What's the coolest/most unique idea you've seen at a wedding?

Most weddings I've been to all look the same. A couple of them have been outside the box.


One wedding when I was in high school many years ago ticked most boxes for unique and fun. It was the first time I had seen photos taken before the ceremony, which is commonplace now. Back then, we all thought it was odd but it worked out very well. The couple dismissed guests by rows and that went super fast. In the church fellowship hall they did all the festivities (cake cutting, bouquet/garter tosses). It was also the first time anyone had seen a fake cake for cutting with one real slice the couple never found. But they served half sheet cakes from a local grocery store in 3 flavors that were cut right in front of guests so they could choose what they wanted and go back for 2nds or 3rds in birthday cake slices. No one was offended or weirded out. After that, they went to a dance at the local community center across town. Leftover cake and fruit platters were served. No full meal but it wasn't done in that family/circle. The couple also had the limo for a block of time (2 hr minimum) but didn't need it after the church so the driver took all the kids for a spin around town to use up the time.
Another was a couple years ago at a local community center owned by the parks department. They served a full meal but it was catered by a local Asian restaurant. It was a variety of Chinese, Teriyaki, Hawaiian cuisine in a buffet. Everyone talked about the food being the best they'd had at a wedding. And leftovers for anyone who wanted to take some home.

I think my favorite things I’ve seen at weddings were

1. The bride was Irish and had surprise bagpipers in kilts play a couple songs during the reception

2. Axe throwing at the reception
3. Probably the coolest and most unique was the reception of one of my best friends. The couple were both filmmakers and had their reception at a beautiful historic independent theater. They had movie posters made for their wedding which were displayed out front, and the refreshment stand serving free popcorn, candy and sodas. Then they surprised guests by debuting the trailer for their new film.

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Michelle - I love unique food at weddings! I think honestly that is the one thing people always remember years later, how good the food was! But even if it's just cake and punch like your first example, if the atmosphere is good that's all that matters!

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Oh I love bagpipers! I've had a couple of weddings with them, and they're always amazing.

I'm not sure how I'd feel about axe throwing, especially if people had been drinking. But I can only imagine how cool of photos that could end up with.

For your friends wedding, I love when couples are able to really tell their life story with the wedding. Plus getting a sneak peak into a film made by them? Awesome!

A unity volcano is so unique. I went to a wedding they had a magician for entertainment and I thought that was really cool.

The couple had their wedding at a zoo. It was my first time visiting one since I was a child

Some friends of ours had a Jane Austen meets Godzilla themed wedding. The ring bearer had a green "monster" pillow, their ceremony was a skit that referenced everything from Taco Tuesday to Shakespeare to D&D, and the centerpieces were Austen's novel covers with Godzilla photoshopped onto one of the male characters. I also still have her throwing bouquet, which was made of pages from old paperbacks.

Another couple we know, the husband is DH's swordmaster - he does Italian fencing. The wife is in theatre. So they had a swordfight *with each other*.

Which was hilarious, because DH and I had always planned to have a swordfight *with our friends* at our wedding. We're both actors, and we are both stage combatants, and our director friends delight in casting us in plays wherein I beat the living snot out of DH (...his character has, always, 150% deserved it). So, for our wedding, we wanted to team up and fight other people for a change.

Soooooooo:

(That is one of our dear friends who is an amazing actor, who usually does videography for our circle, but we said, Uh, no, please come play with us, thank you! And he did, because he is a delightful human. He is also deeply hilarious and his ad libs make it very hard to stay in character. It's hard to see here, but that's an axe.)

View Quoted Comment That’s actually the type of venue the volcano happened at, and where my FH and I are getting married it! Zoo weddings can be incredibly fun

View Quoted Comment Oh my gosh these both sound like incredibly fun weddings! I would love to see things like that in person. They sound incredible! Especially the sword fights, that’s such a fun idea.

Dear Courtney,

I haven't been to too many "unique" weddings. Although, I remember being around twelve and going with a good friend to her cousin's wedding. They were both lawyers, who had met in law school, and they held the wedding at the bride's family home in Bryan, Texas. Their home was pretty standard. It was very nice and expensive, but definitely a cookie-cutter and in a subdivision in which every house looked basically the same.

The really interesting part is that they moved every single piece of furniture that they owned out of the home, and replaced it with tables, flowers hanging from the ceilings, the whole works! It was just one large living and dining room, with catering out of their own kitchen (all open concept, obviously), but it felt like a ballroom. Even her little sisters bedrooms were completely transformed into mini-spaces where you could get popcorn, or take photos (this was before photobooths blew up)! The only room guests weren't allowed into was the master, as that's where the bridal party got ready. It was absolutely wild seeing the transformation. I mean, these people were very well off and had a ton of furniture. Where did it all go??? I'm still stumped. Oh my gosh- even the bathrooms suddenly had attendants and everything! Another really awesome transformation, was that the entire room had to initially be set up for a ceremony, and a whimsical array of attendants quickly flipped the row seating into table seating in the 10-15 minutes it took for us to go outside and watch the couple release two doves.

My favorite part, and maybe the start to my "I always cry at weddings," trope, was that they were married in front of her family fireplace, with the fire roaring and with her grandfather officiating (he was a judge).

All in all, it was a very, very grand occasion. The biggest surprise is just that: you'd never think that this cookie-cutter home out in the suburbs would be hosting such a lavish affair!

Anyways, thanks for reading while I ramble. I look forward to seeing everyone else's posts! So fun!

Aubrianna Abbema

One of our groomsmen just shared with us a wedding he went to a few years back. The couple got married at a Castle and everyone dressed up in cool fancy costumes like a masquerade ball. The wedding party each had a skit or something and were introduced as if they came from foreign lands like something you see in a movies with Kings and Queens when guests arrive to the ball. For the ceremony instead of exchanging rings, they exchanged crowns. We watched the video and it was very cool!

My friends' wedding had a silent disco. They had headphones that you could choose your station on. It was neat, but I did find that it "divided" the crowd.

2 months,5 days later LOL.

I attended a Jewish wedding a few years ago , I loved their traditions, especially the Hora , a celebratory dance where guests dance in a circle. Women dance with women and men dance with men. The bride and groom are seated and lifted into the the air while holding onto a handkerchief or cloth napkin. Not unique since this is a tradition but definitely cool,fun!

After filming many, many, many weddings when I was a videography assistant... honestly, weddings are pretty standard and I haven't seen much that was unique.

One odd one that I can think of is one where the ceremony was 7:03 long. I'm not kidding. I know because my camera started rolling as soon as the bride entered, and it was seven minutes and three seconds before they kissed. It was the absolute shortest ceremony I have ever seen. And honestly, I kind of liked it. No preaching, no overused readings, no nonsense. Here are two people getting married, marriage is awesome, do you? I do, now kiss. Bam. It probably wasn't most people's idea of how a ceremony should go, but guests actually seemed to really enjoy it.

At a wedding I went to, the first dance was a perfect re-enactment of the final dance from Dirty Dancing, including the lift and the Swayze solo dance break. It was pretty darn impressive, if not a tiny bit extra