Queer Fashion, Wedding Etiquette and a SIL Showdown with Kati Kons

My new book Here Comes the Drama: A Ferris and Sloan Story is live!

What happens when a bride’s sister demands the wedding photos be moved — because she’s pregnant? This episode dives into a real-life story filled with family tension, wedding day stress, and boundary crossing. Christa and Kati unpack the drama behind the scenes: from feelings of entitlement to unspoken rivalries and the pressure of making a wedding day perfect for everyone.

If you’ve ever wondered how far you should bend for family or what’s really acceptable at weddings, this episode is for you. Plus, they share honest reflections on friendship, jealousy, and the tricky art of RSVP etiquette.

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Episode Chapter Markers

00:00 Introduction

01:18 Bridesmaid Experiences and Challenges

02:46 Bridesmaid Dress Shopping Stories

05:23 Financial Expectations for Bridesmaids

08:34 Non-Traditional Wedding Choices

10:48 Fashion and Color Theory

14:01 Growing Up in Chicago Suburbs

15:14 Privacy and Online Safety

16:37 Meet Kati: The Queer Fashion Stylist

19:48 Non-Traditional Wedding Attire

28:31 Kati’s Wedding Planning

34:25 Rapid Fire Questions

38:36 Diving into Wedding Stories

39:48 Rant on Formal Attire Norms

40:55 Queer Fashion at Weddings

44:13 Navigating Wedding Dress Codes

51:56 Wedding Story: Sibling Rivalry

55:31 Reacting to Wedding Drama

58:32 The Importance of Communication

01:04:48 Reflecting on Wedding Etiquette

Must-Hear Insights and Key Moments

The Photo Location Drama — Should a bride accommodate a pregnant sister’s request to move photo shoots on the wedding day?
Family Tension and Silent Rivalry — Exploring possible jealousy and competition between siblings at weddings.
When Love Isn’t Transactional — Discussing the expectation of reciprocity in wedding roles and attendance.
The Importance of RSVP Etiquette — How a simple “yes” or “no” can save the bride and groom headaches.
Photographer vs. Planner Roles — Why having a dedicated wedding planner is crucial to avoid chaos.
Pregnancy and Wedding Participation — Respecting health and energy limits without guilt-tripping.
Friendship Boundaries Post-Wedding — Navigating hurt feelings when friends can’t attend your big day.
Legal Marriage vs. Long-Term Partnerships — When wedding guest lists exclude “non-married” partners, and why that’s problematic.

Words of Wisdom: Standout Quotes from This Episode

“Love is not transactional. If it feels that way, then maybe you shouldn’t go.” – Christa Innis
“It’s wild to ask a bride to change the logistics of her entire wedding day for someone else.” – Kati Kons
“Sometimes people feel like they’re owed something just for showing up.” – Kati Kons
“Weddings aren’t about competition — they’re about celebration.” – Kati Kons
“Marriage doesn’t change your life overnight; it’s more like a party you throw for yourself.” – Kati Kons
“The wedding day is about the couple, not anyone else’s agenda.” – Christa Innis
“RSVPs are important — they’re not just polite, they’re necessary.” – Christa Innis

About Kati:

Kati Kons is a queer wedding fashion stylist based in Washington, D.C. They specialize in helping queer individuals find affirming and non-traditional attire for weddings and other formal events. Kati works with nearlyweds, guests, and vendors, guiding them through the process of finding attire that reflects their personal style and identity. They are known for their inclusive and affirming approach to wedding fashion, particularly for those who may not find themselves represented in traditional wedding attire.

Follow Kati Kons:

Join the Drama with Christa Innis:

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A Team Dklutr Production

Blog Transcript:

Note: We use AI transcription so there may be some inaccuracies

Christa Innis: Okay, so we were just talking like while before recording and so we’re like, you know, let’s just start. And of course here I am the planner. I have to start like introducing it even though we said like, let’s just start talking. Um, anyways, we were talking about bridesmaids being a bridesmaid because I said last week my person had a hot take that said, if you like your friends, don’t ask them to be a bridesmaid.

And I’ve been a bridesmaid like nine times. You said you’ve been one once and that was enough for you.

Kati Kons: Yeah, that was totally enough. Like I’m done. Yeah. Well, and it was for my sister. It was not even like a friend. So funny.

Christa Innis: All your friends listening are like, okay.

Bridesmaids, Budgets & Boundaries: Rethinking the Wedding Party

Kati Kons: I also got married two weeks ago and didn’t have a wedding party.

So,

Christa Innis: see, and I, it’s funny because like the older I get now, I’m like, there are certain things that like, I’m like, I would do so differently. Mm-hmm. I loved having my wedding party, but, but like, I feel like if I were to get married today, I’d be like, you know what? If you wanna be like, wear a certain color, but I’m not gonna have you guys do all that extra stuff.

I don’t know, I kind of just, it does complicate things a little bit.

Kati Kons: And like what, like what complicate, what does it complicate?

Christa Innis: I feel like not my own wedding. ’cause I feel like I, again, like I was one of the last, one of last of my friends to get married. So like, I had been in so many weddings over the years and I saw kind of like drama that happened with bridesmaids stress, with bridesmaid dress shopping.

Oh, I’ve, I got stories about that. Um, just crazy stuff where I was just like, I don’t wanna deal with this. So, for example, like the bridesmaid dress shopping, it was like. You’d go in with a bride that had no clue what she wanted. Right. And so like, everyone ha shares their opinion. Everyone picks their favorite dress.

It’s like bridesmaids the movie. Right? So it’s like everyone’s picking their own dress and like, this fits me the best. This color’s best for me. Too many opinions. As a bride, you need to know if we’re gonna have bridesmaid dresses. No. Kind of the vibe you want. So I was like, we’re going online. You have to set

Kati Kons: some boundaries.

Christa Innis: Yeah. So for me, I was like, we’re going online. I literally sent them a link to Birdie Gray and I was like, pick something in this color. Pick whatever style you like for your body. Do you?

