Indie style in weddings rapidly replaces the traditional churches, posh restaurants, and classical music, even among celebrities. Today, a wedding is a much more diverse event, with receptions moving to village-style barns, beaches, and even cemeteries. In addition to being so much more fun, indie weddings are cheaper, often because you can hold the festivities in your own backyard, in a forest, or in a cottage that does not cost an arm and a leg. And to make it even cheaper, there are decorations you can do yourself or together with your future spouse instead of buying them or hiring people to do it. (Also, it’s a wonderful chance for some bonding time.)
Wooden Box Cooler
The summer is hot but a fridge has no place on your rustic-style backyard wedding party unless you have a vintage wooden one that costs more than the wedding itself. What to do? Make your own! With a bit of creativity, some nails, and a hand planer to save your guests from splinters, you have a box of precisely the size you need (because you decide it) filled with ice where you will put bottles of beer and cans of Coke for your friends to grab as they pass by between dances. When all is done, you can fill the box with soil and use it as a flower bed: a beautiful decoration for your backyard and a reminder of the happiest day of your life.
Paper Bunting
This one is fun to make with kids. If you or your significant other have children from before this wedding, or if they are younger siblings, friends’ children, or the kids from the nursery you work at, they will probably love to help decorate your special event. It’s easy and only requires some color paper, scissors, and time. It will also busy the little devils so that they won’t get in the way of adult preparations.
Colored Glass Flower Bottles
In the hustle-bustle that is an indie (or any, really) wedding, broken glasses and flower vases are sometimes inevitable disasters. Even if you don’t find classic vases outdated in general. You wouldn’t want to set your family heirloom porcelain vase on the table to find it in pieces on the floor at the end of the day. Instead, what about soda bottles hand-colored together with your bridesmaids, adorned with ribbons, and placed everywhere around? Simple beauty that is also more sturdy will be a great choice for an outdoor party.
Blessings All Around
What can be nicer than a hundred wishes you read everywhere you go? If you hold your wedding inside—in a cottage, a barn, or an old-style club—hang some strings with from the ceiling and leave pencils and pieces of paper on the tables. Your guests can write down their wishes for the newlyweds and tie them to the strings so that you could read them as you walk around. This same effect can also be achieved with balloons floating around, blessings tied to their tails.
Photo Board
A wooden shelf with framed photos of your journey to this wedding or a cork board with Polaroid-style printed pictures, an altar to your love story from the day you’ve met, your first date, the vacations together, meetings the parents—we can go on forever. In the digital age when every good moment of our lives is captured and posted on the Instagram, filling a shelf with pictures is easier than ever.
DIY Canopy
You will need either 4 or 8 posts (PVC or wood works well, it is lightweight and easy to assemble) and a drape. Or a bunch of streamers that match your wedding colors. Or small flower beds and ivy. Tiny plush toys? Photos of loved ones? Comic frames of Jessica Jones being in love with Luke Cage? Yes, please. The best thing about a DIY canopy is that you can do whatever you want with it.