Marcella & Derek’s World of Warcraft meets Spanish carnivale wedding

The offbeat bride: Marcella, Actuary (mathematician)

Her offbeat partner: Derek, Director of Personal Training, Gold’s Gym

Location & date of wedding: Garden ceremony, home champagne brunch, and Spanish restaurant reception in Richmond, VA — June 20, 2010

What made our wedding offbeat: We did just about everything ourselves, with the help of talented friends and family. The whole production cost only around $6,000. I made my own dress and jewelry and reconstructed the bridesmaid’s dresses. We all pitched in to make the decor.

Our friend/groomsman of London Hair Design did our hair… another friend who owns Crossroads Coffee created an awesome vegan brunch menu… my bridesmaid, a talented musician, created a kick-ass playlist for us. It meant so much to us both to see everyone throw their hearts into making our day awesome.

Our goal was to celebrate our “weirdness” – after all, we met on World of Warcraft! – within a sort of traditional framework. The end result was: A small garden ceremony that honored our beginnings as comrades in WoW, and included an excerpt from a sci-fi novel while remaining moving, miraculous and a spectacular post-ceremony vegan brunch at our home with our closest friends and family.

All culminating in a Spanish Carnivale-themed reception at a local restaurant complete with salsa lessons and sangria! Somehow, these seemingly disparate elements came together to make an awesome whole, sort of like how we did!

Tell us about the ceremony: From the ceremony welcome: “We are gathered here, as family and friends, to celebrate the joy of the marriage of Marcella and Derek. This union, this mysterious oneness and dedication of love, began over four years ago in the most unlikely of places: an on-line fantasy game where they met as avatars, each knowing nothing of what the other looked like or, initially, even whether the other was a man or woman.

As they quested and fought battles together from opposite sides of the country, they became teammates and fast friends. Over time the camaraderie grew into something more and on Valentines day several years ago, Derek made his first cross-country journey to finally meet Marcella in person. That initial excitement and curiosity has survived growth and transition to become a strong, true love. We are here today to honor this love…”

Our biggest challenge: The greatest challenge was paring down all of my initial grand plans into something manageable. It’s amazing how small details can take on such daunting significance when planning your wedding! Time was the biggest help there: as the time grew shorter, options for everything from venues to musicians and food and everything else shrank down to several rather than the overwhelming hundreds that I started out with.

My favorite moment: Amidst the frantic rush to get ready for the ceremony, having finally gotten into my gown and veil, I turned to face my maid of honor and bridesmaid and they both immediately burst into tears.

Laughing with Derek at the “altar” as the celebrant somehow managed to tell the story of our meeting in Warcraft with grace and solemnity.

Seeing everyone pitch in, unasked in most cases, to do everything from clean our house and make cupcakes, to act as coordinators and make paper flowers.

Dancing together at the end of the night.

My funniest moment: Seeing everyone in fake mustaches was pretty damn funny.

My advice for offbeat brides: Getting the many people of your lives together in one place, probably just this once, makes all the effort worth it and any mishaps insignificant.

Also, people will remember having a good time and how happy you were, not whether you had perfectly color-coordinated centerpieces, menus, and escort cards or any such details. Don’t get so immersed in “Martha Stewart Weddings” etc that you forget that the portion of the population not currently getting married has no idea what an escort card is anyway. Don’t worry too much about that stuff!

Care to share a few vendor/shopping links?

• Dress: Me
• Headpiece: Etsy, Be Something New
• Photographers: Kimberly Frost and Chris Smith
• Makeup: Dayna of Vamps and Vixens

Enough talk — show me the wedding inspo!