Kati Kons: Yeah, no, that is, that is good. Um, I, um, one of my clients is a bridesmaid in someone else’s wedding and didn’t know what to wear and came to me asking me to style them and was like, oh, uh, the bride doesn’t have any parameters whatsoever.

And I said, not even color. And she goes, oh yeah, I guess she gave us green and blue. I said green or blue. Not even like, not even like a shade, either one. There was, there was absolutely no parameter and no dress type. It doesn’t have to be a dress even. It can be pants, it can be anything. Um, which is great.

I like, I love flexibility, but at the same time, it’s like, you know, she has an idea of what she wants to wear and she has an idea of what standing out means. But I feel like. Everyone’s interpretation of like standing out and like being interesting at the same time, which is what bridesmaids want to do is be interesting, but not stand out too much.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm. Is like

Kati Kons: different in everyone else’s heads. And I feel like that’s really challenging balance to, like, it’s a balancing act and it’s really hard to strike that balance when you don’t communicate that with the bride.

Christa Innis: Yeah. And the

Kati Kons: bride doesn’t communicate exactly what she wants. So I’m like trying really hard to help her with this task, especially when I’m not in communication with the bride myself.

Christa Innis: So, yeah, that’s hard when there’s a middle person. Yeah. I feel like a lot of the stories I hear or see it all comes down to communication too. ’cause it’s like if a bride, you know, maybe is like, maybe there’s a weird tension with one of the bridesmaids or something, and then the one bridesmaid like picks a dress that’s like a loud color or something, but they never really communicate what the expectations were of being a bridesmaid or vice versa.

It’s hard to like. Get on the same page if they don’t communicate, I don’t know. Or if it’s like a husband’s cousin or something, so they’re not close.

Kati Kons: I just also feel like it’s really hard when you’re like a bridesmaid and there’s like some people that are like, oh, I can afford to pay $400 for a dress, and other people can’t.

And it’s like, how do you shove the expectation on people to like pay for some things and not other people? I don’t know. It’s so challenging. So I had another client subsidize her bridesmaids where she was like, oh, I want them in like $600 dresses, so I’m gonna give them $500 each and they’re gonna have to pay the rest of the way, or whatever.

Okay. And I was like, that’s a really good idea. But then she was like. But I want them in $800 shoes. And I was like, girl, oh my gosh, that’s like a crime. You can’t do that. Um, and so we had to have a conversation about expectations. But anyways, um, that was, uh, it was, it was really nice on her end to be like, oh, I wanna subsidize part of the way because she wanted a certain look to like her, she wanted her bridesmaids to look a certain way and like have a certain aesthetic that she knew couldn’t be done with a smaller budget.

And so Right. That was definitely a great way to like ensure that at least it was there in some respect. Right,

Christa Innis: right. And

Kati Kons: I think not a lot of brides prioritize that. And I think they should.

Christa Innis: Well, yeah, and I feel like I’ve heard that a lot. It’s like they have all these expectations, but don’t kinda look at the budget of each individual person.

Mm-hmm. Um, I feel like, I look back at weddings I was in in my early twenties, and I think the first couple, they were pretty good. Like where it was like, okay, we were all just like right outta college. We were all pretty broke, you know? Mm-hmm. Exactly. And then as you kind of get a little bit older, like maybe you’re a little more in your career, but definitely mid twenties when I was in my wedding in weddings, I was still was spending way outta my budget because it was like bachelorette party, you’re, you’re paying for bridal shower, you’re buying gifts for each thing.

It all just adds up. And I was in weddings where brides wanted very specific. Most were, I would say most were laid back, but it was like very specific colors. Mm-hmm. And styles of shoes or something. Luckily not $800, so I couldn’t complain too much. But that’s why when it got time for mine, again, it was like a $99 dress.

I know on the website, I think my maid of honor, her dress was like 40 because they had like a sale. And I was like, buy yours now. Buy yours now. And so I was like, I want everyone to feel comfortable, like, yeah, wear shoes you already have, don’t spend extra money. I

Kati Kons: mean, like, we’re me and my friends, what’s so funny is like I’m, I’m 25, like we’re not, we’re not 22, 25 is like young, but like, I mean, we’re being the first being married out of our, all of the friends, you know, I feel like this responsibility to make everything cheap.

And we didn’t do bachelorette parties. We didn’t do any of, we didn’t do wedding parties. We didn’t make anyone pay for things. The only thing is we wanted people to be here. Yep. And, and, and, yeah. And we, they were here, you know? Yep. And that was awesome for us. We didn’t do a registry even, we didn’t ask people, we didn’t do bridal showers.

We didn’t do any of that. Um, which we didn’t. We’re non-traditional people, so that didn’t feel like we needed to do that at all. Um, but like, I don’t know, paying for things seems like such a big thing right now because of the economy, you know? But like, if I were, if I were like, I don’t know, I’m, I’m, I don’t feel like I’m millennial, but like if I were a millennial and I was like getting married in the time when all the millennials were getting married, like if I were my sister and like, I don’t know, everyone was doing those things.

And like I had the choice between like a $4,000 wedding dress and a $6,000 wedding dress and that $2,000 delta. Or I could take the $2,000 and subsidize my bridesmaid’s wedding or their dresses Yeah. To like get them to wear something much cooler. I would do that. I. Yeah. Yeah. But I feel like people don’t do that and they should.

As a fashion stylist, I feel like if you’re gonna dictate what your wedding party is wearing, it better be something much higher fashion, you know? Mm-hmm.

Styling Weddings with Color Theory & Confidence

I had to wear, when I was a bridesmaid, a very boring dress. It was like just a plain sage green. How long

Christa Innis: ago? A plain sage green, you said?

Kati Kons: Yeah.

Christa Innis: How long ago was the

Kati Kons: wedding?

Uh, it was April, 2020. Uh, f*ck. 2022.

