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Offbeat partner: April
Offbeat partner: Bethany
Date and location of wedding: Camp Tanager, Mt Vernon, IA, October 13, 2018
Our offbeat wedding at a glance:
The theme of our wedding was performance. We are professional performers and have lots of performing friends. We had many different performances from Burlesque, Fire, Aerial, Dance, Hip-Hop, Belly Dance, Singing, Juggling, and more.
We ended the ceremony by lighting our dresses on fire!
Tell us about the ceremony:
We used stuffed animals instead of floral bouquets. We had a handfasting but with a whip.
And of course, we lit our dresses on fire instead of doing a unity candle. Our officiant said, “You may now light the brides” before it all started. We're both fire performers so we know all of the precautions to take when doing something like this. We had a certified pyrotechnic and medic on hand just in case, but they weren't needed.
A person from my wedding party lit my dress and one from Bethany’s wedding party lit hers. We tried to get them to match evenly but mine ran up first and Bethany’s took a while but it slowly burnt up the skirt. I think Bethany managed eight seconds in hers and mine was 12 seconds before I had to drop it. We attached slow-burning duck cloth canvas to the trains of our dresses, which would easily tear away.
Our hair was up, the ground was damp ground, and we had 50+ experienced fire performers helping out. We followed all of the rules outlined in the Specialty Insurance Requirements, NFPA 160 and NAFAA Regulations. So we were very safe about the whole thing.
Tell us about your reception:
We had blue and pink themed decor at the reception. My favorite color is pink, and Beth's favorite color is blue so it made sense. For entertainment, we had jugglers, clowns, and aerialists perform during the reception.
What was your most important lesson learned?
If you have an LGBT wedding, be very careful about posting publicly. There are still a lot of anti-LGBT people in the world who will comment or message you with threats of violence toward you. You can read more about this element here.
[Editor's note: here's a post to help you if your wedding happens to go viral!]
Vendors
Photography: Cukini Studios at Studio Reserved, Sherry Schons, and Emi's Photography • Cake: Molly's Cupcakes • Venue: Camp Tanager
Gallery
Follow up post…
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The stuffed animals idea is so cute!
Also, your dresses in their multiple iterations, including on fire: AWESOME!
YES! I am also a circus performer planning a queer offbeat wedding and I feel so encouraged by this! And now I’ve got a little more backbone for those “so if we brought an aerial rig . . .” convos. So far everyone has been super excited! Beautiful pictures. You two make my heart sparkle <3
** also I love that you included ALL the safety caveats. Guys – hire professionals unless this is *literally* your job like our beautiful fire brides! Trust me, there are performers near you who would love to be part of your wedding!