Capitol Wedding: Jamelyn & Chris’ Edgar Allen Poe Themed, Offbeat Virginia Wedding

Oh MAN today’s real Virginia wedding feature is going to be good. I caught a glimpse of this awesome wedding on photographer, Leo Druker’s blog, and I just KNEW I had to have it. I was PUMPED when he submitted it to me.

“Our wedding was vintage inspired and very intimate. We tried to incorporate different elements from the Victorian and Edwardian time periods but in general we kept it simple which is a common theme of times past.”

This wedding has so much awesome. Tons of tattoos, piercings, Etsy details, top hats, canes, and sick, steam-punk pocket watches. Jamelyn & Chris executed that Victorian/Edwardian theme perfectly and just WAIT until you see how Leo Druker captured it all [magnificently of course]. Oh and the getaway car – oh just you wait ….

Jamelyn & Chris’ Offbeat, Victorian Richmond, VA Wedding at the Edgar Allen Poe Museum

Vendors:

Photographer: Leo Druker | Ceremony Location: Edgar Allen Poe Museum | Reception: The Douglas Baird House | Flower Girls’ Dresses: Etsy | Floral Design: Flowers by Mona Ray | Cake: Shyndigz

Details from the bride & groom:

The girls got ready at an early 1900’s Bed and breakfast, Maury Place at Monument along historic Monument Ave, which was also where the bride and groom spent their first night.

We started with the flower girls and found on etsy.com a seamstress from England who made the dresses. The dresses were made from unbleached cotton and had only small handmade flower establishments. Next, we focused on newsboys and fedoras for the ring bearers and guests to bring in all of the early 1900s influence to life.

The colors for the wedding, orange and green,were chosen because the brides favorite color is orange and green complimented very well.

The bride’s family made headbands in the wedding colors for the flower girls, which were garnished with hand spun cloth flowers and the baskets for the rose petals the flower girls used.

For the groom and groomsmen we got tailed tuxedos which were common and accented them with the ascots instead of more modern ties and/or bow ties. We further carried this vintage theme into our venues.

For the bridesmaids and brides mother, we gave them vintage replica cameo necklaces and the groomsmen were given steam punk inspired working pocket watches.

The ceremony at The Museum of Edgar Allen Poe seemed a natural choice for us since it holds a special place in our relationship and Poe’s sense of the macabre appeals to our sensibilities. The location is also the oldest building/house in Richmond (circa 1740).

We used lanterns topped with cymbidium orchids to line the aisle and used the same orchids in a cascading fashion to accent the water fountain at the ceremony; the flowers were from Flowers by Mona Ray in Richmond.

The bride’s mother made the ring bearer pillows with burlap and ribbon and embellished them with spare skeleton key replicas.

Click inside for the rest of Jamelyn & Chris’ offbeat, Victorian inspired Richmond, Virginia wedding at the Douglas Baird House!

On their unique wedding ceremony:

The wedding ceremony included an analogy to relationships and marriages as it relates to getting a tattoo. Thanks go to the bride’s family and groom’s best friend for traveling 7 hours to attend and for her two uncles for officiating the ceremony.

They went “DIY” when it came to their wedding music, choosing a personalized playlist over a DJ or live instruments:

We also did our entire wedding music play list. We played John H. Clarke a contemporary Spanish guitarist based out of San Francisco for the ceremony, including the processional, and The Beetles “I want to hold your hand” for the recessional.

The girls each got their favorite flowers with the orange added and all happened to be a Lilly of some sort and we used roses to accent the Lillies in my bouquet.

 

For the engagement photos we dressed in 1950’s attire. For the wedding we acquired a top hot, cane, parasol and genuine mink shawl for added vintage flair. We used the bride’s great grandmother’s broach to bustle my dress.

The reception took place at The Douglas Baird House which was established in the early 1900’s.

We spent most of our time going to several antique shops looking for table decorations. We used vintage autographed and postmarked postcards, a camera, students light microscope, art nouveau sterling silver hand mirror and brush and much more (including bride’s early to mid 1900’s family photos) for table decorations.

We also, with the help of the bride’s family, put into a trunk vintage toys, such as dominoes, dolls and a wooden truck along with boas, gloves and jewelry for the kids to play with.

We used old milk bottles to hold the flowers as well as milk glass from the bride’s grandmother.

For our guest book we bought a puzzle in the shape of an oak tree handmade from a gentlemen on etsy.com, which came with a heart shaped piece in the trunk with our initials carved into it.

The wedding cake, Shyndigz in Richmond, had the pattern of the lace on my dress piped onto the tiers.

We, along with the bride’s parents, made our favors, which included two types of picture frames complete with at least 6 different engagement photo choices and different types of replica skeleton key ornaments.

 The reception started with an hors d’oeuvre hour for which we played 1950’s music, during dinner we played music important to our relationship and danced the night away in a sock-hop fashion.

The bride and groom’s families were instrumental during the process.  Also, special thanks to the groom’s mother and sister-in-law and the bride’s mother, grandmother, aunt and best friend!

And now, the best getaway car decorations you will EVER see … and the groom’s reaction? Priceless.

^Ah-mazing … RIGHT?! Ah! It has been SUCH a joy blogging Jamelyn & Chris’ amazing, offbeat Victorian wedding at the Edgar Allen Poe Museum & Douglas Baird House in Richmond Virginia. A special thanks again to Leo Druker Photography for sharing his stunning images.