How did you two meet?
A: We met in person for the first time at a coffee spot.
G: But we really met online through a site called OKCupid. It isn’t one of the most popular dating sites…
A: It was popular at the time!
G: The coffee shop we met up at was in DC — I grew up in DC and she grew up in the Boston area but moved down there for college. That was about six years ago now.
How did you end up in Rhode Island?
A: I moved up to the Boston area, and then eventually the Providence area, for work. We did long distance for a while — about two years.
G: Then as soon as I moved up here, we pretty much decided we wanted to [get married]. We were originally going to wait another year, but then a spot opened up at Gracie’s and we jumped on it. We planned the whole thing in less than three months.
How did you get engaged?
G: I just put a ring on it.
A: Yeah, pretty much. I mean, it was just very spontaneous.
G: We were going to bed and it was dark and I just took the ring out…
A: “He was like, “I have something for you,”and I was like, “What?” You know, totally oblivious.
G: I just kind of slid the ring on her finger and asked her.
A: I didn’t see it coming.
G: I was trying to come up with some big romantic plan, I was going to do something else but…
A: I think he was just really excited. That’s what happened.
G: Yeah, I was.
Did you always know you were going to have a smaller wedding?
A: We really weren’t sure, at first.
G: I think we knew it wasn’t going to be huge. We knew that it was going to be about fifty guests, maybe more, but we ended up with about thirty-five to forty. Everybody who was there was important to us.
A: W really liked everyone that was there.
G: It was almost all family plus a couple friends. It was fun. Really fun.
What was your favorite part of planning?
A: Greg liked the cake tasting. I know that was his favorite part. [Greg doesn’t disagree] I thought planning was really stressful, so I don’t really know that there was a favorite part on my end… Oh, I know. I went to Spark Bridal on one of my lunch hours just to check it out. At the time, I was working somewhere close and I saw they had that beautiful blue dress. When I saw that it was my size, I was really happy. Because I was really stressed that I wasn’t going to find something for the wedding. That was probably my favorite part of planning: when I found the dress that I wanted.
Tell me about hiring a comedian for your officiant.
A: We both love comedy.
G: We kind of wanted it to be less formal. We didn’t want a religious ceremony or anything like that; we wanted it to be more, I guess, untraditional.
A: We thought it would be fun to hire a comedian to officiate and so I was just googling around. I found ___ and he’d never officiated a wedding, but he’d done similar stuff, so I reached out to him about it. He was already ordained.
G: He was trying to find somebody that was willing to give him a shot and we stepped up. He was great, though. It was a really short ceremony and it was definitely a good first try for him.
A: He took the time to get to know us beforehand. He learned our personalities and what our families were like so when he made jokes he knew where they were going to land. He was used to doing roasts for like someone turning fifty, so he really knew how to draw out the right information for his jokes. But he was also good about making it romantic. We didn’t know whether that was going to work because it’s a little different to hire a comedian, but it worked.
What made you go for the Lippitt House for your ceremony?
G: We were originally going to do a small, short ceremony at Gracie’s, but her mom really wanted us to do a bigger, more traditional ceremony. She found it, we saw it and we liked it.
A: It was really nice. Plus it’s actually [rented out] hourly, so it was pretty inexpensive, considering the space.
Why Gracie’s?
A: Well, his dog is named Gracie.
G: We just walked in there one day, randomly…
A: When we were visiting Providence one time, I was like, “It’s called Gracie’s, lets go there!” and we really liked it.
G: The food was amazing. Kendall, their event planner, is incredible. She helped with pretty much everything. They do so much: the food and they have the bakery for your cake… There’s so much that they can do for you that you normally would end up outsourcing and spending a lot of money and time going elsewhere for. They were awesome.
A: We also liked Gracie’s because they didn’t have a minimum for Saturdays. So, if you’re doing a smaller wedding, the challenge can be that restaurants have a 5,000 or 10,000 minimum.
G: Well, we just rented out the basement… You can rent out the whole restaurant and then there might be a minimum, but because we just did the downstairs area, it was perfect for the size and price point.
A: I think people think, “Oh Gracie’s is an upscale restaurant, they’re going to be so expensive to do you dinner there, but it’s actually not true. Their pricing was very reasonable comparatively to other places. And they’re also really flexible; his dad is a wine aficionado and they let him pick the wines. I think that makes a difference too: how accommodating they are.
Tell me about the menu.
G: The food was actually really good because it was a smaller wedding, and everybody got to enjoy it.
A: Gracie’s is just a great restaurant. We had the hen egg that they do, the noki and the steak.
G: it was full pre-fixe menu
A: We had four options for dinner and then three options for the appetizer and then customized desserts. So, you get three different kinds of desserts based on what you like and I thought that was really cool, too.
Tell me about your desserts.
