old mining town on the desert-y mountainside that has burned down to the ground at least three times—and it’s probably haunted. We have a long history of celebrating momentous occasions in Jerome – we even got engaged there in 2017, so there was really nowhere else in the world we would’ve wanted to celebrate our lifelong commitment to each other.”
There is something so freeing and romantic about deciding to bite the bullet and elope. Getting rid of all the stress, anxiety and COSTS that can some with planning a big wedding means it’s an appealing idea for many Rock n Roll brides and grooms! Today we’re meeting Yvette and Rob, who did just that. Originally from the UK, they decided to leave everyone else behind and travel to New York to marry on their own terms.
“Our wedding theme was ‘gold and freedom!'” said Yvette. “We wanted the theme to be no pressure, just free and for ourselves. We got engaged at Coney Island, Brooklyn in 2015. This became the inspiration for us to return to Brooklyn to get married. We wanted it to be very much about marrying each other for the right reasons and starting married life in a stress-free way.”
Josh and James met via an online dating app, and although lived in different cities, they made it a priority to see each other every month and Skyped every night, so their relationship blossomed. They decided to elope while on a trip to Spain in September 2018.
With their shared love of the ocean, they began searching for the perfect location via Google, stumbling upon Esculls de Canyet on the Costa Brava and were immediately in love. “We were blown away,” said the couple. “We thought it wasn’t real at first and both knew immediately this was the place we wanted to start our lives together. We were inspired by the rustic and rugged coastline on the Costa Brava, and we wanted to keep a somewhat formal beach theme.”
Lauren and Charles first visited New York on their first trip as a couple, a few months after they started dating. It was on this vacation that they fell deeply in love with both the city, and each other – so hosting their wedding in NYC was the only way to go! They love sitting in coffee shops, going to bars and restaurants, and just walking the streets til they’re exhausted and lost. “It’s the greatest city on earth, and we wanted our wedding to capture that energy,” said the bride.
They spent about five years engaged – life got in the way, they took the advice of enjoying the engagement period to heart, etc – they’d always joke about how they should just run away and elope to NYC so one day, Charles surprised Lauren with tickets to the city,.. AND tickets to Paris for their honeymoon after. What a romantic!
