Think of the poor souls who got married in the 80’s. How often do you see those photos sitting out where just anyone can see them? Not many! Who would want to be reminded that they once thought aquanet and puffy polyester sleeves was chic?

In this age of being green, do you really want to add to ecological cost of producing yet another humongous dress that can only be worn once? If it’s man made material, it’ll be contributing to the world’s pollution problems, if it’s natural fibers, how can you be sure they were harvested responsibly? And worse, the less expensive wedding gowns (and many of the pricier versions as well) were originally sewn in sweatshops! The finishing work may have been done locally by a professional, but the majority of the work is usually handled in the same types of shops that the rest of our clothes are made in.

One thing is certain, true style never goes out of style. Antique and vintage wedding gowns are ecologically sound (true recycling, people!), are less likely to have been sewn in sweat shops, and you’ll never be embarrassed to have your trendy friends see your wedding photos 20 years from now. If you really want to make a statement, you can help your friends find vintage bridesmaid dresses to suit the theme. All the dresses may not match, but the popular thing now is to let the bridesmaids choose their own dresses, and simply stick to a similar style or color. If you live in a large enough area, this shouldn’t be too difficult.

Besides, choosing a vintage wedding dress and vintage bridesmaid dresses will likely save you a lot of money, which is most valuable of all if you’re getting married at Disney!

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So what kind of a wedding can you have at Walt Disney World?

Disney World Wedding Locations:

Technically, you can get married almost anywhere on Disney property for a price. However, the Disney wedding planners provide a selection of their standard locations that are set aside for weddings and vow renewals, as well as some of the more popular alternatives.

1. Disney’s Wedding Pavilion

This is one of the most popular locations for a Disney World wedding as it’s enclosed (perfect no matter the weather), and has a stunning view of Cinderella’s Castle. It’s located just down the white sand beach by the Grand Floridian, and is beautiful. The site fee is approximately $3000 and applies to the Disney Wedding minimum charge.

2. Sea Breeze Point at Disney’s Boardwalk Resort

This is a lovely white gazebo located at Disney’s Boardwalk Resort. There is no view of Cinderella’s Castle here, but the much lower site fee ($2000) makes that one concession worthwhile for many couples.

3. The Wedding Gazebo at Disney’s Yacht & Beach Club Resorts

The charming white gazebo (complete with heart patterns) is set in a rose garden. As with the Sea Breeze Point location, the site fee is approximately $2000, which counts towards the minimum charge for a Disney wedding.

4. Park Locations

The listed locations on the Disney Weddings website are: In front of Cinderella’s Castle at the Swan Boat Landing, in Epcot at Italy, France, Germany, Japan, China, and the UK. The Epcot locations have a site fee of $2,000 and up, and require ALL arrangements to be made through Disney vendors.

Reception halls are available in the Grand Floridian, Boardwalk, and Yacht & Beach Club resorts.

Now, if you’re willing to cut into your kids’ college funds, you can get married nearly anywhere on property. The rose garden in front of Cinderella’s Castle is always popular, and weddings have been performed actually inside the Haunted Mansion and Twilight Zone Tower of Terror. Wouldn’t a wedding in the Walt Disney World Railroad station be romantic? Or even on one of the trains as it’s chugging through Frontierland? Maybe even a quiet ceremony under the shade of the Tree of Life in Disney’s Animal Kingdom! The possibilities are limited only by your budget and your imagination. And possibly your guest list.

How much does it cost to get married at Cinderella’s Castle?

Tighten your girdles for this one girls- no less than $28,000. Now, this is the minimum total for ALL of your wedding arrangements for the day of the wedding- reception and transportation included. This is still quite a high price, but I’ve heard of much worse for non-Disney weddings. If you’re planning for a fancy wedding anyway, the Disney World option could prove to be rather economical!

How much does it cost to get married at not Cinderella’s Castle?

Bare minimum charge for a wedding on Walt Disney World property is $10,000 in 2009 and will be going up to $12,000 in 2010. This is with their bare bones (still elegant and charming) plans during the value season. On average, you’ll spend between $15,000 and $25,000 for your wedding day on Disney property.

How do I plan my Disney World Wedding?

The first step is to contact the official Disney Wedding Planners and request an information packet. You’ll be dealing with Disney directly for all of your arrangements- even if you don’t get your officiant, photographer, or flowers through Disney, your wedding planner will need to know about your plans.

Did you know that Disney can even handle your dress requirements? It’s true, even if you want something a bit out of the ordinary, say, a red wedding dress? If they can’t help provide you with the perfect dress, they can certainly help in your finding arrangements for it.

The people at Disney are all professionals, and they plan these magical memories daily for people like you, who want to make their favorite place a part of their future. Disney World weddings are certainly the way to go for people who want their perfect day to be… well, perfect.

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To tell the truth, I think that’s actually a fairly low price.

Either way, it’s a brilliant move that I never would have expected them to make. After all, the deal with Disney building a Harry Potter theme park fell through and Universal Studios got the deal. This put Universal Studios into a prime position to take over the tween market, which the Disney parks were already struggling to capture. The only good thing about Disney not getting the Harry Potter deal is that the books are complete and the movies are nearly finished- the buzz is nearly over.

But with Marvel Comics under the Disney umbrella- hoo-boy! Think of the possibilities. Granted, this means the new Marvel movies will be released through the Disney company (cha-ching), the merchandising will be going to Disney (cha-ching), the comics themselves are going to Disney (cha-ching), and best of all, the parks can take total advantage of this.

Can you just imagine Marvel Metropolis at Disney’s Hollywood Studios? I heard that they’re going to totally wipe out the Backlot Tour and extend Pixar Place. But, that’s a huge chunk of land! Perhaps they’ll build a huge city scape ala New York Street (or is it Streets of America?) with Spiderman swinging from the rafters?

And that’s not where the genius of this starts. This is purely business- just think what this will do to Universal Studios Islands of Adventure. After all, they have an entire Island devoted to Marvel! Disney is highly unlikely to renew any contracts Marvel has with US IoA, but from what I understand, Universal has to negotiate any changes to to the attractions as well. I’m going to assume that they’ll be unable to rehab any of those rides beyond what it takes to repair and refresh (i.e. paint, carpeting) them. Screamscape went into some good detail on what this might mean for Islands of Adventure (scroll down to 9/1/09).

Bloomberg got in on the news with a financial angle, discussing repurchasing of stock and such. All I know is, Marvel’s stock went up by $10 with the news.

It’s kind of nuts thinking about Disney buying out Marvel, but really, I like it!

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