Christa Innis: Okay. So like three years ago. So I was thinking like when my, the first wedding I was in, which was, oh my God, I feel so old saying this. 14 years ago, like 13 years ago, I was a junior in college. Anyways, it was that everyone had the same bridesmaid dress style. Yeah. We all

Kati Kons: had the same one too, and that was three years ago.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I can you imagine? Yeah.

Kati Kons: Sorry.

Christa Innis: I love the individual going on. I love the individuality now. I love, I’ve been in a lot of weddings where we all wore the same dress and then it started moving to like wear the same color but different styles. Mm-hmm. Mine was like, pretty much wear the same color or same color, but there was like three color options in the same family.

It was like mauves, whatever. Yeah,

Kati Kons: yeah, yeah. That’s cool. But,

Christa Innis: but yeah, I was, but I see, the thing is, if I had a stylist, I feel like I would be one I love now where they have like different colors, but it just goes together. Mm-hmm. I’m not like, I don’t have the eye for that, so I’m just like, you know what, pick one off.

There’s,

Kati Kons: there’s a very easy way to do that. It’s so easy and all you have to do is play with the color wheel a little bit. Because like, you don’t wanna do something. Well, first of all, you have to do a bunch of different colors. Right. But you can’t use all of the colors. You have to take like two of them out.

So if you’re gonna do like a rainbow, like take out your reds and like any your reds and anything close to a red, uh, pinks are cute oranges if only if they’re bright. Right. Don’t do like a burnt orange. Right. Okay. Like what I’m wearing right now. Like, take out your red. Yeah, but it’s like, it’s like something super warm, like a red.

Don’t do that. Right. Okay.

Christa Innis: Okay. Okay.

Kati Kons: And then you have to maintain, it’s like kind of, it’s kind of like using color theory, but like I’ve never been trained in color theory. The only, so my experience using this color theory is what I’ve been taught as an 8-year-old in art class. So, love it. Literally just like keep that in the back of your mind as I tell you this.

Is that the way that I do it? Is like complimentary colors are like opposite colors on the color wheel.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm.

Kati Kons: Um, and you would use like bright, you know how you would use bright colors with darker colors, right. And opposite colors.

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Kati Kons: Um, you would just basically play with that and take away one color of all of ’em, like red I said, or whichever color you don’t like, red, blue, whatever.

Okay. Um, and then play with the rest of the, and make one of ’em, not neon, but really bright, um, as your accent color.

Christa Innis: Okay.

Kati Kons: I feel like we should, I feel like I should show you this as in real time, but um, here

Christa Innis: I’ll just show you my purse. You are like, let me just like whip something together.

Kati Kons: Yeah. Oh, this is a, is this a good example?

This doesn’t have any blues on it.

Christa Innis: Okay. So yeah, because it all goes together because you’re not take, you’re taking out one of the main Yeah. I wanna start like, noticing this and like looking around because so many fashion is all

Kati Kons: just observing if you Yeah, I was just having this conversation with someone today.

Oops. Fashion is just observing. Um, but yeah, color theory is interesting. It’s just like, um, like, you know how, you know, the, when I was young, they always taught in color class and art class. I used to talk about all the time, uh, the sports teams, uh, football team jerseys. Mm. Like if you think about marketing in, uh, sports, uh, like the Seattle Seahawks, the like neon green and the navy blue.

Mm-hmm. That’s like a very intentional marketing thing. Um. What else? I always thought that like the Vikings, the, the gold and the purple a very bad choice. And the Packers is now, it’s iconic, being gold and green, but I feel like is also a bad choice.

Christa Innis: That was my high school colors. Oh God. We were the Gators.

Where are you from? Uh, Chicago suburb.

Bridesmaid Drama & Digital Boundaries

Kati Kons: Oh really? Me too. Oh yeah. Well, let’s talk about that. I now I’m scared. Where, where are we from? Are we from the same suburb? Are are we neighbors? No. My God. Wait, who’s the Gators? Do I know? The Gators? Let me think. Me and also my partner. I might

Christa Innis: even pull this out ’cause I’m like so secretive about where

Kati Kons: I live.

I don’t, I don’t know if I know the Gators. So let me think about this for a minute.

Christa Innis: There’s the Florida Gators, you know,

Kati Kons: Stevenson?

Christa Innis: Stevenson.

Kati Kons: Oh, nevermind. I feel like Stevenson was green. That’s why I, oh, Stevenson

Christa Innis: High School. I’ve heard of that.

Kati Kons: Yeah.

Christa Innis: Who did I just meet? I just met someone that said they went to Stevenson.

Someone messaged me on. TikTok. So if you’re listening, Hey, uh, she messaged me, I think she said she went to Stevenson and she was like, you talk about being from Chicago on your podcast. And I was like, oh, I didn’t realize I did that, but yeah.

Kati Kons: What suburb is it?

Christa Innis: Huh?

Kati Kons: What suburb is it?

Christa Innis: I’ll tell you when we don’t record, or I guess I can take it out.

Oh, that’s

Kati Kons: fine. That’s so fair. I mean, I guess like, I don’t think, I’m never gonna live there again. I am in Washington DC right now, and yeah, I feel like, I don’t know. I got docs on the internet a couple months ago in which people found my old Instagram account and I deleted it by now. But like they found my old Instagram account, they found a bunch of old sh*t on the internet from me and like put my address on the internet.

Christa Innis: Oh my God. That’s like my nightmare.

Kati Kons: It was like kind of bad. Um, long story short, don’t, um. Do a lot of things that I did, which is actually, actually don’t, don’t be a right wing troll on the internet. How about that? Um, anyways, yeah. Um, I literally was about to do something anyways, don’t don docx people on the internet.

Thank you. Yes. And then, uh, so I feel like that’s fine. But I grew up in a suburb of Chicago, not yours though, because I think I would’ve known by now. Because I don’t know a gator in that area. But anyways,

Christa Innis: people are gonna be like searching like gators. I don’t live there now, so it doesn’t really matter.

