Miami - April 23, 2008

Addicted to Love

Spring 2008 Wedding Guide

Planning your wedding is driving you to drink. Fight back with DailyCandy’s twelve-step program.

Step 1
Admit you have a problem. Your future mother-in-law? Nope. Your lack of venue. Luckily, Schnebly Redland’s Winery now hosts weddings in the plantation-style property’s tranquil gardens (complete with waterfalls and passion fruit vineyards). And for party favors: mango wine bottled especially for your guests.

Step 2
Discover the higher power. Flower power, that is. Guerdy Réjouis, the flower architect behind Fisher Island’s Ocean Flowers, pairs her stylized designs with lighting, accents, and draping. Her pick for this season: opulent color, like fuchsia calypso orchids.

Step 3
Turn your will over to the gods (of music). Namely DJ Ross One, the super spinner known for Favela Chic at Mokai. Without a tinge of the macarena, he gets everyone out on the dance floor (even, rumor has it, Bill Clinton).

Step 4
Take an honest look at yourself. Realize you deserve couture invitations. Paper Fetish’s designers don’t work off books. Instead they craft each distinct card from scratch, using everything from watercolors and rose petals to feathers.

Step 5, 6, and 7
Admit the nature of your wrongs (it’s your dancing); prepare to change (light stretching); eliminate your shortcomings. Private lessons from Salsa Mia, the folks who bring you Friday nights at Yuca, should do the trick.

Step 8 and 9
Make a list of those you harmed (your bridesmaids) and make amends. Before the big day, send them Beauty in a Box from Face Time Cosmetics. The darling package arrives bearing the maid’s name and a cache of customized makeup.

Step 10
Keep a personal inventory (of the party). Capture it all, not just posed and sober. Let In Focus Studios’s resident artist, Manolo Doreste, reveal the night in all its natural splendor, including a trash-the-dress shot, in which the bride mars her fated frock in fiery devotion (optional, obv).

Step 11
Contact the higher power. Or get a power contact high by providing guests hand-rolled cigars. Anissa Velazquez of Deco Drive Cigars (305-674-1811) will arrange for a tobacco aficionado to craft stogies using their Dominican and Nicaraguan blends.

Step 12
Have a spiritual awakening (after tasting your cake). Ana Paz uses her grandma’s recipe to create iced art, which she can bling-out Miami-style with Swarovski crystals.

If all else fails, there’s always step 13: rehab (a.k.a. your honeymoon).

Feed your addiction: Check out our spring and fall 2007 wedding guides.