Trick or Treat...Wedding Style Guide

Halloween is one of the most popular holidays, and it’s easy to see why. Dressing up and becoming someone else for a night in order to get free candy is a lot of fun. It’s also the only night that it is socially acceptable to pretend to be someone else.

 

If you happen to be one of those people who put Halloween decorations in their yard on the first of October, you may want to consider having your own Halloween-themed wedding.

 

The Venue
 

 

You’ll want to find a big, open room for the reception. An abandoned barn or factory building would be best. Hang lanterns, orange tulle, and fake cobwebs on the walls and from the ceiling, but choose heavy black fabrics for other things such as table cloths, curtains, and just to hang from the walls.  If the weather permits, have the ceremony in a cemetery.  Include an area for a spooky photo booth for your guests.

 

The Food
 

 

We love these Halloween inspired cake ideas.  For your cake topper, try a couple inspired by Tim Burton’s The Corpse Bride.

 

Serve lots of pumpkin- and apple-flavored foods. Try to serve only red drinks, or use food coloring to dye drinks red when possible.  For the rest of your food, especially during cocktail hour, try adding a spooky twist whenever possible.

 

The Look

 

A vintage wedding dress is the best style for a Halloween bride (again, think Tim Burton). If you’re really going all out, you could tear it in a few places and get the bottom of it dirty, so it looks black – like you’ve been running away from monsters.

 

For your makeup, choose pale colors for your cheeks but dark red and black for your lips and eyes.

 

The bridesmaids should wear dark colors: navy blue, plum, or black. Choker necklaces are a great accessory for this look.

 

Have the men in the wedding party wear swallowtail coats, undertaker-style.

 

It's All in the Details

 

Don't forget all the small details that come together to create your Hallo-wedding.  The stationery, guest favors, and decorations are a few more items to consider that will help pull your look together.

For you invitations, be sure to let guests know about your spooktacular theme and whether costumes are welcomed.  For your getaway car, consider driving away in a gothic horse-drawn buggy.  A great favor for your guests is a bag of Halloween candy! Use personalized paper bags and decorate them with fake spiders and ribbon or use mini jack-o-lanterns.

Image Credits: Poison Bottles, Cemetery Wedding, Halloween cake, Halloween Masquerade Wedding, Sugar Skull Invitations

Elizabeth is an undergraduate at Ohio Northern University with a double major in professional writing and creative writing and a minor in psychology. Liz writes for My Wedding Reception Ideas as well as creates multi-modal writing projects for Re:Media, an Ohio Northern University online publication.

Trick or Treat Love is Sweet - And So Are These Halloween Desserts!

Many people love the idea of Halloween weddings, but aren't sure how to pull it off without taking away from the I Do's. Our suggestion? Incorporate an elegant Halloween dessert table! Here are our favorite dessert ideas for a spookily styled treat buffet.

Spotlight on vintage soda bottles wrapped in black lace, meringue bone cookies, and cupcakes stenciled with a witchy silhouette. It is so chic your guests will love every macabre mouthful! 

Image Credits: Dessert Buffet designed by Amy Atlas via Hostess Blog, Specimen Viles via Honey Bee Sweeterie, Stenciled Witch Cupcakes and Pumpkin Mousse from Country Living, Bone Cookies, Stenciled Letter Cookies, Pumpkin Spice Cake, and Spider Web Cake Via Martha Stewart, 

Ideas for Planning a Halloween Themed Wedding

What could possibly be more fun than planning a Halloween themed wedding? Keep in mind that a Halloween themed wedding does not have to be held on Halloween. You can have the ceremony the weekend before or the weekend after. The best thing about planning a spooktacular wedding is all the fun choices available for planning your wedding. Here are just a few fun tips for getting you Halloween wedding planning started.

• First decide how far you want to go with the Halloween theme. You can either go all out with all the Halloween trimmings, such as jack-o’-lanterns, bubbling cauldrons and costumes or you can have an elegant Harvest wedding with beautiful fall colors, pumpkin, gourds and leafy décor.

• Selecting your color scheme allows for many choices. Of course black and orange is one choice but you can also use red, yellow, copper or green, the options are endless. Have your groom and his attendants wear black tuxedos with tails to add mystery to their attire. Your bridesmaids can wear black and carry blood red roses for their bouquets. Brides should look for gothic style wedding dress with long flowing sleeves and tight bodices.

• For a dramatic Halloween centerpiece you could use wrought iron candelabras or Black Mini Lantern Tea Light Candle Holders with small gourds and pumpkins around the base. If you want to keep the mood truly Halloween add spider weds with plastic spiders to your centerpieces. Pumpkins are my favorite and they are very versatile. Buy some small pumpkins and stencils and carve your table numbers into the pumpkins.

• Everyone associates Halloween with candy, so a candy buffet is a must. Use all the fun candies of the season such as candy corn and taffy. You could also include caramel apples and sugar cookie cut-outs shaped as ghost and pumpkins. Don’t forget to add dry ice to the punch bowl to add the bubbling cauldron effect.

• Now it’s time to get into your scary groove. Have your DJ play plenty of fun Halloween songs through-out the evening like Monster Mash and Thriller. The sound track from the movie The Nightmare before Christmas also has some great music for a Halloween themed wedding.

Halloween is the holiday that allows us to be anything we want to be, so make you Halloween themed wedding the wedding of a lifetime. A Halloween wedding is a wedding that won’t soon be forgotten.

Carrie