Manolo for the Brides

What do you think of when you think of Queen Victoria? I’m betting you don’t think of recycling, or of frugality. The truth is, though, that she hated waste, wasn’t huge on pomp and circumstance where it could be helped, and was tremendously sentimental. These three facts combined to make sure she reused her wedding lace for the rest of her life.
This is what the scene looked like on February 10, 1840, when young Queen Victoria married her cousin Prince Albert at the Chapel Royal, St. James.

Compared to other royal brides of the period, Victoria dressed simply. She kept the jewels to a minimum and had her wedding clothes made of English products, including her lace. In fact, it’s widely believed that she ordered the Honiton lace ensemble of wide skirt flounce, narrow sleeve flounces, veil, and a fichu before she even proposed to Albert. Whether or not that’s true, she certainly did have the lace made in the village of Beer under the direction of one Miss Jane Bidney. It took some two hundred lacemakers to create the set. When the lace was completed, she ordered the patterns destroyed so that it could not be replicated.

But that’s not the end of the story.
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When Kate Harding of Kate Harding’s Shapely Prose decides to spice up a Friday night, she goes all the way. On a recent Friday night, for example, she and her sweetie Al decided they could either go visit the Hoover Dam… or they could get married. Guess which option they chose.

They tied the knot, obviously! The pair hit up the famous Little White Wedding Chapel (along with Al’s mom) after what amounted to a few hours of hardcore wedding planning and said their vows.

Can I just say that I’m just a tad jealous? Oh, I’m a lot happy for the resplendent Ms. Harding — don’t they just look lovely? — but still a little jealous. It sounds like she had a joyful, absolutely stress-free wedding, though there’s no word on whether she ever did get to see the Hoover Dam.

Now go check out the Wedding FAQ and wish the newlyweds all the best!

I’m not one to cry at weddings, and I’m especially not one to cry at the mere mention of a wedding, but I’ll tell you truly that I did tear up just a little when I saw this photograph.

Forget the fact that it’s such a damn fine photo — lucky celebrities, looking gorgeous 95% of the time — and think about how far things had to advance for us to even be seeing it. Yes, we still have a quite ways to go before gay couples can enjoy all of the advantages of legal matrimony, but pics like this are a testament to the fact that things are moving forward.

Now, for the deets. The 20- person affair took place on the grounds of de Rossi and DeGeneres’ Beverly Hills home. Both brides wore designs by Zac Posen…de Rossi in a beautiful cream and pink halterneck gown, and DeGeneres in a cream ensemble of vest, shirt, and pants. The happy couple sat on pillows while exchanging rings created by Neil Lane before they sat down to an all-vegan meal followed by a vegan red velvet cake.

I wish both of them all of the happiness the world has to offer!

I was deeply engrossed in Style Scoop when my little eye happened upon this intersection of the nuptial and the presidential:

Whether you give two toots about Jenna Bush’s May 10th wedding to Henry Hager (I don’t, oddly enough), it’s beyond cool to see all of the potential dress designs. As Style Scoop tells it, the first lady (hey, should I be capitalizing that?) asked twelve notable designers to submit sketches of the gown that may just clothe her daughter on said daughter’s special day.

The twelve designs sprang forth from the minds of the following designers (from one to twelve): Vera Wang, J. Mendel, Arnold Scaasi, Carlos Miele, Amsale, Carmen Marc Valvo, Angel Sanchez, Badgley Mischka, Nicole Miller, Lela Rose, Marc Bouwer, and Oscar de la Renta.

My personal favorite is number nine, but I have always fancied those Nicole Miller ruffles. Number one looks like it ought to be in the annual toilet paper gown contest. Three gets a big ol’ yawn from me, but all things considered it does look sort of right for a White House wedding. Eight is too daring for the same, and I have nothing to say about seven other than that the cartoon model looks entirely undead.

Which, pray tell, do you favor?

As I was merrily surfing the web, I ran across a site for wedding vows. What fun! I love wedding vows! No, really, I do. In truth, the vows are the single most important part of a wedding. This is what makes the whole thing legally binding and what all the fun window dressing of pretty clothes, delicious food, and beautiful music are there to celebrate.

