Bonnie & Robert’s intimate zen DIY wedding

This week we're celebrating simple weddings, featuring couples who opted to go a bit more minimal with their wedding details.

The offbeat bride: Bonnie, photographer

Her offbeat partner: Robert, writer

Location & date of wedding: The Solarium, Decatur, GA — June 1, 2008

What made our wedding offbeat: Robert and I wanted to make our wedding as local as possible to save money and reduce stress. We didn't want anybody to have to drive all over Atlanta for our big day. The Solarium is just two miles from our house, and just a short drive from the hotel where guests stayed. We used a local florist just a couple of miles from our venue, and my hair and makeup artist was an easy walk to The Solarium. Robert's best man, Oz Dillman, made custom furniture with a Japanese motif, including a Torii Gate which we were married under.

We used bamboo shoots as our centerpieces, and asked everyone to take them home after the reception. I printed blank note cards of my floral photography for our wedding favors. Instead of a groom's cake, a friend of Robert's family made octopus cookies for us. Susannah Davis, our friend and minister, performed the ceremony. Our pal, Brian Hardy, was kind enough to spin some laid-back tunes for us.

Chris Brown, a talented puppet builder, made our cake toppers and his lovely girlfriend, Jolie, coordinated for us. Our hippie friends took care of recycling, and three photographer buddies of mine shot the wedding for me: Jason Spruill, Martin Brown, and Jenni Girtman. Instead of formal photos, we opted for a photo booth. Our friends love to be silly almost as much as we do!

Tell us about the ceremony: Robert's sister read a passage from the Velveteen Rabbit that barely left a dry eye in the whole place.

“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. “Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”

“Real isn't how you are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but Really loves you, then you become Real.”

“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit. “Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don't mind being hurt.”

“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”

“It doesn't happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get all loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand.”

Our biggest challenge: One of the biggest challenges was to keep our wedding under budget. Our families were incredibly supportive, and both pitched in while we paid for a good portion, too. Food was the thing that we spent the most money on. We love good food, so it was hard to skimp there. We saved money by bartering for a lot of things, and by keeping a spreadsheet of expenses so we knew exactly what we were spending.

My favorite moment: I was so excited after our minister pronounced us husband and wife, I couldn't keep myself from bouncing up and down! We decided to skip a lot of traditions for the reception. No first dance, no parent dances, and no toasts. But Robert and I got to slow dance at the end of the night, and that was amazing.

My funniest moment: Robert had not been to a lot of weddings. Our rehearsal was rushed and not the most thorough. He was nervous and thought at the end of the ceremony he was supposed to leave with his best man through the side door they came in through! So, when he started to go the wrong direction, I had to pull him toward me and start walking down the aisle. We both had a good laugh about it.

Was there anything you were sure was going to be a total disaster that unexpectedly turned out great? I was worried that Robert's mother would be upset that we wanted very few formal photos. But she was fine with it. She even did some silly shots in the photo booth, which we really loved.

My advice for offbeat brides: Think about your talents and decide what you can do yourself, what you can ask your friends and family to help with, and then decide what really needs to be done by a professional.

What was the most important lesson you learned from your wedding? Plan everything as best you can, and then try to relax and let the other people take care of little things that pop up during the day.

Care to share a few vendor/shopping links?

• Photography: Jason Spruill, Martin Brown, and Jenni Girtman
• Custom-built furniture: Oz Dillman
• Hair and makeup: Fresche
• Florist: Gitché Yah Yah
• Program art: Atlanta comic book artist Andy Lee

Enough talk — show me the wedding inspo!

About the Author: Offbeat Weditors

@offbeatbride @offbeatwed

Working tirelessly to bring you stimulating content day after day, the Offbeat Wed editors will not sleep until you've gotten your offbeat fix.