Alex & Bess’s Intimate, Modern Virginia Wedding at their Home

I have an amazing wedding this morning from the good people over at Love Life Images. Joe Wang shot this stunning affair and I am just honored to share with you the beautiful story of Alex, Bess & their wedding at a private house in Virginia.

Let’s do this.

A bit about the gorgeous couple first [courtesy of Bess]:

Alex and I met in college in 1998 and have been together ever since.  We’ve moved from Baltimore to DC to Virginia to New York and back to Virginia and now to India. We finally decided to tie the knot last year because DC had just legalized same-sex marriage [yay DC!!].  We had hoped to get married in DC proper but all of the venues we liked were far too expensive.  And then to complicate matters further, I officially joined the Foreign Service in May of last year and we learned that we would be moving to India for our first assignment in just a few months.  We were forced to move the wedding up by 3 months but luckily my best friend’s parents offered us the use of their house in Virginia for the ceremony.  (As it turned out, we had to do a small private legal ceremony in DC to make the marriage legal, but we consider the wedding in Virginia to be our “real” wedding.)

Head over heels in LOVE with Bess’ fascinator!

Bess on her wedding styling:

I bought my awesome dress at David’s Bridal and found cool and inexpensive accessories and shoes from funky boutiques to give it a little extra flair.  I didn’t want to do the typical thing of buying expensive shoes and jewelry that I’ll never wear again.  I wear my wedding earrings all the time and the shoes are a hit at a cocktail parties.

Alex’s dress was from Karen Millen and it’s a great cocktail dress for any occasion.  Plus she looked amazing in it!

The house is absolutely gorgeous and we were able to go all out on our international themed wedding.  The invitations and programs were made to look like passports, the cupcake display was topped with a globe and all the cupcakes had pictures of monuments from around the world, and we even had a game for guests to guess where our first assignment was in the world since we hadn’t announced it to everyone.

Marriage! Rock on!

in LOVE with that dance floor … and Alex & Bess’ dancing for that matter…

The DJ did a perfect job of keeping everyone dancing because our goal for this wedding was not to be stuffy or formal – we wanted it to be a party that just happened to have a wedding included!

We even had cuisine from around the world and brought in our favorite DC area restaurants to cater:  Greek food from the Greek Deli on 19th St., Persian food from the Mediterranean Cafe in Great Falls, and good ol’ American Barbecue from Red, Hot and Blue.

We had gorgeous decorations and flowers from Capitol Decor who did a phenomenal job setting up the vibe of a laid back loungey feel throughout the house and yards.  We complemented their decorations with a few unconventional and handmade things thrown in – like luggage tag themed menu cards that we made for the buffet, inexpensive Cobalt blue “Amac” boxes from the Container Store instead of flower vases, and inexpensive international decorations from World Market to help continue the theme.

How insanely stunning is this decor shot ? Seriously one of my absolutely favs featured on my blog to date. So insanely cool, modern, and blissfully romantic.

Most of all, this wedding was a wonderful chance for us to celebrate 12 years of being together and being able to openly share it with all our friends and family.  It was also a perfect way for us to say farewell for the next two years while we’re abroad.  We couldn’t have asked for a better event – the food was delicious, our friends and family were amazing and best of all everyone had a wonderful time.

Thank you so much to Love Life Images, Joe Wang, & especially Alex & Bess for sharing their wedding with us !! We wish you so many more years of love, life, and happiness!

For more pictures [including an amazing shot of Bess’ shoes … that are T.D.F] click on over to Joe’s posthere.