But I’m like, I’m like very private online, and I’m like, if people seek No, you should be, no, I

Kati Kons: think

Christa Innis: that’s a really

Kati Kons: good thing

Christa Innis: because there’s just like, like what you just said. Um, I had a girl on here that said,

Kati Kons: I was like, the f*ck. But it, uh, it’s a good thing because I, uh, and you should know this for the future, if you ever get docs, you can request to scrub things from Google.

And so I did and it was gone. Oh,

Christa Innis: well, there you go. All right. Well that’s a, that’s a good lesson. Yeah.

Kati Kons: Yeah. And I’m so sorry for derailing the conversation like four times, but, um,

ADHD, Creativity & Queer Wedding Fashion

Christa Innis: oh my gosh. You’re, uh, let’s, let’s go back, well, since we kind of just jumped in, can we just like introduce who you are and what you do?

I know we kind of went backwards, but I, um, I feel like it would give more context to why we’re talking about styling so much. So tell us about your brand, who you are and all that good stuff.

Kati Kons: I am Kati. I am a queer fashion stylist, and I mostly do weddings and non-traditional weddings, um, because there’s no process for finding non-traditional wedding attire, um, or wedding attire that isn’t like a suit or a dress.

Um, to clarify. Um, and what were your other questions? I have a DHD. I just already lost it. Oh, good. I

Christa Innis: think that’s why we’re vibing so well. I haven’t, okay. I haven’t been officially diagnosed, but my whole life I’m like, I’m pretty sure I have a DD or a DHD. No. Then you probably do. It’s, I get like, either very focused or I’m just like, woo, where are we?

What are

Kati Kons: we talking about? Yes. That’s a DHD. It’s, it’s not the lack of focus, it’s the reregulation of it. Right? Yeah. If

Christa Innis: I don’t plan out my day. I’m all over it. That’s why I’m a planner. That’s why I love planning sh*t, because if I don’t, I am.

Kati Kons: That’s really good. I, I don’t, I really should plan out my day because when I do it, I’m so on, you know?

Yes, yes. That’s the thing.

Christa Innis: I think people don’t think we have the capabil, I say we now. I’m like, now I’m a part of the a d We don’t, people don’t get us. No. Um, yeah.

Kati Kons: It’s okay.

Christa Innis: No, it’s just like, I think like the

Kati Kons: diagnosis is just a label.

Christa Innis: Okay. It’s just a label. Yeah. No, I just feel like once I was really able to like get organized, that’s when I was like, okay, that’s my magic power.

I can get organized and I can get stuff done if I don’t, you able

Kati Kons: to like control your brain is just an unmatched thing. Yeah. It’s crazy. Once you be able to, once you’re able to like literally control, wield your power, it’s. I just feel like it’s your brain is actually able to do more than other people.

I can’t explain it, but yes, sometimes my

Christa Innis: husband’s like, like, I’ll like bring up something else I’m working on. And he’s like, aren’t you already doing this? And I’m like, I don’t even know what just happened. Like, I just get outta the, I full disclosure. Right. Right now we have a, we have a two bedroom, so I work from, I’m in my closet.

Fun fact. So we gotta make spaces work. Um, and so I will come out of our room and I’m like, I just, I just got so much done and like I’ll like show him. He’s like, how did you do that? And I’m like, I focus mode, but if I don’t have a plan and I waste like a couple hours, I’m like so hard on myself. I’m like, what?

Kati Kons: Yeah. I feel like it’s like, I don’t know if, if I’m on, I can like do more than most people and if I am just like, uh, so not focused. I like waste so much time. It’s so terrible. But yeah, I feel something. Um, what was your,

Reshaping Non-Traditional Wedding Fashion

what I, did I have to introduce?

Christa Innis: Yeah. So. So talk about portrait of a bride on Fire. How you got started, how you got into it.

Yeah, how I got started.

Kati Kons: Okay. Um, well, I got started because I got engaged and I identify as like somewhere in between, like female and non-binary. It just kind of depends on the moment. Um, and not like I wake up one day and I’m non-binary and I wake up one day and I’m a woman. It’s just like I don’t care to do the soul searching is the moment, I guess.

Uh, like, yeah. And so, but I, but in my day to day, I love wearing dresses and skirts, so when I got engaged I was like really, really into like wedding dresses and I got really into like the whole wedding fashion scene. But what became super apparent to me was like, there is. Nothing outside of wedding dresses for anyone outside of white wedding dresses for anyone that was non-traditional at all.

Right?

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm.

Kati Kons: And there were just no options. None. And the thing is, all the wedding dresses were the same too. There were like 10 different styles and there were like 10 variations of those 10 styles and that’s it. And there were not even non-traditional white wedding dresses. It was so crazy to me.

’cause like to find the non-traditional white wedding dresses, they were like, I don’t know, like on Etsy that you had to order mm-hmm. From across the earth, like you couldn’t try them on. It’s just so weird. It was such a weird thing to me. Anyways, I got really frustrated because there were no like even pants or jumpsuits at the wedding shops in town, and.

Suit shops were obviously only for people who were like strictly traditional men. And there was like nothing in between and there was no color anywhere mostly. And it was just like nothing. And so I started like kind of, I wanted to get into like what I loved the wedding dress situation. And I just started learning about wedding dresses a lot.

But I wanted, I started posting on TikTok because I started to get into like content creation at the time. Um, and so I kind of started, um, wanting to help people find their non-traditional wedding attire. And so that’s kind of how I got into it, is like I got into it myself and then I got into wanting to help people ’cause I realized that they didn’t have it.

Um, you know, they didn’t have a means of finding it. And also there wasn’t a lot of it, so that made it. Twice as hard. Um mm-hmm. And so that’s how I started is I started in like wedding fashion and now I do like wedding fashion styling. So I help you throughout the journey of finding your wedding attire and also styling the accessories and all the little details of your wedding outfit.

And then I also do personal styling on the side, and I do some like. Like red carpet styling, event styling as well, just like to a much smaller scale than um, the other two things. Mm-hmm. Um, and yeah, I do kind of a lot of things because I just kind of take on things that I wanna do and I don’t, and I only, I don’t really say no unless I really don’t wanna do it.

