The ranger plucked limp wisps of confetti from the moss between the trees. Remnants of one gender revealparty in his forest. “It was a boy,” he stated matter-of-factly. He came by in an item of EditionNL, already last week (February 2). It may not have been a world problem what he brought up here, but after a few nights of sleep I realized that this is of course a pars pro toto for the problem: man is an enemy to his environment.
Nature turns out to be the perfect backdrop for wedding photos. Dunes, heath, forest. Beautiful with the rising or setting sun, a breeze, dew drops, and all that green goes nicely with everything. If you really want something original, you can fly a drone that captures the bridal couple from above, and which can also give a spontaneous effect: a confetti cannon. For example, the forester sees one bridal couple posing after the other, and otherwise the traces of them. Four shoots in one day, and on Fridays in May or September it is sometimes a traffic jam. Well good, the news was that nature managers are now going to charge money for ‘shoots’ or ‘events’. Buurserzand, Beeckestijn, Groeneveld and Buitenplaats Elswout charge fifty euros for using nature and cleaning up and maintaining it.
‘Organized Chaos’
Wedding planners Nina and Susanna “create organized chaos” for their brides-to-be and on six Wednesday evenings, we see Everything for the wedding where their work takes them. In the first three episodes, these were Tuscany, Barcelona, the South of France, The Hague, Puglia and Mallorca (“Feels like Italy, more affordable than Ibiza.”) Favorite locations for one or more day weddings of Dutch couples.
Everyone has their own unique wedding, of course, but what strikes me about all those highly personal wishes is that they all look so terribly alike. On every site visit I hear the planners say that this is where the “long tables” will be for dinner with all guests, that “everyone will receive a nice welcome drink” and the ceremony itself will be in an “intimate setting” anyway. There are goodie bags or personal gifts for the guests, often something with the initials of the couple. The groom who wants to put together the bridal bouquet himself stands out the most. That never happens, the planners say, at all. There is some variation in the budgets, although you will not hear that from the television couples. The amounts range from 30,000 to 150,000 euros, the planners charge 20 percent for their services. But where the day threatens to fall into the water, it is the same for all couples. The sun might not shine, the wind might pick up, the rain or heat could spoil the plans. In the end everything works out and the wedding planners themselves cry the loudest with every yes word.
I also think it’s a pity, isn’t it, that my judgment gets in the way. Why can’t I just be relieved when the sign with neon letters, specially made in China for the bridal couple, arrives just in time at the party location in Barcelona? Admittedly, a new sign had to be made in a hurry, which unfortunately was delivered to Madrid, which meant that the trainee had to fly up and down to get it. And I certainly don’t think it’s a nice feature of me that I cheer up when I hear that in episode 4 the plane with 25 of the 42 wedding guests to Montpellier has been cancelled. No, no other flights for the next three days. All trains fully booked. Cars then? Unfortunately, no rental car available anymore. How will Nina solve that?
Getting married on average 60,000 couples in a year, sometimes there are a thousand in a day and if they also all have to be photographed. ‘Our’ nature is too full, the world becomes our new setting.