Your wedding is a work of art. This is one of the most important events and experiences of your life, and you’ll be sharing it with someone you truly love—all while surrounded by your closest friends and family members. Treating your wedding as an artistic display, as much as a social event, can give everyone involved more vivid memories, and color the experience with a character you couldn’t get any other way.
The question is, how can you work more art into your wedding in a way that works?
Treating Your Wedding as Art
There are a few guiding principles you’ll need to consider:
- Art is expression. The philosophy of art is too complex to reduce to any one idea, but as applied to your wedding, it’s best to think about art as a means of expression. What you express and how you express it is up to you—you can express the story of how you and your partner met, express your feelings as you head into the event, or express your hopes and dreams for the future in your artistic choices.
- Any sensory experience can be artistic. Art isn’t just about visual aesthetics. As long as there’s some kind of intention behind the arrangement, any sensory experience can be art. Consider sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and even touch-based experiences.
- Consistency is key. If you include art from too many different backgrounds or with too many different focal points, it may be more distracting than memorable. Make sure your artistic choices are all in line with each other.
Specific Opportunities
Now let’s look at some of the specific ways you can incorporate more art into your wedding during the planning process:
- Set a tone, vibe, mood, or clear rubric for selection. Before you start the planning process, consider what standards you’d like to set for curating and creating the art involved in your wedding. Will you be focusing on a specific period? A specific mood or vibe? An overall tone, or a specific color scheme? This will help guide all your choices, and ensure your choices all line up.
- Choose creative wedding rings. You can start by choosing creative wedding rings for you and your partner, which represent what you mean to one another. Finding a ring with the right materials, the right shape, and maybe even some history behind it can add much more character to your main event — unforgettable memories and a permanent reminder to carry with you for the indefinite future.
- Look for a venue with artistic sensibilities. Your choice of venue will play a powerful role in forming your guests’ first impressions and adding context for all your other décor. You could even choose to have the wedding or reception in an art museum, or some other location centered on art.
- Think outside the box. If you find yourself stuck on visualizing all the artistic components of your wedding, try thinking outside the box. What music or soundscapes can you create to add to the vibe of the event? What smells, tastes, and feels can you use to give your guests a unique experience?
- Consult with art-friendly professionals. If you’re looking for help, consider reaching out to a wedding planner with artistic sensibilities. Alternatively, you could consult any professional artist friends you have to get their opinion on your upcoming work. The final call will stay yours, but more opinions will introduce you to a more diverse range of ideas and options.
- Avoid off-the-shelf décor. Try to avoid utilizing any off-the-shelf décor. Mass marketed products may dull the aesthetic you’re trying to create, and they certainly won’t fit as well with your overall vibe as something that was created from scratch.
- Display works of personal creativity. Don’t underestimate what you’re capable of creating yourself. You don’t have to have a big budget to feature some truly original work; as long as you have the time and dedication to gather supplies and assemble them to your liking, you can have complete creative control over things like centerpieces, tabletop items, walls, and flooring.
- Enlist the help of friends and family members. If you don’t have the time to create everything yourself, enlist the help of your friends and family. They’ll be thrilled to help you out, and every item they create will have an extra personal touch to make your wedding that much more unique.
You and your partner will open a world of unlimited possibility when you decide to plan your wedding with an artistic foundation. Try not to get too stressed as you select the sensory experiences for you and your guests to enjoy, and make sure you have plans to document the immersive experience, so you can always remember it.