The must-have Elements for a Perfect Rustic Wedding

You can’t deny the charm of a classic rustic-themed wedding – the mason jars, wooden barrels, handwritten sign and strings of fairy lights – everything is homely, relaxed and just plain adorable. Idyllically romantic, too.

Over the last decade or so, the theme has gotten so popular that it’s almost ‘mainstream’ in the wedding planning universe. More and more hotels and hospitality venues are creating these classily raw barn-style spaces that make for great backdrops for rustic weddings.

At the same time, more and more couples are drawn to the laid-back, effortless beauty of the theme. The theme makes weddings personal and memorable, and less ‘mass produced’ so to say. An afternoon of tying rustic twine around wedding invitations and favors with your bridesmaids, anyone?

Because the personal touch is such a big part of the theme, rusting weddings have a lot of room for creativity. Every wedding planner and couple have different ways of bringing their rustic wedding to life, but there are a few elements that are essential to the theme.  

Without these elements (or creative variations of them), a rustic wedding is somewhat incomplete. Here’s our list of rustic wedding essentials:

Love you until I D-I-Y

The Do-It-Yourself parts of putting together a rustic wedding are what makes this theme feel so homespun and heartfelt. The couple and their families can get extremely hands-on and involved with the table décor, the signs, handcrafted Bomboniere and more.

While you might not want to put big aspects like the catering or the music in the hands of amateur family members and friends, you can’t go wrong with the little aspects. And even if you do, nothing says rustic better than the beauty of imperfection!

Location perfection

Location is everything when it comes to a rustic wedding. With these, and with the garden glamour themes that I love working on just as much, you want to try and find a location that needs little or no work.

The perfect rustic wedding theme location doesn’t need transforming or big budgets. You want the natural beauty of a venue to hold the essence of your theme, and all you and your planner need to do is work on bringing out that essence just a little bit more.

The UAE has some spectacular hidden gems that are perfect for a cozy rustic wedding. We’re willing to spill our secret discoveries over a coffee with the bride and the groom!

The Ultimate Rustic Wedding Prop Pack

I like to call this kit the Ultimate Rustic Wedding Prop Pack, you’ll see why. If you’re going as DIY as it gets, and planning your whole wedding yourself, too, all you need to do is make sure you have this list covered, and your rustic theme should look more or less in place. Make sure you have:

–    Fairly lights

–    Wooden barrels

–    Hand-painted signs

–    Mason Jars (or some of these beautiful alternatives)

–    Wood-back rustic chairs

–    Farm-style tables

When I’m with you all I think is wildflowers

Wildflowers and lots of greens are the way to go for that effortless beauty of the rustic theme. Many couples choose the wild outdoors for rustic wedding venues (as wild as the woods, even), but since that’s not much of an option in the UAE, you can bring that look by going with a particularly wild bunch of flowers for your wedding theme.

Here are a few wildflower wedding bouquets that made us all here at We Do Events leave heart-eyed emojis in the comments.

Undress your cake

This is my favorite part. The semi-naked, rough-around-the-edges berry-laden, flower-topped rustic wedding cake. There are so many ways to go about this particular cake style, and quite honestly, I love each style better than the next one.

The wedding cake is a statement, and you’ve got complete freedom of speech with this one, so to say! As with any cake, my expectation of a good rustic wedding cake too is quite basic: soft, moist, supple, moderately creamy and totally irresistible.

That’s my list of absolute essentials that complete the rustic wedding theme. For different weddings, I’ve worked on creative variations of these elements

Sometimes we’re working with tight budgets, and sometimes, we just have a lot of creative licenses and have the opportunity to try out customized, personalized alternatives.

Either way, I’ve always resorted to this basic list and made sure I check it off when I’m planning a rustic wedding.

If you’re exploring the rustic theme yourself and would like a consultation session or more detailed support, feel free to reach out to us so we can show you some of the rustic magic we’ve created before. Drop us a line on info@wedoevents.ae.

Can you think of any other essentials to help make a rustic wedding as rustic as it gets? Leave us a comment!