So,

Christa Innis: yeah. When you say non-traditional wedding dress, and you’re talking about like jumpsuits, I, I remember. When I was engaged and I was like starting to plan into my wedding, I, um, I’m a, my friends all know me. Like when I was a bridesmaid, I was like, the jump, I love a good jumpsuit. Like, so for like three weddings I was in, I wore a jumpsuit.

Good. Because they like looked like kind of dresses. So it like, looked like uniform, especially like a palazzo pant or something where the wide leg was like flowy. Yes. I loved it. It was so, and then you’re on the dance floor and you’re like, I can do my thing. Like, you know, you can do the splits, you can do whatever you want.

Yeah. If I wanted to learn how to do the splits that night, I would be okay. But yeah, it was just like, so I loved, but I remember seeing a lot of the bridal jumpsuits starting to come out more and more. I wore one to my rehearsal dinner, but not the actual wedding.

Queer Wedding Fashion Beyond the Binary

So when you say untraditional wedding dress, what kind of, like, are you looking for personally or like, do you look for like for brides or couples getting married, um, that, that come to you for that kind of unique look?

Kati Kons: Yeah. So I feel like, um. I, the reason I say I’m like a queer wedding fashion stylist is because there’s like no one that tailors their services to the queer community. And I don’t want to be exclusive of other non-traditional people that want these kinds of services, but I know that there’s no one else that, that actually tailors their services to the queer community.

And I think that’s important, especially in pride month and like this time, day and age, when like queer people are like just being targeted left and right, right? Mm-hmm. So, but uh, to take a step back, I think like the attire that is non-traditional is more like the drama of a dress, but like the comfort of pants, right?

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm.

Kati Kons: Mm-hmm. And like. Like you just described, a jumpsuit is like gonna give you the mobility and the freedom to do what you want when, but you get the, like, the prettiness of make a dress, you know, Uhhuh. Um, and I think a lot of people when they come to me is they’re like, I want the drama moment of a dress, meaning I want a train, meaning I want the details and I want the, like, I want the like princess or prince or something where it’s like, I want the grandeur of like that.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm. But

Kati Kons: I don’t, but I don’t want to be in that level of femininity of a dress.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Because

Kati Kons: they feel secure in pants.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I love, and I think

Kati Kons: a lot more people do feel secure in pants than dresses.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm.

Kati Kons: Yeah. But like suits are just like out of the f*cking question for a lot of people, so, you know.

Yes, yes. Especially ’cause like the there the options for like suits or like. Traditional man suits, which are like, you know, f*cking boxy as sh*t. And then there’s like women’s suits, which are like business suits that you wear to like corporate events. You know, there’s not like a, what does it feel like?

And then there’s like the other accessible suits you find out like fast fashion places, you know, there’s no like good accessible suits for women that are like quality sh*t that you can just find. Yeah. I don’t know, like where would you even look for that? I’m like, off the top of my head, I don’t even have an answer.

And I’m a fashion stylist that makes me so angry.

Redefining the Wedding Experience

Christa Innis: Do you ever like want to like work with a designer and like design like your own? I don’t know. I feel like you have such an eye for that stuff where you could like design. I do that for some

Kati Kons: clients.

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Kati Kons: Some clients look for custom options. And I do work with designers to design custom attire when they have the budget for it.

It’s just way more expensive. Of course. So I

Christa Innis: bet. Yeah. Yeah.

Kati Kons: I love, I love that because it’s like really, really fun to go through the whole beginning to end process of being like, let’s formulate your vision. And like what’s so fun is being like being able to see where someone has a vision and being able to be like, okay, but we can make it so much cooler than that.

Like, yeah, so much cooler than what you have seen on these random Pinterest boards that are just like probably so limited. Mm-hmm. And like, let me show you some even cooler stuff. You know what I mean? Like Yeah, like let’s show you some stuff and then like, let’s draw and like, let’s do all this stuff with the designer.

Like it is so cool to watch everything develop and I’m not a designer so I can’t, like, I can’t sketch and I can’t, you know, make garments. But like seeing that chick from beginning to end is the coolest thing in the world. And then me being able to like. Pick out their shoes and like walk them through their hair and makeup and accessory.

Oh my God. It’s such a fun, it’s such a fun moment. Like putting together. Yeah. Okay. So

Christa Innis: you mentioned you just got married two weeks ago. Mm-hmm. Congratulations. So Thank you. When it came to planning or putting together your own wedding mm-hmm. Like what were things that were the bat you were like, this is what we want, and what were some things that you were like, we no, we’re definitely not doing that.

And you said no wedding party. Yeah, yeah. Sorry.

Kati Kons: Um, so we, uh, as young queer people, we were non-traditional in nature and we said, no florals. We did not spend any money on florals. And my, we did spend a lot of money on a photographer. Um, and my photographer is Lindsay Michelle in Boston, and she is amazing. Um, but I knew her way before because of what I do.

I knew her way before our wedding and she knows me well. So she was like, I need you to get a personal floral because I need you to have something in your hand. I need you to have a hand accessory. You’re gonna thank me later because she knows me. She knows I’m gonna want the whole look, right. Mm-hmm. I’m gonna want my whole look to be done.

And I was like, you’re right. I’m gonna want not a flo, a personal floral, I’m gonna want a purse. And so I got a purse with flowers in it. Oh, cute. Yeah. But we didn’t get any florals. And the other things that we did differently is. We did it in our apartment.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm.

Kati Kons: We walked in together, no bridal party, uh, ceremony.

And then

we didn’t do like a, a dance situation. We just went to dinner afterwards. I love that. Yeah. It was pretty like chill and laid back. It was really nice.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Yeah. I love when you go in like on the same page, knowing what you want. ’cause I think so many times couples get caught up with like, unsolicited advice coming in of like, you need this, do this.

