When Lisa emailed me about her wedding(s), it was such a novel idea. She and her husband decided to travel the world and experience weddings through local cultures.
Their blog, 2people1life, is about their travels around the world for the last four years having cultural weddings in every country they visit. So far, they have had 67 ceremonies in 65 countries.
Tomorrow we’ll feature their South Asian wedding stop in Pakistan, but first I chatted with Lisa about her adventures and experience around the world.
What inspired you to do this?
The inspiration for this trip came from the inability to find a wedding that suited our personalities in England, our home country. We decided to travel and explore other countries wedding cultures and traditions and try to find the perfect place, and way for us to make this special commitment to one another.
How have you gone about planning? How do find locals and vendors to do this? How long does it take to plan one wedding?
Each wedding is very different. Our wedding in Pakistan for example, IPlan events had only 3 days notice to plan our wedding, other weddings have been in the planning stage for years, our most recent wedding in New Zealand came about after remaining in contact with photographer Emily Adamson since 2011.
When we first embarked on this adventure we would spend a lot of time researching and reaching out to local vendors through newspapers, websites, facebook and blogs but since the story has had a lot of International media attention we are now contacted on almost a weekly basis with invitations to hold weddings all over the world. Most recently we have been invited to Iceland where a whole team of locals await us, and also Jordan who want to join forces with our story to show the world the wedding cultures and traditions of their ancient country.
Are your family/friends traveling along and attending the weddings?
We have been very lucky to have had some family and friends join us for weddings. Our whole families were present for our first wedding in Didsbury, both of our Mothers and my aunt joined us in France and Alex’s Mum has been to South Africa and Hungary. What is also most amazing is that we become close friends with the local vendors who make our wedding days possible and several of them have travelled to join us across the Globe. Photographers and cinematographers have flown from England to Tahiti, England to Morocco, America to Europe and recently Australia to New Zealand. We are incredibly lucky to have so much support from so many talented friends in the wedding industry.
How have you underwritten the weddings?
The weddings are not about extravagance, expense or excess, they are special days made possible by people coming together and lending their time, skills and belongings. We borrow all outfits and return any decorations…(we do always eat the cake though!) and in return we offer international publicity of the wedding.
A lot of people help us for the love of adventure, to share a happy story and through pride. They want to show the rest of the world how they celebrate love and what it means to them. Ours is a happy story made possible by the faith of humanity.
Will you be writing a book or some compilation when you’re done?
We are asked every day to write a book so I think we definitely should try. What kind of book should it be is the question? A romantic story? A book of wedding inspiration? A history of the culture and traditions of weddings around the World? Who knows, what do you think?
Tell us about some of your favorite traditions you have learned.
There are so many incredible traditions it is hard to choose just a couple. One of them was definitely being fed the Golub Jamin by our guests in Pakistan, so much fun and SO. MUCH. SUGAR! Another was the hand fasting in Ireland, representing the age old tradition of ‘Tying the knot’, another was Alex having to shoot an apple in Bosnia to prove his prowess! Oh, and Colombia, in Colombia we had to have a sheep present at the wedding…just because it is tradition!
Tell us about some of your favorite outfits you have worn.
I am probably the luckiest girl in the World getting to wear so many wedding dresses…but I do have to give them all back. I have to say my original Charlotte Balbier is a firm favourite. That dress has been through so much, under water, in the washing machine, on a horse, on the beach and it still looks amazing every single time.
I adored my dress in Peru by the talented Fatima Arrieta, hand embroidered with the local colours, turquoise and magenta.
And then there was the fantastic traditional dress in Antigua Guatemala, Alex’s traditional animal skins in Africa and of course, my amazing dress in Karachi!
What will you be doing after all this traveling?!
We are in the final stages of updating www.2people1life.com to help other couples find wedding vendors for their own special days. One thing we have learnt in the last 4 years is that the right wedding team can make anything possible. They can make the difference between your day being as perfect as you envisioned it to it being a shadow of what it once was. We are hoping to connect couples with brilliant, personable vendors from all over the world that will make their wedding dreams a reality.
{Wedding Photographers}
New Zealand wedding: Emily Adamson
Mexico: Dean Sanderson in Mexico
Backless gown photograph in Corfu, Greece: Nik Pekridis
Pakistan wedding: O’shoot Photography
Charlotte Balbier dress: Jonny Draper Photography (Didsbury, Manchester, United Kingdom)
Fatima Arrieta dress: Luis Chiang Chang-Way Photography
Wedding in Guatemala: Photography Jose Pablo Martinez
Africa wedding: Derryn Semple Photography