Credit: Steven Weissman
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  • Steven Weissman

Did you read the I, Anonymous this week about the wedding that the bride and groom are charging people to attend? Here’s the first half:

You used Papyrus as a font on your wedding invite. We can get past that. Asking for money instead of gifts so you can fund your honeymoon AND your fucking trip to Burning Man? It’s tacky and obnoxious, but I’ll let it slide. But charging for food, booze, and “carnival games”? Encouraging people to bring a guest… as long as the guest pays 20 bucks into a “wedding gift box” at the door?! The note encouraging photographer-friends to work for free and send you digital files was a nice touch. But this part’s REALLY special: I found out that some people got a “ticket” with their invitation, entitling them to a wristband and a VIP area with free food. You have been going to shitty festivals for too long and you are confused…

Today, we got a letter to the editor from the bride. She writes (sic throughout, identifying details redacted):

To who it may concern,

This article is specifically about our wedding. I would cordially like to invite you to our wedding, by passing the “ridiculous” 20 door fee and have to be welcomed into our “tacky” vip room. I’m not sure how to handle the attack made our wedding by this person… with whom I’m pretty sure I know their disgust having not received an invite. I don’t feel the need to explain to you the editor the reasons why we are having a vip room for the older folks and friends that are helping us throw this event, but I would like to invite you to report on the performances and djs that are working for us that night. This even is a way to bring burning man and the likes to our family and friends who will never get the chance to go and experience the place where we fell in love.

I’m having a hard time focusing write now on writing this letter considering it is less then three weeks to my wedding and I just read the article. I am NOT a bridezilla nor is my groom. If you would like to contact me my cell phone number is [redacted]. I would just like the opportunity to explain, rather then walk around with this dark cloud over my head for the remainder of the time before the wedding.

Our wedding is at [place, date, and time redacted].

Thanks again
Sorry for this letter being all over the place.. once again.. I’m just shocked and baffled that we are being attacked like this

Much thanks,
[name redacted]

The wedding is still a few weeks out, but The Stranger is taking the bride up on her offer and will be reporting back on the party—and the family drama, the VIP haves and have-nots, the performances and DJs—in an upcoming installment of Party Crasher.

Christopher Frizzelle was The Stranger's print editor, and first joined the staff in 2003. He was the editor-in-chief from 2007 to 2016, and edited the story by Eli Sanders that won a 2012 Pulitzer...

177 replies on “Following Up on This Week’s I, Anonymous: The Wedding with the VIP Room”

  1. If this is the way they “bring burning man and the likes to our family and friends” then they are getting Burning Man wrong. I’ve been to two burner weddings this summer alone, and neither required a $20 donation, was BYOB or had a VIP area.

  9. Yeah, she’s going to regret writing this letter. How is setting herself up for more public ridicule supposed to disperse the ‘dark cloud’ over her head?

  11. You’re “shocked and baffled”? Really? Let me give you a hint as to why you’re getting this reaction: Asking people to pay to attend your wedding reception is incredibly tacky. You can try to wrap it in the 10 principles all you want, but it still comes out looking really bad.

  13. Oh my fucking god, Kelly O better go and take me as a +1, I FUCKING SWEAR TO GOD.

    I’m from Texas, this is my fucking forte. BAD WEDDINGS ARE MY FUCKING FORTE, YOU HEAR ME?

  16. Typos and mispellings galore!! Now my 0% respect dropped to -15%… Charging to go to a stupid wedding is one thing, but being old enough to marry and not knowing how to spell is another thing altogether!

  17. Not sure how to handle the attack, eh? It’s not an attack, honey, it’s a rant about your incredibly presumptuous behavior. You don’t charge people to attend your wedding. Period. And if you can’t afford one, you either do what I did (elope) or you have a potluck in the backyard.

  18. Ohhh, there’s only one thing I like better than an entitled and clueless bride, and that’s an entitled, clueless, and DEFENSIVE bride.

    This is going to be awesome… I would totally pay $20 just to watch this train wreck itself in slow motion.

  20. Excuse me…Burner Wedding?! Glad we are protecting all that str8 marriage by denying civil rights to everyone else. Seriously, burner wedding?!

    Until I have the right to get married, I absolutely refuse to belief anyone who gets married dressed like this >> http://tinyurl.com/239gjh8 isn’t a total TOOL.

    And that is way before hearing about the VIP room, the cover charge, and the for-profit carnival games…all to emulate a week long ode to ball sweat where commerce is outlawed!

    Way to represent!

  21. Wow, it’s even tackier than I originally imagined! I say just embrace it and go for full tacky. Instead of charging for drinks with cash, I suggest selling tickets at $10/11 tickets, and have varying ticket prices for different drinks (beer 6, house cocktail 8, premium cocktail 12, doubles are 2x the tickets) Also, have a different color ticket for food and another for non alcoholic drinks, ensuring everyone has to overbuy for each!

