Mara & Bill’s ultimate electronic geek wedding

The offbeat groom: Bill, Electrical Engineer

His offbeat partner: Mara, Electrical Engineer

Date and location of wedding: Fort Lauderdale Yacht Club, Florida — March 10, 2013

Our offbeat wedding at a glance: I proposed to Mara by hiding the message on a printed circuit board that she designed. Then we built on that theme to apply our trade and passion to our wedding: electronics! We made electronic wedding invitations with secret Morse code messages, and we designed centerpieces that were 3D printed at home. We even had a circuit ceremony involving a soldering iron.

For the invitations, we used a solid ink printer to make flexible circuit boards at home, and added circuits and some LEDs for a sparkling effect. You can see the details on the assembly here.

Our centerpieces were similarly created with 3D printing techniques and a silhouette cutter.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CX-EhtAiIHU&w=560&h=315]

We added some light and sound effects to our wishing well, too. Combining an Arduino, an inexpensive music player, an PWM shield, and a 3D-printed latch, the well puts on a quick show every time a wish is deposited. See it here:

Our outfits also involved meters of wire, LEDs, and batteries. I used a friend’s suit since I’d be customizing it way too much for a rental, and Mara designed her own dress to customize. [Reminds us a little of this! – Ed.] The e-textiles had lots of lights and electroluminescent wires.

If you want the real nitty gritty for assembly, I wrote a whole post about it!

Tell us about the ceremony: When it came time for me and Mara to draft the ceremony, we pondered how we could incorporate an element from our theme. We had only four days to go and only some vague ideas. Mara bought some wood letters to spell out “I DO,” and wanted to use them somehow. We also joked about using a soldering iron during the ceremony. Then it hit us: we could symbolize our connection by soldering iron together to complete an electrical connection.

The circuit boards that asked “Mara Will You Marry Me?” were repurposed to light up the “I DO” letters. During the ceremony, the final connection was made to make it all come together. Here is the video of the circuit ceremony:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FIoZgh6VvN8&w=560&h=315]

My favorite moment: Our circuit ceremony turned out to be really fun, and one of the easier projects, surprisingly. Other details we loved included our hand-painted aisle runner, the electroluminescent wire bouquets that Mara schemed with our florist, and my mother and Mara’s jewelry creations with resistor and circuit board elements from old print cartridges.

Care to share a few vendor/shopping links?

• Flowers: Victoria Park Flowers
• Photography: George Street Photography
• Venue: Fort Lauderdale Yacht Club

Enough talk — show me the wedding inspo!