Wedding | Rebekah & Colin

Tell us a little about yourselves!

We met five years ago while both living in Denver, Colorado. Rebekah had just moved. It was an immediate, undeniable yes. Rebekah struck up the conversation that we're still having to this day. By three weeks in, we admitted we were in love. Colin said it first.

After traveling a bunch and living in Latin America for a little while, we realized we wanted to build on top of a foundation of really deep roots and chose to return to Colin's hometown of Richmond, Virginia. Both our moms couldn't have been more surprised that we'd landed back on the East Coast. It surprised us, too. 

We've got a sweet little opposites attract thing going on, in some ways. Rebekah is exuberant, driven, and perpetually pulled by 1000 ideas at once – a big dreamer, the vision keeper. Colin is immeasurably chill, composed, patiently analytical, and quietly goofy. We like to live very in the moment while staying steadily focused on the bigger picture. We're both creative and enjoy building things. We also like to travel, learn languages, and spend absurd amounts of time at Natural History Museums. Our first dates included a lot of bike rides, camping trips, oysters, spending days on end together, and watching Joseph Cambell's 'The Power of Myth'.

Colin's proposal was perfect and completely unplanned. We were exploring the Isle of Skye in Scotland, driving through thick mist and listening to the album “Finally, We Are No One” by Múm. The title track of that album became the song that began our ceremony, a full-circle moment. We hiked to Talisker Bay, a salty Hebridean cove surrounded by cliffs. It only us and some sheep. As we approached, we both intuitively knew. We wandered around the beach, teary-eyed and in awe, and as we began our walk back, Colin knelt down and asked Rebekah to marry him. She said yes before he could get all the words out. She remembered she had a toy mermaid ring in her pocket. You can find Colin's account of this on an iconic AllTrails review.

Rebekah is a designer / artist / snail mail enthusiast Colin is a software engineer / yoga teacher / enjoyer of a croissant and a cold brew.

Why did you decide to get married where you did?

Having our wedding in Richmond made sense. It's our home, and we love it here. So many of our friends live here. We wanted as many people as possible to be able to attend without any stress. We chatted about eloping in the desert out west, where we spent so much time falling in love – and it would've been beautiful, just the two of us like that, but it would've been a fundamentally different experience than what we truly wanted, which was to make something really special alongside our loved ones.

We actually had decided on a different venue, venues actually, when Colin suggested we pivot and have it at Celeste Farms instead. After a winter where we'd go to Celeste every Sunday morning as the first stop of a sauna/pho combo date, it had such a positive association already – an established dot on our mental maps. Keeping everything at one location felt much more in line with our desire to have the whole event flow seamlessly and feel very immersive.

Also, we wanted the food to be really, really good. Everything we had for dinner was grown or raised on-site. We didn't even see the menu for dinner until we sat down to eat. We just trusted that it would be incredible.

How many guests did you have?

Fifty! It was the number we had in mind, and our final headcount was exactly that. It was perfect. It was small enough to feel personal and present, but it was still a party. It was so clearly the right decision when a torrential downpour surprised us as a dinner guest and moved the reception inside. We had such a cozy time dancing in the house together.

We celebrated with our extended families at an engagement party the summer before, and had an intimate welcome dinner the night before. Both were excellent moves.

What was your budget?

It ended up being just shy of $30k. We prioritized spending with hyper-local businesses on details that elevated the guest experience, and saved a lot through trades, collaboration and craft.

Decor was very important to us, but we didn't spend a lot of money on it at all. The heirloom silver candelabras that normally live on our mantles donned the bar, Colin made a beautiful handfasting cord to incorporate the Celtic tradition into the ceremony, and our friend Pat helped us install a photo backdrop that ended up getting repurposed as decor for the inside tables when the weather had other plans. It felt special to incorporate so many objects that were already so imbued with memory, and it aligned with our values to repurpose a lot of things to avoid unnecessary consumption.

Tell us about your outfits.

Rebekah: I wore a raw silk dress that was custom-made by a small sister-duo design house. I had it bookmarked for months, and kept coming back to it over and over again. Material is so important to me, and I loved how soft the natural fabric was against my skin. I wanted the dress to be both comfortable and to fit like a dream, and the corset back really allowed those desires to coexist.

I grew up Catholic, so somewhere deep in my psyche, a long lace-edged mantilla veil really was the only option. They're so moody and romantic. During the cocktail hour, my uncle told me I looked like Mary Magdalene, so I think it landed with the right audience. I ended up wearing it all night.

Colin: I decided early on that I wanted a dark green tuxedo, something that looked and felt very classic but was unique and subtly different. I lowkey hate bowties, so I didn't wear one. I found some patent leather tuxedo shoes that were so incredibly shiny that I could see my reflection in them. Rebekah loved them.