And then you end up having this day where you don’t even enjoy it ’cause you’re like, I’m doing this for everybody else. Not yes. For us.

Kati Kons: And I think that’s tremendously challenging, but also I am, I said this to my partner, I don’t know if you can, uh uh. Like, if you relate to this, but I’m so lucky that I didn’t have a childhood dream of a wedding because I didn’t have to deal with any expectation around what I thought my wedding would look like.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm.

Kati Kons: Uh, and I just feel as if a lot of people, especially a lot of young women, grow up with a dream of what their wedding would look like and like when you get to be in adulthood in terms of like finances and in terms of just like where you are in life and execution and, and so many different things.

Mm-hmm. It just like can turn out so different and I just, like, sometimes it’s a good thing and sometimes it’s not. And like, I’m just so glad I didn’t have any expectation because I had the best f*cking day in the world, you know? I love that. Yeah. And so

Christa Innis: I just,

Kati Kons: I’m so glad I

Christa Innis: had no expectations. That’s such like good advice too.

And I’m so glad you said that because a lot of people probably don’t know this. ’cause I don’t even know if I’ve said it before, but, and then I find it surprising ’cause I have a wedding podcast or mostly like wedding content. But I was never the girl that was like, I can’t wait to get, be a bride. I can’t wait to have my wedding.

I never visualized it either. And I don’t think it was until like, being in a bunch of weddings and then like, I met my husband and like, you know, at that time we, like, we were engaged for like a hundred years. So like, we were like, kind of like knew what things we wanted and didn’t want. And so I feel like, yeah, it was just like a way different, I didn’t want the big ballroom.

Mm-hmm. I didn’t want the big Cinderella dress. I, that just wasn’t my thing. Yeah. And my parents were also ones to, they never like pressured and were like, oh, when you get married, when you do this, like, they were just never like that. And I, I’m glad because I wasn’t like, oh, I’m gonna be a princess on my day.

And I was just, I just. Never had that vision. And I remember even my makeup artist being like, you’re like the most relaxed bride I’ve ever done makeup for. And I was like, well, I figure at this point everything’s done. If something goes wrong, like we’re all here, like, yeah, have a good time. Like what am I to worry about?

Kati Kons: We always wanted, we always wanted was like we, we didn’t want the like, big event situation, but we did want is like a smaller micro wedding, like around 50 people or less. Um, but we wanted to have everyone there for like a weekend, like wherever we did, just so like we had people there for longer. So it was like a longer experience, but like a smaller amount of people so that I wasn’t like super.

Overwhelming, but that we had more time to spend so that we could like, you know, um, have a lot more experience, which I feel like is now becoming more of a thing with like, welcome parties and brunch afterwards and like, which I totally get because I think it’s so fun to spend a whole weekend with your people.

Especially, it’s like the one time everyone’s in town for you, it’s like mm-hmm. You might as well make it worth it, you know?

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Kati Kons: People are

Christa Innis: flying in or driving in, like have like different things set up or like plan to like hang out. I think

Kati Kons: it’s so worth it. I, and I think like a week long might be a little extra, but I’m like, at least making it a weekend I feel like would be so fun.

Christa Innis: Yeah,

Kati Kons: it works fun, at least for us, so

Christa Innis: yeah. I love that. Okay, let’s get into, because I know we’re kind of, we’re running on our A DH ADHD time in a longer time. No. Um, okay. Let’s get, if you don’t, I hope you

Kati Kons: don’t have a, I hope you don’t have a 6:00 PM Um, no, I don’t. Okay, good. Okay. I’m good. We’re, we’re good?

We’re good. Let’s go.

Christa Innis: Just have my family where they’re fine. Okay. Rapid fire. This is just pick one or the other, whether it’s your own, I don’t know, as a, I don’t know why I’m like introducing it. Just rapid fire. Let’s just pick one. Okay. Okay. Classic ballroom wedding or outdoor garden party.

Kati Kons: Outdoor garden party.

Christa Innis: Minimalist. Chic or bold and colorful.

Kati Kons: Bold and colorful.

Christa Innis: Veil or no veil?

Kati Kons: No veil.

Christa Innis: Custom gown or off the rack.

Kati Kons: Oh sh*t.

Is this for me or a client? Either, I mean,

Christa Innis: just in general, I guess, custom gown, uh, one photographer or photography and video package, one photographer first look photos or traditional aisle reveal. First look match your wedding style or your to your home aesthetic. Yes or no? Yes. Bridesmaids. Same dress.

Different dress or totally mismatched. Mismatched statement. Shoes or statement earrings.

Kati Kons: Statement, shoes.

Christa Innis: And then what’s one style trend that you wish couples would leave behind? Like, or just, or just any trend. You’re just like sick of seeing. Oh. Um, not to put you

Kati Kons: on the spot,

I know this one’s supposed to be rapid fire and I feel like I’m blanking now. It’s okay if you don’t have one too. I feel like I don’t, which is pretty wild, but I definitely do. I’m just blanking.

Christa Innis: No, no, it’s all good. If I think

Kati Kons: about it later, we’ll bring it up.

Christa Innis: Yeah, yeah. Okay. Awesome. Um, I think, well, I feel like we talked a lot of that about the wedding hot takes as we were kind of just talking.

What does Steven earrings at weddings?

Kati Kons: I’m still, I think that’s why I am blocked is because I am literally no one wears statement earrings at weddings.

Christa Innis: Okay. This might be a dumb question. What is a statement earring? Just like a big, bold earring. Mm-hmm. Like as, like,

Kati Kons: I’m just thinking of like a statement necklace where they’re just like, chunky.

What’s a statement? Yeah. But like statement earing is like, is like Yeah. Really wild and big and people don’t really do that at weddings. Yeah. I,

I don’t know. It’s true. People don’t really wear necklaces at all at weddings anymore, though.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I wear like the mo I wore like the most simple, I I wore my mom’s. They do.

