Wedding Options make it Easy for Couples to say “I Do”
bridal shop, culture, downtown, elizabeth city, jenny davis jones, pasquotank river, pond house inn,
Jenny Davis Jones picked her own hometown to throw the wedding of her dreams.
The Elizabeth City event, with 200 invited guests, met all her expectations – and then some.
“We got married at our church and had the reception at the Pond House Inn,” Jones says. The reception was an outdoor event with the Pasquotank River as its backdrop.
“It was spring and things were bloom-ing. It was a great setting. … They set up tents, and there was a sailboat filled with beer.”
With waterfront nuptials all the rage, Elizabeth City-bound brides and grooms are in luck. They’ll find no shortage of wedding specialists eager to cater to their every desire and help create memories that will last a lifetime.
Jones turned to local chefs to create her cake and cater her reception. Flowers were arranged by an in-town florist, and even formal wear was found within minutes from the engaged couple’s home.
Another popular venue for wedding parties is the Culpepper Inn in the heart of town. Couples may wed at one of the downtown churches and walk to the inn for the reception. Or they may choose an intimate wedding in front of the inn’s six-foot-tall fireplace.
“If we are having a large outdoor wedding, sometimes the city police will close the street in front of our inn to give the wedding party more privacy,“ says Bonnie Stewart, who along with her husband, Jim, owns the Culpepper.
With its quaint downtown, pictur-esque architecture and waterfront views, it’s no surprise that Elizabeth City is an increasingly popular site for wed-dings, says Martha Johnson, who owns the Pond House Inn.
“We started having weddings the first year we opened,” Johnson says. “We have between eight and 10 weddings a year now.”
Local business owners recently formed the Albemarle Wedding Association, which sponsored its first bridal show in February 2007. That show drew 35 wedding vendors and dozens of poten-tial customers, says Pam Winslow Smith, owner of Louisa’s Bridal Shop.
“More and more people are getting married in this area,” Smith says. “Some of that has to do with the number of people moving into the area, but we are also getting to be more of a destination.”
In fact, weddings are an integral part of Elizabeth City history, Smith says. During the 1940s and 1950s, sev-eral wedding chapels sprang up to accommodate a rush of military brides and grooms.
“Military men from Norfolk, Va., would come down here [with their brides] and get married over the week-end,” Smith says. “There is still one of the wedding chapels downtown, but it has been turned into a law office.”
Smith has definitely seen an increase in business since she bought the 45-year-old bridal shop in 2004. She not only offers bridal gowns but also mother-of-the-bride dresses, bridesmaid dresses and tuxedo rentals.
Smith keeps a list of area businesses specializing in wedding services and products to make planning easier for the bride and groom. The list includes photographers, bakeries, hair and nail salons, florists, caterers and even a carriage company.
Martha Chedister and her husband, Jeff, started Carolina Carriages in spring 2007. Their company uses a white Victorian vis-à-vis carriage, which has two seats facing each other, and a plush burgundy interior. For weddings, the Chedisters decorate with the carriage with flowers and bows.
“The carriage is drawn by one horse, but we have two beautiful Percheron horses,” Chedister says. “They will definitely get the wedding party to the church on time.”
Story by Pam Sherborne
Photo by Ian Curcio
