This absolutely darling destination wedding is fun and fabulous. Sara and Rocky travelled to Las Vegas from the U.K. to get married in a chapel, infusing their wedding day with glitzy emerald green details, drawing inspiration from the bride’s engagement ring. Sara wore a vintage wedding dress and despite it being a destination wedding, this couple customized many parts of their day, including the playing card-style stationery and that amazing vintage brooch bouquet.
DIY DETAILS + DECOR
I came across button and brooch bouquets on Pinterest. I thought they were amazing, but I couldn’t find one with the colours I wanted, and custom orders were very expensive. So I decided to make one for me, and one for my Maid of Honour. It took a lot of work.
Firstly I needed to find the brooches, many of which came from eBay. Some came from family, and some fit our theme, like red sparkly hearts to match my shoes and a little cat brooch, as Rocky and I have 2 cats. I used big gold ones for the first layer of brooches, and then lots of big sparkly green ones. The more sparkly the better! Some of them weren’t the right green, so I used a bit of green nail varnish on the enamel bits to get them the right shade. I was sat with a glue gun, florists wire, and florist stem tape for 3 solid days before I could even start putting them together! It was hard, but absolutely worth it. I got so many comments on them, and given that we were traveling it was great to be able to know exactly what my ‘flowers’ would look like before getting there. I also like having it to keep forever, and being able to give people in my family bits of it in the future when they get married.
THE CEREMONY — Garden Chapel at Vegas Weddings
The ceremony was exactly the simple and fun wedding we were after. We had a ‘first glance’ option in our package, so I arrived before Rocky and most of the guests and I waited in the bridal suite with my Mum and my Maid of Honour. Once all the guests had been seated my Dad came and met me and we walked down the aisle to the Star Wars Throne Room song.
The doors opened and the room felt full of our families and friends. The venue was lit with candle light, and had rose petals scattered down the aisle. All of this made it feel very intimate. Just what we had wanted. We were both a bit nervous, and the ceremony was short and sweet as we weren’t having readings or anything, so it passed by in a blur. Luckily we have a great video as part of our package to be able to watch it again and send it friends and family. A few friends from the UK were able to watch live online through the streaming service that the venue provided. Our recessional was Queen’s Don’t Stop Me Now.
FAVORITE MEMORY
I’ll always remember walking down Fremont Street for our photo shoot and having people woop and cheer and shout “Congratulations!â€
One of the stand out moments was walking into the room in Maggiano’s and seeing how beautiful the team had made it. Spotting all the little decorations I’d given to the team around the room and seeing the beautiful flowers and cake. Overall we’ll remember how much fun the day was! When there’s so much organising and build up you worry that something will go wrong, but everything was so easy thanks to all the great people involved, that we were able to really enjoy it!
THE RECEPTION — Maggiano’s at Fashion Show Mall
I couldn’t have asked for a more perfect venue for our reception, a private room at Maggiano’s. We’d visited the day before to give Beth (a manager) our decorations and when we arrived on the day she and the florist had made the room look beautiful.
Rocky’s family is Italian, and they were particularly impressed at the quality of Maggiano’s food. We had a family-style dinner, which meant we passed round shared plates, which was a great way to get everybody talking, and meant everybody could have as much as they liked. We’d selected a package with an open bar and everybody enjoyed it to the fullest extent. The music selection was perfect (lots of Frank Sinatra, jazz and easy listening, which we love) and we all felt so relaxed and comfortable thanks to our wonderful host who looked after us all the whole time. There is nothing we’d change and it was the perfect chilled out evening we’d hoped for.
WHY LAS VEGAS?Â
The day after we got engaged we started looking at venues. We didn’t want to wait as we knew venues book out far in advance so could be waiting a long time if we didn’t settle on somewhere soon. We knew we wanted to travel for our wedding and wanted something small and intimate, and the UK’s weather is so unreliable! It’s also a great way to start the honeymoon straight away (we went on to spend five days in New Orleans and eight days in New York). We both love the US, so where better to get married than the Marriage Capital of the World?
We looked at a lot of the hotel chapels, but most were either booked, or looked like a bit plain. Rocky found the ‘Vegas Wedding’ company, and saw they had a Garden Chapel. It was perfect!
LAS VEGAS WEDDING TIPS FROM ROCKY AND SARA
You just can’t get enough photos! It might seem tedious at the time, but take the time to get lots of combinations of you and friends and family members. And get individual ones too! e.g. just bride with maid of honour, groom with best man to make sure you have a full set to choose from.
GUESTCOUNT +Â BUDGET
We had a budget of about £9,000 ($15,000) for everything (dress, ceremony, reception, and the honeymoon). We ended up spending about £11,000 ($18,500) and had 14 people join us. We were lucky that our parents helped, and our family and friends gave us money towards the honeymoon. We used HoneyFund to take contributions which was great as we could show people what we would use their contributions for.
VENDOR + VENUE DETAILS :
PHOTOGRAPHER . Light Life Studio
CEREMONY VENUE . Garden Chapel at Vegas Wedding
RECEPTION VENUE . Maggiano’sÂ
FLORAL . tablescape: The Palette, other: Vegas Wedding / CAKE . Freed’s Bakery / BRIDAL FASHION . dress – vintage from Saint Francis Hospice charity shop in Hornchurch, shoes – custom from MDNY, jewelry – engagement ring, Holts Gems, necklace + earrings, Cosmic Twist, accessories – TARDIS charm, Spiffing Jewelry, headband, Arsiart, phone cover, My Bling Thingz / ALTERATIONS . Gold Needle and Elite Alterations / HAIR + MAKEUP . I Do Updo / MANICURE . Barry M Emerald Green and top coat Barry M Green Glitter, Christophe Salon at MGM Grand / GROOMSWEAR . suit - Moss Bros, shirt – T.M. Lewin, tie + handkerchief – Tie Tack, shoes – Topman / TRANSPORTATION . courtesy Vegas Wedding / LIGHTING . marquee lights, The Letter Lounge / STATIONERY + PAPER GOODS . portraits, Kate Zaremba, Vegas skyline, Architette Studios, printing, Moo