Real {Minnesota} Wedding: Susan + Mark

This wedding was originally featured in the Munaluchi Spring/Summer 2010 edition.  

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[tab title=”Love Story”]By Kaylyn Eshesimua

Who knew that a children’s TV show could help find your soul mate? For Susan Nwoke and Mark Leppke, who met at a mutual friend’s summer party, The Muppets became their ultimate matchmaker. “I was sitting by the TV as The Muppets were on,” said Susan. “People were trying to figure out if they were a real band and who would play them in real life. I sat next to Mark and we talked about the Muppets.” What began as an interesting conversation between two strangers, eventually led to an intimate date at a Chinese restaurant, and the rest as they say, was history. Mark wasted no time securing the love affair he had with Susan. Using his artistic side to infuse every aspect of his proposal, he purchased a plastic silhouette of a wedding ring from a nearby museum. “I wanted to make sure that the ring I got her was something she’d love,” said Mark. Under the pretense that they were going to dine out for the evening, Mark escorted Susan to a romantic restaurant, where to her surprise, presented her with a shelled mussel filled with a beautiful ring. “I figured I’d hide it [the ring] in a closed mussel shell and surprise her by asking her to open up the closed muscle shell,” said Mark.  

Over the next few months, the two began to plan every detail of their wedding event together, starting with the date. “We decided to do it in March during the spring season since spring felt so much better and everyone we cared about would be able to share that new moment with us,” said Susan. Drawing inspiration with only Susan’s Vera Wang wedding dress: a stunning ivory v-neck silk gown with picot edged drapes and jeweled straps; Susan and Mark came up with a 1930s Hollywood theme to bring their special event to life. “We looked for venues and designs that would fit with this thought and derived ispiration from turn of the century posters and architecture to match the space we had our wedding in,” said Susan. For their location, the couple chose to join hands at The University Club of Saint Paul, Summit Avenue Clubhouse in St. Paul, Minnesota. Its Victorian-styled architecture and luxurious view of the downtown skyline and Mississippi River Valley provided the perfect backdrop for the 1930s Hollywood theme they envisioned. Every design detail from the bridesmaids gowns to the floral design was done up in a vibrant color palette of blues and yellows along with various green color accents. “The paper colors and dark wood of the architecture from the site helped dial back the brightness with more muted, antique tones,” said Susan. “We worked with the florist who used antique light fixtures as the table arrangements during the reception. It was simply beautiful.”

Inside the ceremony, Susan and Mark stood at the altar and awed guests with their “flower ceremony”, a matrimonial symbol designed in place of lighting a unity candle. Even the families got a chance to join in. Susan’s mother read a Nigerian love poem while Mark’s mother played “The Wedding Song”. Following a full night of feasting and dancing, Susan and Mark were sure their wedding exceeded their dreams, particularly because they were able to relax and enjoy the full planning process together. “Our goal was to not get burdened by the cost of the wedding and make the planning part fun and involved. We found creative ways to work on each aspect of the planning and get our families involved in the process. We wouldn’t change a thing![/tab]
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