Outdoor Weddings

As an outdoor wedding reception planner for the rich and famous, I’ve seen most everything. I have planned outdoor wedding parties in almost every place you could conceive of. Naturally, I’ve planned garden weddings, and in great numbers, at that. When people imagine how celebrity wedding parties go, they picture the tabloid headlines and a massive gathering, but in reality is most often quite private. The rich and famous usually desire a private outdoor marriage ceremony, free from the scrutiny of reporters and the paparazzi. A garden wedding is just the thing.

Of course, outdoor weddings are not your typical ceremony. When most people think of a garden party, they picture a quaint event, in the backyard around an old picnic table. Maybe if you have a little spending money, you might purchase some new accessories or perhaps have some landscape gardening done, but nothing excessive.

The weddings I have planned, however, have gone beyond the imagination. People with the most beautiful, elaborate gardens will demolish them and have them entirely redone in order to have the wedding of their dreams. They will not hire the average landscaper, but instead famous designers, feng shui professionals who specialize in harmonizing environment with encompassing achitecture. Rather than hiring a single wedding photographer, they will often hire full film crews, at times calling in favors of producers, directors, or cinematographers that they know. Although most of these celebrities are divorced within the next year or so, the sky is the limit when it concerns getting married.

Of course, when people ask me about the outside weddings i’ve planned for famous people, they do not wish to hear about garden parties. They want to get the scoop on the truly eccentric. I’ve seen them as outlandish as they come. One famous person, who will remain unidentified had a certain captivation with the desert. He hired me to design one of the most challenging and difficult wedding ceremonies of all time. It was in the middle of the Sahara Desert, totally secluded. I essentially had to plan and build a virtual oasis, symbolic – at least in his mind – of the oasis of his beloved. Needless to say, like many of the more exuberant outdoor weddings, this one didn’t mark a lifelong commitment. They were divorced six or eight months, later if my memory serves me correctly.

Needless to say, it keeps my life interesting, working with the rich and famous. I wouldn’t trade it at all. If you are planning an outdoor wedding, I recommend “The Knot Complete Guide to Weddings…” Book

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