A: The cake was similar to something they had done before… We wanted something untraditional and then we both like bright colors. That was sort of the inspiration. And we had tried their macarons and we loved them so that was a no brainer.
Adrian, what made you decide to wear two different dresses?
A: The first dress was huge and I was worried because Gracie’s is kind of tight given the seats. It was just going to be really hard to sit. Plus, the festival, PVDFest, was going on. We were going to go out after and I wanted to be more comfortable rather than trying to get around in a big ball gown.
Did having your wedding in Providence during PVDFest make things more fun or more hectic?
A: Matt from Blueflash was the one who told us it would be happening. We were just walking around looking at vendors and he was like, “You should know that that weekend is PVDFest.”
G: We didn’t find that out until after we had started planning and had already booked the venue.
A: We were about a month in.
G: It was a little bit difficult getting some people to and from the venue, like grandparents who can’t move around very easily. But we had a bus that transported people within a couple of blocks, so it wasn’t too bad. We were worried about that but everything ended up going really smoothly.
A: And it was nice, after the wedding, to be able to go out. We went out to a couple of different places, like Trinity Brewpub, the Eddy.
G: Yea so the festival was less of an issue — it was more fun than anything.
A: Plus, we got cool pictures. Yeah, the WWII photo gave me the idea. When I figured out about the festival, on the day of I was like, “Can we recreate that photo?” And we nailed it.
What was each of your favorite memories from that day?
A: I think, for me, it was after the ceremony but before we went over to Gracies when Greg and I just had a little bit of time with the photographer alone. In terms of timing, we didn’t want everyone to have to wait and sit around, because I hate that at weddings when you’re stuck sitting around before the ceremony. So, we did all of the photos in the blue dress before the wedding.
G: Yeah, my favorite time was before the ceremony when we took all the photos because it was nice and calm, getting to spend time together one-on-one just to connect.
A: He was fine, but I was so stressed. It was nice seeing each other before the ceremony, though. He got to see my dress and everything. We’re very untraditional; I wasn’t worried about him seeing me before the ceremony.
Would you recommend other couples try the untraditional route?
A: I think it depends on your relationship. Like, even with my shoes, Greg helped me pick them out — it was his idea to do red. He’s definitely my best friend, so we had more style conversations than most brides and grooms would.
G: I think it would have been more stressful to not consult each other or be able to see each other that morning. It would have been more of an unnecessary buildup. It made the whole day a lot more relaxing and fun to just be together and really spend the whole day together.
Do you have any advice for newly engaged couples?
G: It’s about you, it’s not about everybody else. So just do what you want to do. Don’t worry about making everyone happy and making sure everybody you know is there. Just do something that you want to do.
A: We’ve had friends who spent their entire weddings, because it was so big, just saying hi to people, and we did not want that for us. We just wanted to be able to enjoy it.
G: Yeah, it was a big party.
Did you go on a honeymoon?
G: We’re probably going to do something next summer; we haven’t figured out exactly what yet.
A: We both had recently started new jobs, so it’s a little challenging. But it’s something to look forward to. I work for AAA Northeast and they have really amazing vacation packages that you can book through travel planners and so basically what were planning to do is wait for when there’s a flash sale. Recently, there was a flash sale for the Bahamas for five nights; it would have been $4,000 all-inclusive with flights and everything, but my coworker got it for $2,000 because of the sale. So, we’re hoping for something similar and then we’ll also get an extra discount because I’m an employee.
G: We’re definitely going to go somewhere warm and tropical.
A: We’ve never done anything like that, either.
G: It will be our first big vacation, just the two of us, so it should be fun.
How’s married life treating you?
A: It’s great. It doesn’t feel that different.
G: We’ve been together for six years, so it’s just making it official.
A: Long distance was the challenge. So, getting through that, I think we feel like we can get through anything now.
G: It’s amazing, it feels totally normal. There was a lot of buildup and then it was sort of just like back to life. But it’s good though.
A: I still trip up and say “my boyfriend” all the time.
G: I mess up too. I was just getting used to “fiancé,” which I find to be an annoying word anyway.
A: And I’m going through the hell right now of changing my last name. It’s a struggle, but it’s cool. It’s worth it.
The Details
Photography: Blueflash Photography // Ceremony: Lippitt House Museum // Reception and Catering: Gracie’s // Cake & Favors: Ellie’s Bakery // Hair Styling and Makeup: Pro Radiance Artistry // Bride’s Hair Coloring: Kristen Lazzareschi of Studio 101 // Bride’s Ceremony Dress: Allure Bridals, Spark Bridal Outlet // Bride’s Reception Dress: Lulus // Groom’s Suit: Ted Baker, Nordstrom // Florals: Frey Florist // Officiant: AJ Hapenny // Shoes: Badgley Mischka