  22. Of course she’s baffled by the response, she and her fiance were obviously never taught any manners and she therefore just doesn’t understand how greedy-sounding and tacky these arrangements are.
    She’s having trouble focusing “write now” on writing her letter because the wedding is less than three weeks away? Then don’t write the letter until you can focus, because it is a mess.

  23. Bridezilla= RetardedBridezilla…

    Clearly too many shrooms and pot at the afore mentioned Burning Man (or should I say Burning-Sensation-When-She-Pees-Man)…

  24. I could just picture this woman in the receiving line:

    “Hi! Thanks for coming! So good to see you! Did you remember to put your $20 in the wedding gift box?”

  25. I’m trying to decide from this letter if the VIP room is a place for her to cram Burning Man down the throats of the “older folks and friends that are helping us throw this event”, or a place where those same older folks can get AWAY from the Burning Man activities.

    Can’t wait for the Party Crasher report!

  26. The only thing that would have been better would be if she had asked the Stranger to underwrite part of the party (I mean wedding) in exchange for exclusive coverage of the grand event.

  27. Why does everyone these days perceive a complaint about their ludicrous behavior as an “attack”? It just makes me want to jab them with an ice pick.

  28. “I’m having a hard time focusing write now on writing this letter considering it is less then three weeks to my wedding and I just read the article.”
    Gosh, I really feel you. Whenever something is happening in three weeks I always forget how to spell and write in complete sentences. It’s so taxing to have think about the future and present simultaneously.

  29. I wonder what kind of dreamworld this person is living in. Does she really not realize how unconventional it is to charge people for your wedding? Has she been living under a rock? If she would at least acknowledge how unusual her approach is, maybe do a little mea culpa of some kind, I might buy her Burning Man defense. As it is, she comes off as utterly clueless.

    Maybe in her little burner circle, this is totally cool and within the bounds of social normality. If so, good for them. But it seems she’s overestimated the width of that circle…God help her if some cantankerous aunt doesn’t get a VIP pass.

  30. @18 Really. Some of the best weddings I have ever been to were small affairs held in free places like parks or backyards. Some of the worst cost tens of thousands of dollars.

    I don’t much mind the honeymoon fund thing, though I would never do it, but I would certainly not attend a wedding that had a cover charge or a VIP area. Fuck that.

  33. burners should be sterilized so this ridiculous behavior won’t continue for generations to come.

    and congrats on your wedding!

  34. so is this like a rave? did they make flyers? what djs will be playing? will there be e? is it drum and bass or trance or what? just put an ad in the stranger and youll make a ton of money for your party dont forget to buy insurance for your wedding peace

  35. Here’s an idea. Throw a wedding reception only for the VIPs (family and friends close enough to you to help out) and forget all the rest of it. Oh, but you can’t make a profit off of that, can you? Shame.

    I’m waiting with bated breath to find out if the food is worth the $20. I’m guessing no.

  36. I think some of the new information makes me understand a little more where they’re coming from. They wanted to throw a big rave/party/club night — and it kind of sounds like it could be a good one. So, from that standpoint, charging for food, admission, etc., seems to make some sense.

    However, you don’t get to have it both ways, in my opinion. You can’t throw a big party, expect people to pay for food/drink/entertainment AND expect people to give you wedding gifts as if it were a traditional wedding.

    By the by, given the context of big rave/party/club night, the $20 admission for random people is not so bad. But for spouses of invited people (as someone in the comments of the original column said was happening)? Crazy tacky.

  38. i want to hear about the bride trying to hype everyone up to make it appear like everyone is having fun.

    that’ll show I, Anon.

    and if her reason for doing this is to share the experience of burning man, where they met and fell in love then it’s a good thing they didn’t meet at some tragic event like a scene of an accident or something.

  41. Isn’t Burning Man all about bartering? You don’t spend money on the playa. Why not use the barter system and have guests contribute to the event with food, alcohol, sound system etc.

  42. I second 39’s writer choice: Lindy’s spastic commentary + Charles’ penchant for seeing everything through an anthropological lens = best article of the year.

  43. Julie @38 totally gets it. Either it’s a traditional wedding (with gifts) or it’s a festival that happens to have a bride and groom (no gifts). I had friends that had a festival for their stag & doe (cost for activities, food, and drinks), but then had a free wedding on the actual day. That was a nice combination, and left none of us feeling put upon.

    Neither party had a VIP section, though. That’s just too tacky.

  44. so, i had no idea what ‘burning man’ was till i did a google search. it’s an art festival? how the hell do you ‘bring that’ to a wedding, anyway?

  48. I second the notion of sending Baconcat and Kelly O to report back on this mess, which I can only hope includes a VIP Room for the old folks where they are baked under heat lamps and sprayed with sand until they drown in their own gritty sweat. For the experience.

    Oh, and “with whom I’m pretty sure I know their disgust having not received an invite” is not English. I don’t know what it is, exactly; poshlost?

  49. We should have a poll on who to send.

    That said, I’ve enjoyed most of the Burner weddings I’ve been too, especially the fire twirler ones.

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