Element of surprise at their weddings
within the last four years.
Without the pressure of friends and family weighing in, couples feel free to make their vision come alive, often without all the trappings of a traditional wedding. Smith has seen surprise weddings without assigned seating, cupcakes instead of wedding cake, and food trucks or light fare instead of seated dinner. Such amendments can be more cost-effective, she said.
But the planning process can be challenging.
Swecker said there were a million things to keep a secret to make sure her wedding had the perfect level of shock factor.
“You have to be so committed to the surprise,” she said. “I was looking my best friends in the face for months and lying.”
When Sheri Anderson, 48, of Pigtown, and her husband, Randford, 49, planned their February surprise wedding, they opted to tell no one about the ceremony to take place — not even their parents or their children.
“You miss out on the bridal shower and the bachelorette party, and you don’t have the support of a team because no one knows,” Anderson said. “You have to be connected to your partner.”
Because their planned engagement party had already become so elaborate, the Andersons decided to combine it with their wedding. They planned for four months, enlisting Smith to help coordinate the blue-and-silver color scheme, the Miamichic decor and the lounge-style theme at Preston Hall downtown.
“I think it’s probably more work than a traditional wedding because if you have a traditional wedding with a planner, things are laid out for you. We didn’t have anything laid out for us,” Anderson said. “I didn’t have any bridesmaids. I had to pick out everything myself.”
Still, Anderson had unsuspecting friends and family helping run aspects of the engagement party without knowing she and her fiance would be tying the knot.
“I had one person look over the desserts, another person collect gifts, and another person look after tables ... and they just thought that was the party duty,” she said.
Guests were also inquisitive throughout the planning process for both the engagement party and the wedding.
“Everyone wanted all of the details,” Anderson said, but the couple remained mum and committed to their plan. “My husband is great about not talking a lot. The only thing I would do is not answer as many questions when planning my party.”
Like the Andersons, the Sweckers went to great lengths to keep the wedding a secret from friends and family. Only a handful of people —the couple’s parents, the caterer, and a cousin and a friend involved in planning — knew about the wedding ceremony.
“You can’t talk about it to anybody. A very select group of people should know about it,” said Swecker.
Swecker created a fake wedding website with a fake date, location and bridesmaids to throw off her guests.
Southwest Baltimore resident Daniel Kennedy, 28, said professional help was key to pulling off his surprise wedding in 2013.
He and his wife, Andrea, 28, invited friends, family and guests who were unable to attend their destination wedding in Punta Cana to a “pre-reception party” at the Fraternal Order of Police lodge in Catonsville, encouraging them to be on time for their grand entrance. They let their parents and Andrea’s grandmother in on the surprise, but to everyone else — even Smith, who planned the event— the wedding was a surprise.
“[Smith] took a load off of us,” Andrea Kennedy said, noting that they felt the same sense of relief that they’d hired a photographer and videographer to capture the moment. “The event went on without a hitch.”
Not everyone was on time to see the ceremony, the couple said, but they had the freedom to do their wedding their way.
“If you’re just a type of a person who wants to eliminate drama, kind of everyone putting in their two cents … if you’re looking to not have too many hands in the pot, I recommend a surprise wedding,” Andrea Kennedy added. And the payoffs can be big. When the Andersons surprised guests who thought they were attending an engagement party, guests were in tears (some a little upset they hadn’t brought wedding gifts).
“It was great and touching,” Anderson said. “We talk about it every day. There’s always a moment that we didn’t expound upon.”
Swecker said the experience brought her and her husband closer together.
“You’re holding a secret together. It’s not a shameful secret. It’s a really exciting secret. That experience gives you something,” Swecker said.
“I wouldn’t do it any differently.”