Online - October 24, 2006

Love Story

Creative Ideas from Wedding Planner Jo Gartin

Bloated budgets, wardrobe glitches, annoying extras, demanding leading lady. The only difference between your wedding and a movie? You don’t want people rolling in the aisle. So take advice from Jo Gartin: Having planned celeb nuptials and written a book on the subject (Jo Gartin’s Weddings), she knows how to keep the Hollywood endings coming.

Call Time
Save-the-dates don’t have to be on paper. Your shebang’s at the shore? Print the details on a beach ball. Ditto place cards (you know: starfish, pumpkins, maracas, and such). On invitations, get creatively specific with the text (overlooking the Pacific; in the family rose garden).

Schwag
Welcome guests with gifts in their hotel rooms: totes filled with water, candy, chips, gossip mags, your favorite novel, or a mixed CD.

Wardrobe
There’s no need for two white dresses. Mix things up for the reception by simply switching accessories: Throw on a wrap, some fun jewelry, or change into dancing shoes. Keep the maids happy by letting them wear ballet slippers they’ve adorned with feathers and rhinestones.

Props
Add a sentimental touch to your bouquet by making a cuff out of movie stubs or love letters from your sweetie. Send your flower girl down the aisle with an antique birdcage filled with a pair of lovebirds instead of flower petals. For the reception, fill vases with unexpected things like mini pine cones, cranberries, or hazelnuts.

Set Design
Customize the aisle with a runner made of upholstery fabric or heavy, woven straw raffia. Present the rings in something unique. Met in a bar? Keep them in a matchbox from the venue. Sentimental types should write out their actual ceremony in a beautiful book for the officiant to read from; it makes for a lovely keepsake.

Craft Services
Preceremony refreshments are a crowd pleaser. For warm climates, serve raspberry lemonade or Italian ices. In cooler spots, warm apple cider or hot chocolate. Or serve a signature cocktail like a Key lime martini or papaya smoothie shot.

For a casual end to the meal, serve bite-size treats like chocolate mousse in espresso cups, crème brulee in self-standing Chinese spoons, and mini milk shakes. In the cake itself, make each tier a different flavor and request your favorite combos, whether that’s chocolate cake with peanut butter cup center or red velvet cake with a cream cheese icing. The one traditional touch we recommend: an engraved cake knife.

Consider it your Oscar for such a stellar performance.

  Weddings