Creative Projects
Technical Writing
Justin & Rhianna’s Wedding
Eclectic Matrimony
My husband and I are an eclectic couple with a wide variety of shared interests, spanning from video games and digital media to nature hikes and the great outdoors. And for our wedding theme (and subsequent website design), we wanted to capture our uniqueness as a couple, while maintaining a sense of elegance and refinement for the occasion – and our less eclectic family members.
Eventually we settled on a theme that subtly drew on our mutual love for our favorite fantasy video game, Blizzard’s Warcraft, while maintaining an elevated tone. Leaning away from the hyper-pixelated nerdcore culture and, instead, highlighting the specific use of fantastical autumnal colors and appreciation for nature featured in the game. Thus, it can be summarily described as “enchanted forest meets traditional Native American cabin” – or, for those in the know about the series, a perfect union between Night Elves and Tauren.
Designing a unique, personalized approach to fit a creative tone.
This resulted in us opting to host the weekend-long event at a local venue by the name of Camp Puh’tok, a summer camp located in Monkton, MD, which specializes in providing interactive educational experiences involving American history and ecology. Because the buildings in this space are recreations of Native American and Colonial American lodgings and outdoor arenas, it aligned amazingly with our unique theme and provided ample space for creative DIY projects.
As with many things in the modern age of digital technology, a cohesive wedding website is a must.
At the time, we had a limited amount of experience with web development and needed something to plug-and-play along with the rest of our wedding communications. After much deliberation, Justin and I determined that Zola’s wedding website service would be the best option for our online base of operations.
We found that they had a wide variety of themed templates to choose from — which aligned perfectly with their stationary options (Save the Dates, invitations, etc.) — while still providing a user-friendly interface and decent selection of customization options to give us the tools to create a personalized wedding website that showcased our unique vision.
So, we went with a template that best fit the vibe of our event and got to work on developing an outline of what information we needed to display on the site.
Once we had a plan and a template, I whipped up the web copy, or text components, of our wedding website over the next few weeks to provide our guests with detailed information about us as a couple, the date/time/location of the wedding, and other important communications regarding the big day.
As a key component of any good event communication strategy, I made sure to include a FAQ section with detailed answers to common questions I anticipated and fielded from guests.
This ranged from how to navigate the venue, where people were staying on-site, wi-fi availability, to your basic registry questions. It also provided information on who to contact for further assistance to ensure that our guests would be supported no matter what.
Clear, concise, & thoughtful communication.
In addition to the web content, I also designed many of the paper communications that were provided to guests for the event, including our Save the Dates, invitations, RSVPs, programs, and signage. Although the design echoed the same colors and elements from our wedding website, these programs were designed entirely by yours truly in Canva.
Don’t forget about your vendors!
Although less aesthetically exciting, wedding plans also typically involve effective communication with your vendors – especially when that wedding is held at a remote venue with limited internet access.
Rhianna provided such clear, detailed instructions on where to go that I had no trouble at all getting to and from the venue. Super helpful!
– Alex, With Love Beauty Bar
To help alleviate some of the stress of navigation at our wedding, I compiled detailed instructions for our vendors (along with maps) to help them navigate parking and locate their respective areas at the venue for the day of the event, sent in advance via email.
The end result?
Our DIY, woodland wedding was a major success entirely because of the amount of work we put into it. From establishing a cohesive design for the decor and communications to providing clear and concise messaging to guests and vendors alike, we made it possible to carry out the wedding fantasy of our dreams.