When Sydney and Scott originally submitted their wedding to me, there were just portraits and a ceremony. I thought perhaps they had forgotten to attach photos of the reception, so I emailed to find out what was up. Here’s what I found out: they got married in Sydney’s mom’s backyard, had a small luncheon afterwards, then headed to a dive bar with some friends. That’s it. No bells or whistles, and no paparazzi during lunch. Clearly, they knew exactly what the point of their wedding was.
Says Sydney:
Scott and I started talking about getting married very early on in our relationship (I’m talking like week two), so we ended up having a little over three years to decide on what our perfect wedding would look like. When we brought the idea to my parents of having a small wedding, my mom offered their backyard as a venue. We wanted a wedding that was about us and getting married, and not one where we felt like we had to compete with weddings we’d been to, seen on TV or anything having to do with Pinterest. We wanted to do things our way and really focus on the celebration of getting to spend the rest of our lives together.
But reception or no, I had to know more about the Sydney’s outfit. Here’s what she told me:
When I got engaged, I started immediately looking for wedding dresses. I do pretty much all my clothing shopping online and I didn’t really want the whole hullabaloo of wedding dress shopping in person. As much as I love Say Yes to the Dress and the experience of shopping with your mom, sisters, and friends seemed like a special one, I just knew I would feel overwhelmed and uncomfortable. And since I am so comfortable online shopping (often times too comfortable) I started looking at some of my favorite shops’ websites for white dresses. I also didn’t want to spend a lot of money. But another requirement was that I also wanted to be able to wear the outfit more than once.
The dresses were pretty and I could have imagined being married in any of them. But before I even ordered any to try on, I remembered a Michael Kors store opening when Bar Rafaeli was wearing this amazing white lace jumpsuit from his collection and I knew that I wanted to look like that. As soon as I got the idea to wear pants, I felt like I actually had that feeling that brides say they get when they try on “the dress.” I tried to find the MK jumpsuit, hoping even that maybe I’d find it gently used and on sale. But after a week of searching the highs and lows of the internets, I came up empty. So I thought then that I would have the two-piece made, but every option ended up being out of my price range.
I went back to scouring the Internet again, looking for a lace two-piece pantsuit. After about two weeks of searching I found the Alexis two-piece (that I ended up wearing). It wasn’t exactly what I wanted, but I loved the sleeves of the top and the lace was vintage looking. When I got it in the mail, I brought it to my parents’ house and tried it on with my mom, and we both new that that was “the one.” It was beautiful, different, and a little risky—perfectly me. I had it altered to fit snug on the top and had the pants tailored to fit more like a bell-bottom than wide leg. On my wedding day I couldn’t wait to put it on, and when I did I felt feminine, classic, and unique all at the same time. Afterward, Scott told me that seeing me walk out in my pantsuit made him think, “Wow, she is so badass.” To be honest that is exactly how I felt, and how I always wanted to feel at my wedding.
You can see more photos from Sydey and Scott’s wedding over here.