Just one thing went through my mind when I first laid eyes on Melissa and Joel’s wedding – THAT DRESS! I had to find out all about it…
“I am a clothing designer so naturally I was very excited to design and hand make my own dress”, Melissa told me. “I also made the bridesmaid and flowergirl dresses, the ring bearer’s outfit and the vests, ties and bow ties for the guys. I even made the outfits worn by our mothers and things for lots of the guests! I had lots of help from my mom, sisters and friends thankfully!”
“My dress was three pieces and it converted to four completely different looks! The first look was a sweetheart strapless dress with a pin up style collar and button detail with a very full skirt. The skirt was made from many fabrics in different prints and textures, but all white and black. The full skirt was removable to reveal a white pencil dress with a black ruffled mermaid skirt. The mermaid skirt could also come off to transform the dress to a short pencil dress with ostrich feather trim. But that’s not all! The pencil dress is fully reversible to a plain black side (which I did end up wearing for about five hours the next day. I have worn the dress a couple times since, I plan to make the mermaid skirt into a circle skirted pin up dress and am probably going to make the big skirt into a comforter for our bed!”
The wedding was held at Ness Creek, Saskatchewan in Canada and even though it rained, they still had the ceremony outside. “The venue is where we dropped a decent amount of cash”, she explained. “Ness Creek is a magical place in the Boreal Forest. They hold a few music festivals, workshops and events there in the summer. We attend the major music festival every year and thought it would be amazing to be able to share this place with our friends and family. They strive to keep everything very natural and environmentally friendly which is very important to us. It wasn’t that pricey to rent in the long run because the guests were all able to camp for free, which is a great added value. ”
“We took a lot of inspiration from the surroundings for the wedding, being that it was outside at a very eclectic and natural outdoor setting. Everyone camped on-site or stayed in the tiny cabins which was really nice too. All aspects of the wedding were outside, that was really important to us because we love camping and being outdoors. Our midnight meal consisted of a make your own bush pie bar, cooked over the open campfire and a popcorn bar.”
“Everything about our wedding was amazing”, she concluded, “even though it poured rain for the ceremony!”
