Winter Wedding Affair Aims for Romance

By Jonathan Kleyer

As the Kalamazoo Bride magazine hosts its local bridal show, “Winter Wedding Affair,” on January 9th at the Rose Street Market, the event strives to meet a very particular goal: providing brides with a bridal show that preserves a certain amount of romanticism.

“It always perplexed me that so many bridal shows would have such a sterile environment with a bunch of booths,” said Kelly Stroburg, the event’s coordinator. “Your mindset is ‘I want all this beautiful stuff,’ and it’s just creating, for lack of a better term, an environment that accommodates that. It’s a girl thing.”

Stroburg is one of the partners of GRB Ventures Publications, the publishing company of Kalamazoo Bride. She said that they began holding the show three years ago with the goal of bringing together sought-after vendors that stay relevant and educated as to what brides are looking for at the time—which she feels may be the key to making the show the best location to find such things in the area.

“We go to a lot, lot, lot of bridal shows every year, so I feel like we had more than most a very strong handle on what was out there for brides,” said Stroburg. “We essentially came to the conclusion that they all were quite similar, taking place in a larger, more expo-style facility with the goal of accommodating more vendors. We decided we wanted to create something that was held in something more like where you would have your wedding.”

To that end, Stroburg said that they pamper both the vendors and the attendees, providing refreshments and live music performed by classical guitarist James Hillary and a string trio called the Classic Touch Trio.

“From the minute you get engaged, many people want everything around them to be as romantic, beautiful setting that brides can say ‘oh my gosh, this is how I want my wedding to feel,’” Stroburg commented. “From such an early age, it’s this fantasy that you’re exposed to throughout your whole life.”

With the concentration on atmosphere, rather than packing vendors in, the event will be hosting 40 vendors, most of which come from the Greater Kalamazoo area.

Perhaps the most unique decision for this year’s show, however, is that a portion of proceeds generated by the show will go to “The Cinderella Project,” a charity program run by the Junior League of Kalamazoo and Memories Bridal and Evening Wear.

According to Stroburg, about 5 percent of the proceeds would go to the program, which provides gently used gowns and accessories free of charge to junior and senior high school girls in the Kalamazoo area.

“Basically once a year, Memories takes apart the floor of their shop and they set up a boutique of used gowns that girls can come and browse to experience sort of their dream day of prom dress shopping,” Stroburg explained. “It’s a really neat charity.”

Stroburg said that otherwise, the show would generally be very similar to its previous incarnations, which have typically drawn over two hundred people despite any winter weather.

“Brides are determined people, and they show up in droves no matter what weather conditions may come up,” Stroburg commented humorously. “The important thing is to hold on to the idea that it will be fun and beautiful and fun. You can be prepared or unprepared, truthfully, and still have fun.”