Kati Kons: It’s like a, it’s a very simple thing. Yeah.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Because it’s like you’re wearing this like beautiful gown or whatever you’re wearing that you want most, most of the attention on.

Kati Kons: What’s the style thing that people should be, should leave it home. I feel like the answer is so many things, honestly.

Christa Innis: You said no veil quickly. Do you think veils are outdated?

Kati Kons: Well, like j in like the theory of it? Yeah, but like, oh yeah. Like, yeah, just like a garter, like in theory. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Like it’s disgusting in theory, but it’s like, I mean, it’s like cute. I mean, like, you should not have, if you, even if you have a garter, you shouldn’t do a garter toss. Like that’s disgusting. You know what I mean? But like a garter’s kind of cutie if you have the right dress.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I just did one for a photo.

I don’t even know if they took a photo of it now. They might have just done it with like everything. Yeah. And veil was one thing. I was like, I’m not doing a veil. I don’t wanna a veil. But then I ended up up finding one for like down the aisle. I did not cover my face or anything. Yeah.

Kati Kons: But I was just like, it’s a very, very religious thing.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm.

Kati Kons: And like, that’s, that’s fine. I just feel like if you’re gonna honor that tradition, honor that tradition. But if you’re like just wearing one to wear one, I just feel like we need to separate, I feel like we need to honor the tradition if we’re gonna wear a veil. I feel like we need to not be so nonchalant about wearing veils,

Christa Innis: in my opinion.

Kati Kons: Okay. Um, but I feel like there, I feel like I do have a very hot take about. Styles for weddings. Leave the white at home maybe. Um, I literally wore white to my wedding. Um, I don’t know.

Christa Innis: You Oh, like, you think like No. What? No. White at weddings.

Kati Kons: I just feel like it’s kind of, I would love to step away from it.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm.

Kati Kons: Um, I don’t hate it. I just would love to step away from it. Do you ever

Christa Innis: consider wearing another color at your wedding?

Kati Kons: Yeah. Yeah. I just didn’t because, um, I didn’t wanna be too different from my partner and she wanted to, so I was like, I’m not gonna like, fight too much about it. Yeah. And I know that she, like, I wanted her to be super comfortable so I wasn’t gonna like, make it a thing, you know?

Right. I get that.

Christa Innis: Yeah. No, I’ve seen gorgeous black wedding dresses, never in person. I’ve just seen them on weddings and I was like, I love the look of that.

Kati Kons: Oh yeah. Well, we were both open to wearing either black or white, but. We found her dress that was in white first, and so we were like, okay, we’ll do that.

Christa Innis: Go along with the theme. I love it. Yeah. All right. Let’s get into this week’s wedding submission. So people send me these stories. I have not read it yet, so I don’t know what’s gonna happen and We’ll, please, I just

Why Dress Codes Need a Makeover

Kati Kons: thought of my thing. Can I tell you everything?

Christa Innis: Oh, yeah, please do.

Kati Kons: This is actually a long more of a long answer.

Um, this is not a rapid fire answer, and that’s probably why I didn’t think of it right away. Um, I have a hot take though in terms of a style thing that, okay. I leave at home. Um, and it’s just that I think formal attire, my definition of formal attire differs from the average person. Mm-hmm. But specifically at weddings.

Christa Innis: Okay.

Kati Kons: Uh, in that, like our wedding, our like dress codes at wedding, be it the guest dress code or just like what we were to, weddings in general needs to stay at home in general. Like we need to, those need to go die, um, because like they need to go to jail, like whatever, because they are so obnoxious and limiting for queer people specifically, or like any type of non-traditional person trying to feel themselves because like, how are you trying, how are you going to express yourself in a way that is outside of the social norm?

If you’re like not fitting into traditional standards of formal attire, if it’s not like a suit or a dress, right? Because if you think about it this way, people who don’t fit into the standard norms of traditional attire, suit or dress, if you’re a celebrity, all you do is wear something super chic, high-end fashion.

Maybe it’s a t-shirt and shorts, but it’s Balenciaga, and you still walk the runway and you still look chic as f*ck, and you’re still slaying. And that’s great because your name is Billie Eilish and it’s branded and it’s really cool, you know? Mm-hmm. And like, that’s awesome. But why do, why can you do that on the red carpet and not at a wedding?

Christa Innis: Hmm. Why

Kati Kons: are our, like, why is the decorum for a red carpet moment so different than the decorum at someone’s wedding? And I understand that the marketing moment is a little bit different than someone else’s wedding, but why is the formality of a red carpet event, which should be the most formal event. So different than the decorum of someone’s wedding, which should be your average Joe’s most formal event in your lifetime.

Right? So why does a celebrity’s red carpet like event have a different definition for formal than our, our average person’s definition Of formal? Because for queer people being something other than suit and dress is not acceptable. In our definitions of formal attire, there is no like, I’m gonna wear something outside of those norms that fits into formal, semi-formal black tie.

There’s nothing that fits into that. Experimenting into, into different things doesn’t fit into those categories because it’s not socially acceptable. Socially acceptable is what fits into those categories. Mm-hmm. And like there’s no way to like experiment with new things with those dress codes. It just doesn’t work.

Yeah. And so I’m like, my whole like goal, my purpose is to like try to change the definition to like align more with like the red carpet definition where like if you’re mo most comfortable in a t-shirt and shorts, like great, let’s f*cking elevate that. So it’s a red carpet t-shirt and shorts, you know what I mean?

Mm-hmm. Like, let’s get you a t-shirt. I know a lot of high-end t-shirt and shorts and it’ll look high-end as well. It’s not like it’s gonna look like Adam Sandler, like it’ll look high-end, you know what I mean? Like, uh. It’s like there are existing really, really nice and really, really cool embellishments on t-shirts and shorts.

So it’s like, we’ll get you there. But like, why isn’t that acceptable for a wedding? It wouldn’t be today, you know?

Christa Innis: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ve never, so I’ve never been to a wedding where it’s like very specific, like, wear this. But I’ve seen more and more people do it where they’re like, only wear these three colors, or only wear this style of clothing.

