How to Choose Your Wedding Aesthetic

You put in the hours to determine what you’re going to wear to your wedding. You put in even more hours (maybe) before you settled on that perfect oval engagement ring. Why would you do any less for your wedding’s aesthetic? Well, luckily, choosing a wedding aesthetic doesn’t have to be nearly as difficult as dress shopping, ring buying, fiancé choosing or any other big wedding decision.

What Do You Like?

Look, we know this sounds a bit oversimplistic. It’s like the “what’s your favorite color” of wedding questions, but hear us out. What are you passionate about? What are your favorite places? What are the important locations and dates of your relationship? We aren’t saying you should have a Himalayan-themed wedding because you always wanted to climb Mount Everest but didn’t. Well, you could, but those Everest climbing suits aren’t the most flattering.

What Colors Look Good on You?

We aren’t saying make “blue” your whole wedding aesthetic just because you look good in blue. However, certain aesthetics have certain color palettes. You look better in certain color palettes. Ergo, certain aesthetics are going to be much more flattering to you. That said, if you don’t like the look, even if it looks good on you, probably best to keep it moving.

What Does Your Venue Look Like?

This is especially true if you booked a really hard-to-get wedding venue. You wouldn’t have a wedding at a castle and tell people to show up dressed for a tiki bar. Well, we hope you wouldn’t. We have several questions for anyone willing to do that. Point being, your venue can lend itself to a natural theme. Instead of trying to fine-tune the venue to fit your aesthetic, consider making your aesthetic blend in with the venue.

What Are People Wearing?

For most people, this question is going to be backwards. However, if you have a specific vision for what you want people to wear on the big day, that can help you easily define an aesthetic. Want something more casual? Maybe you’ve got some sort of Bohemian thing you can work with. Black tie? Midnight in Paris or something like that. You get the idea.

Take a Quiz

You (probably) didn’t take a quiz before choosing a men’s wedding ring, so why start now? Well, there actually might be some utility to it. We aren’t recommending that you get your wedding aesthetic from a Buzzfeed quiz. However, taking a few quizzes or similar questionnaires can help you define your starting point. It (probably) won’t give you your answer, but it can absolutely help you find a place to start.

Photo by Malysheva Liudmyla/Shutterstock.com

Scout Out Other Weddings

For legal reasons, we have to mention we aren’t saying crash strangers’ weddings. Please don’t do that. What we mean is that – when you’ve been invited – you should keep a lookout for what you like and dislike. Probably keep the dislikes to yourself and debrief after, though.

Still, other people’s weddings are some of the best options for figuring out what you want your wedding aesthetic to be. Maybe just keep a note on your phone or something. If you show up with a clipboard, it’s not going to be particularly subtle.

What Time of Year Is It?

You want your outdoor fairy dream wedding. You also want it to be in Maine. You also want it to be in December. See the issue we’re running into? If you have an aesthetic you’re set on, obviously, you can just adjust the time of year you have your wedding. However, if you’ve got a set date, the seasons are going to have something to say about what your wedding looks like.

If you’ve got a date already set, in some ways, that’s a really good thing. Having certain limits in place can actually boost your creativity, and you want all hands on deck creativity-wise.

Consider Your Guests

Yes, the day is about you and all that. Trust us, we get it. However, you still want your guests to have a good time. If your whole family likes to live simply, they may not be super comfortable showing up to a wedding that would make Gatsby blush. Vice versa, your rich in-laws may not love when the dress code says shorts and offers no full-length pants option.

You have the final say, of course, but you still want to be considerate. If nothing else, considering your guests can be really useful when you’re down to your final few options.

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Get Some Outside Input

When all else fails, bring in the consultants. Now, this is a delicate balancing act. You want a couple of voices in the room that you trust without having a “too many cooks” scenario. Maybe ask a parent or a close friend. Maybe both. Or better yet, ask your wedding planner that you’re already paying to help you! If you’re asking more than three people, though, you’ve probably hit the law of diminishing returns.

At the end of the day, the aesthetic is important, but it isn’t make or break. You’re going to make memories that go far beyond all the material portions of your wedding, so find an aesthetic you like and overthink it!

Featured image by fizkes/Shutterstock.com