What was the most important aspect for you, in terms of planning your wedding?

Rebekah: That it felt sincere, immersive, and ours. With a wedding, if you don't make thoughtful decisions, decisions are kind of made for you, and you're left with the default. We took a lot of care in crafting our ceremony so that it didn't shy away from the inherent intensity of the moment. We looked at it as: we're free to write our own ritual here. What do we want that to feel like, for us, and for our loved ones?

Colin: Similarly, for me, I wanted it to really feel like ours rather than following the kind of default script for a wedding. We chose one of our favorite places around town for the venue, wrote our own vows, worked with our officiant and dear friend, Morgan, to craft the ceremony, made all of the playlists, built our own photo backdrop, and I can't even remember what else. Rebekah designed everything, from the tablescapes with handmade dove-shaped placecards to little souvenir matchbooks. We both love a project, as do so many of our friends, so we were able to pull together something that felt like a natural extension of our relationship, our tastes, and our life together, and invite everyone to join us in it. We're so grateful for the help we received from our friends and family in making this happen.

Were there any elements that were important for you to incorporate?

Rebekah:  We had an old home video of my late grandmother holding me as a baby, slow dancing as she sang. I danced with my mom to the same song, and surprised everyone by projecting the video footage behind us. My grandmother was such a foundational person in my life, and having her presence there in that way was deeply important to me. There wasn't a dry eye in the house.

I wanted it all to feel cohesive, despite us not having a set color palette and using a lot of different textural elements. I chose to use a double-headed distelfink as a central, symbolic element in our designs. It's a classic Amish folk symbol that represents “double good luck” and a joyful, strong union. I grew up deep in Amish country, so incorporating that felt like a homage to heritage.

Colin: It was important to me that we planned quiet moments for ourselves together during the wedding day. We did our first look at the hotel where Rebekah got ready before driving to the venue together. Then, we gave ourselves the 15 minutes after the ceremony to breathe and take it all in, and made sure to keep finding each other when we were inevitably pulled away into other conversations through the evening.

Any tips for couples getting married?

Rebekah: You're the architect here. Ditch expectations and any ill-fitting traditions. Center on what matters most – the world you've built together, that you're sharing with your loved ones. Embrace surprise weather. Even if you're staying in town, get a fancy hotel room for a few nights. We didn't have traditional wedding parties, but still have the most competent, quick-on-their-feet friend you know as your Maid of Honor (Sarah, we love you). Hold hands as much as you can during the evening.

Colin: Give yourselves as much time as you can to feel present and centered and together in the week leading up to the wedding, especially if you're planning and coordinating it yourselves.

Are there any vendors that you would like to tell us a little more about?

All of our vendors were ridiculously talented friends of ours. Terra showed up with DJ equipment when we had just asked her to babysit a playlist. Haley's basil buttercream icing and roasted strawberry compote I'll never stop thinking about. Lauren kept me centered while getting ready, and I trust her with my hair so much I asked her to chop some face-framing fringe the morning of the wedding.

Our photographer and videographer, Joséphine N Manet, is calm even within the eye of a storm. She's so sweet and makes you feel right at home. Her work speaks for itself. I mean, come on. She's incredible. She was the first person we booked, a year and a half in advance, before we even had our date firmly nailed down. We had such immense trust in her.

A special shoutout to Angela Simakoff, owner of Fable Flowers. The crescent-moon-shaped meadow she made for the ceremony space became our precious marriage portal, our foliage nest from which we proclaimed our vows and crossed the threshold into marriage. Then, we reused them at dinner, in a way that tucked the guests between them. She understood my desire for intentionality, shared my aesthetic vision, and working with her was just so much fun.

Photographer & Videographer: Joséphine N Manet Photography @josephinemanetphotography | Planning & Styling: by the couple | Flora: Fable Flowers @fable.flowers | Ceremony & Reception Location: Celeste Farms @celeste.farms | Celebrant: Morgan Whitehead @mater.matutolypea | MUA: Emily Davis @emxlymakeup | Hair: Lauren Ashley Lucado @laurenashley_avocado | Catering & Beverages: Celeste Farms Beverages & Erin Gerety @eringerety | Cake: Haley Jeannine @haley.jeannine | Stationery: Rebekah Alexander @rebekah__online; Printed by Post Rider Press @post_rider_press | Entertainment: Terra Etienne @ghosstcat | Skincare: Wynn Skin Aesthetics @wynnskin | Dress: Office Seven @office.seven | Suit: Oliver Wicks @oliverwicks | Veil: Vintage | Wedding Rings: (hers) Jaded Designs NYC @jadeddesignsnyc & (his) Luminous Diamant @luminous_diamant | Shoes: Knockoff Tabis from Raboesy @raboesyofficial; Florsheim Tuxedo Shoes @florsheimshoes