The part of this particular site that rather tickled my particular sense of humor was the section of Celebrity Vows. Yes, you can now choose the same wedding vows used by Bruce Willis and Demi Moore, or Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller. Actually, most of them are pretty much standard forms from various protestant denominations, and not that unusual.

There was, however, one part in one ceremony that caught my eye. I’d like to share it with you. It comes from Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward’s wedding. While it’s not the vows, per se, it strikes me as a particularly wonderful way of expressing what marriage is really all about:

Happiness in marriage is not something that just happens. A good marriage must be created. In the Art of Marriage: The little things are the big things. It is never being too old to hold hands. It is remembering to say ‘I love you’ at least once a day. It is never going to sleep angry. It is at no time taking the other for granted; the courtship should not end with the honeymoon, it should continue through all the years. It is having a mutual sense of values and common objectives. It is standing together facing the world. It is forming a circle of love that gathers in the whole family. It is doing things for each other, not in the attitude of duty or sacrifice, but in the spirit of joy. It is speaking words of appreciation and demonstrating gratitude in thoughtful ways. It is not expecting the husband to wear a halo or the wife to have wings of an angel. It is not looking for perfection in each other. It is cultivating flexibility, patience, understanding and a sense of humor. It is having the capacity to forgive and forget. It is giving each other an atmosphere in which each can grow. It is finding room for the things of the spirit. It is a common search for the good and the beautiful. It is establishing a relationship in which the independence is equal, dependence is mutual and the obligation is reciprocal. It is not only marrying the right partner, it is being the right partner.

And I think that sort of says it all.

You want to hear a pet peeve of mine? Well, here it is: Bosom cups that stand up of their own accord when empty. I’m totally feeling this Vivienne Westwood gown (worn by the vivacious Sarah Jessica Parker as Carrie Bradshaw) from the midsection down, but looking at the uppermost part is making me want to scream, “Alter the cups! The cups!” Unflattering things happen when you don a dress you can’t fully fill out. Observe…

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Seal has announced that he’s recorded a duet with wife Heidi Klum. The song is one he wrote for their May 2005 wedding. I think that’s sweet…and I sure hope she can sing.

Eddie Murphey and fiancee Tracey Edmunds have announced that they intend to shun Hollywood glitz and have a “small, casual” wedding instead. Edmonds said of planning the wedding: “We keep checking in with each other. Like, ‘What do you think about this?’ So we’re getting a little closer, figuring it all out. It’ll come together really soon.” It’s great to hear that they’re working together to make it happen.

And in the world of deeply strange wedding news, the Lancashire Evening Post reports that Patricia Catterall, a Chorely market stallholder who runs Pat’s Market Cheese Shop was recently hired to make a six-tier all cheese wedding cake.

It weighed thirty pounds and cost two-hundred twenty pounds.

The base layer was made of Brie de Meaux, topped with Lancashire cheese, Cornish cheese, Wensleydale with cranberries, cheddar with shallots and chives, and Cornish blue, finally topped with a traditional wedding couple topper.

A more traditional sweet wedding cake was served at the afternoon reception, with the cheese creation being saved for an evening reception.

Catterall says she’s already been hired to do other cheese cakes.

All I can say is if Mr. Twistie had heard of this before our wedding, he might have tried to get it duplicated. Yeah, I might have gone for it.

This past weekend, Rebecca Romijn showed the world the right way to wear a light, airy, summery wedding dress. Her floor-length Ralph Lauren frock not only looks beautiful, it also looks comfortable. And don’t she and that Jerry O’Connell fellow look absolutely smitten with one another?

From what I could tell by taking a gander at the photos over at A Socialite’s Life, the new Mr. and Mrs. Romijna-O’Connell-Whatever had their guests sitting on bales of hay covered in country quilts. I can’t say I’m a big fan of theme nuptials, but when they are wonderfully underdone like this Western wedding, they can be super!