Edition: U.S. / Global

Your Wedding

Published: June 26, 1994
(Page 3 of 4)

For example, St. Maggie's Cafe, a Victorian-style restaurant on Wall Street, will do weddings on weekend nights, with a five-hour open bar, hors d'oeuvres, a four-course meal of American cuisine and cake for $65 a person, including tax and gratuities.

Have you considered a Chinese wedding banquet? The Sheraton La Guardia East Hotel on 39th Avenue in Flushing offers a traditional 11-course banquet, including the mandatory longevity noodles, for $350 a table (an average table seats 10). Included in the price is a honeymoon suite.

One restaurant that can provide a similar spread for $30 a person (and you can bring your own liquor) is the Triple 8 Palace, a glittering Hong Kong-style room on East Broadway in Chinatown. Cakewalk

Everyone wants a wedding cake that actually tastes good; few ever really have one. If you've made the mistake of flipping through a bridal magazine, you are probably already suffering acute cake envy. A top-of-the-line cake from Colette's Cake on West 11th Street, for example, is a towering piece of edible architecture, with its sugar flowers, lattice windows and cherubs abounding. Of course, at $12 a slice, you aren't having it.

So why not buy the sugarwork floral bouquet that graces the top for $200, and throw it on a considerably cheaper, non-wedding-specific cake bought elsewhere?

If it must be a wedding cake, top to bottom, there are deals to be had. For $175, Veniero Pasticceria on East 11th Street sells a three-layer yellow sponge cake filled with cannoli cream and decorated with the usual roses, which serves 100. "Some people get their cake here just because their parents and grandparents did," said Robert Zerilli, who works in the cake department. Everything Else

Even if they are to be modest, you'll want some flowers. The number of flower options, of course, will be directly related to the amount of time you have. You may very well want to have your bouquets made professionally, and do the centerpieces yourself. (Though a few lovely flowers bound with an elegant piece of ribbon will cost you about $5 a bridesmaid.)

Anne-Stewart Hamilton, who was married last November and now plans weddings for others, grew ivy on her terrace and clipped it all off to use as garlands for her entire hall and her cake. She tied up her invitations, bouquets and napkins with ribbons bought in the millinery district (the upper 30's between Fifth Avenue and Avenue of the Americas).

Jennifer Farrington and Sean O'Neill, who were married last month, saved their funky, old-fashioned-style Italian tomato cans for several months before their wedding, then filled them with blooming plants that served as very hip centerpieces for their family-style Italian reception. The cost: $30. "I didn't include the price of the tomato cans," said Ms. Farrington, "because we used them for sauce, anyway."

There are those who believe that the music is actually the most important part of the reception, but that doesn't mean you have to spend a mint on a band that specializes in weddings. For every jazz quartet that wants to charge you $800, there is a good band made up of otherwise-unemployed musicians that can be plucked cheap from your favorite bar.

A lot of people, of course, simply prefer to make their own tapes; they get all the songs they want and have a wonderful tape to play on each anniversary.

There are several approaches to hiring photographers, and of course you will have to look at their books to make sure you like their work, because awful wedding pictures are much worse than, say, bad cake.

You can call an art school's photography department and ask to see the books of some fourth-year students. Also, many couples hire a photographer only for the ceremony, and ask their guests to bring cameras to shoot the candids at the reception, which often end up being just as good, if not better. Finally, skip the parent albums. Your family can pick out what they like and order prints themselves.

For invitations, it is best to bypass the retailers and deal with a printing house. But if you have the time (or can appropriate someone else's), make your own. Ms. Hamilton went to Jam Paper and Envelope, that paper nirvana with stores all over the city, and picked out cream stock paper and envelopes that looked like the expensive kind, a few gold calligraphy pens and some cream ribbon from the millinery district, again.

Her sister wrote them out, tied them up and sent them out. Total cost: $60.

In the end, you will most likely exceed your budget in some areas, and may need to make some arrangements.

If your second cousin is a florist, this is the time to invite her to dinner. If you have friends who are professional photographers, caterers or wine merchants, start thinking of creative ways to ask for their services. Consider barter, even with total strangers.

Jordana Rothschild, 24, who works in public relations, saw herself creeping over her floral budget, so she offered her professional skills in a trade for extra greenery. She somehow dragooned five journalists over to the publicity-hungry florist's loft space, and the florist gave her the flowers she had always dreamed of.