And yeah, that’s, I feel like that’s, it’s a bit much sometimes like as the, like we’re talking to the planner, as the planner in me, sometimes I’m like, okay, here’s the vibe we’re going for. ’cause have you ever gone like invited to something and you’re like. What’s the, like, where are we getting married at?

What’s the style? Mm-hmm. Like, and you’re like, do I wear a formal dress? Do I wear a cocktail style dress? Am I wearing my jumpsuit? You know, that kind of thing. So I like some guidelines, but yeah, you’re, you make a really good point. No, direction is totally helpful.

Kati Kons: Mm-hmm. Like we talked about that with the wedding party.

It’s definitely true for the guests as well because like, I dunno, you don’t wanna, you don’t wanna be like the one that’s sticking out Yeah. At someone else’s wedding. Um, but like, you also, as a queer person, especially going to like a hetero wedding as a queer person, you don’t wanna stick out too much and like, you wanna also be yourself at the same time.

Christa Innis: Hmm. It’s

Kati Kons: like a really hard balance. Um, and like, I don’t know, I just feel like a lot of queer people have a hard time with formal attire and like weddings are just like one of the hardest places to be, I think. Um. Mm-hmm. Yeah, because like a lot of the options for like androgynous attire, I think are too adventurous for like a cape or like a, a scarf around your neck I feel like would be too flamboyant.

Um, because like if I said gender neutral, you, like, most people would think masculine, right? Yeah, that’s true. Um, ’cause like gender neutral in my head means like gender fluid or androgynous or something that’s like a mix of both. Um, but like that would mean it has to be somewhat feminine. Right? And most people would think it, it means like a suit, like masculine, something that’s like at least neutral and masculine.

So it’s acceptable to everyone, you know?

Christa Innis: I never thought about that. You’re right. Yeah. Yeah. Gender neutral. And so it’s like more masculine.

Kati Kons: Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Christa Innis: And

Kati Kons: so it’s like. It’s really challenging to find something that is actually androgynous or like gender neutral or something that’s like acceptable for people to feel comfortable in, because that is oftentimes not the expectation of everyone else.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Kati Kons: Yeah. It’s really hard. Um, but the only reason I say that is because I feel like there’s a lot of, like people whose expectations about formal attire are very different from like, um, queer people whose expectations for formal attire are like very different. Yeah. I just feel like we need to all dress ourselves in a way that makes us happy and walk away and that’s it.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm.

Kati Kons: I feel like, like we, somebody said to me once on TikTok, somebody said to me once on TikTok, I posted a video, I. They said what looks like non-traditional formula attire to you for someone’s wedding. And I posted a bunch of pictures that were of the wedding, the designer that designed my wedding attire and I love her.

Her name is Ophelia. She’s great. One of the pictures was of like a sheer silk organ organza hoodie, and it was a mini dress, a hoodie, mini dress. It was gorgeous. And it was like, like again, like silk organ organza, oversized hoodie. Like really cool. And they were like draw or uh, I’m sorry, draw strings.

Draw strings. Like on a hoodie.

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Kati Kons: Are not, have no place in formal at tire. Why is that there? And I was like. Like you’re really telling me something like silk organza has no like place in formal attire. Like you have no idea what you’re talking about. You know what I mean? Right. This person like literally has no idea what they’re talking about, but like we are so twisted in what we think formal attire means and our like understanding of like suit and dress is all rooted in like white supremacy and patriarchy.

It’s so terrible. So it’s like something we really need to shift our understanding into.

Christa Innis: Mm,

Kati Kons: sorry. That was a, that was a rant, but it felt like that needed to be said.

Christa Innis: No, I loved it. I love, I love the hot takes. I love, ’cause I feel like it opens up good discussion for, you know, people listening too to be like, wait, I never thought about it that way.

Or, you know, I think you’re, I think you’re right about, you know, the weddings in general or events in general put a lot of pressure on people to fit a certain mold and, and there’s like expectations of like how to look, how to dress. And, um, and I feel like as a, you know, as a queer stylist, you’re sharing so much more from your perspective and what you see personally, and I think that brings a whole new, uh, whole new take on it.

No, I, I’m, I appreciate, I see.

Kati Kons: I’ll say one more thing about queer weddings versus hetero weddings. You see, you know, when people try to, uh, theme their weddings sometimes mm-hmm. Or themes or, oh, theme Yes. Dress codes

Christa Innis: mm-hmm. Or

Kati Kons: stuff like that. Um, the theme upstage the bride, um, more often you see that at queer weddings.

I don’t know why.

Christa Innis: Mm. That’s interesting. Yeah. I actually saw like a viral post about upstage the bride, and I loved it. And that was the first time I had seen it.

Kati Kons: I like, love that so much.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Do you think it like. I think about that. Yeah. I wonder if it’s like, it runs in because it’s like the traditional, like, you know, like hetero wedding, it’s like the traditional, like bride is the queen star of the

Kati Kons: show.

I don’t know. We talked about our dress code being like Met Gala themed for a long time. Uh, just so that everyone popped the f*ck off. Um, ’cause we wanted something like that. Uh, and then we realized we didn’t want people spending a ton of money, uh, just on the retirement. Yeah. Um, so we did do that. But, um, I don’t know.

I don’t know. I don’t know what it is, but I don’t know what it is about like the traditional culture that like does that, but it’s interesting.

Christa Innis: Yeah, because I’ve even heard people say like, don’t wear, oh, like. Bright red dress to my wedding dress. Yes. Where is this and where does that come from? I don’t know.

And see, I’m someone where I’m like, I don’t care What? I didn’t care what people wore in my wedding. One of my closest friends wore a bright, like a hot pink dress and looked amazing on her. I had five people wear hot pink to my wedding. Yes. It was like, good,

Kati Kons: thank

Christa Innis: you. You look great. Yeah. Someone could have showed up at White.

White in my wedding too, and I would not have cared. I’m not that. My

Kati Kons: sister had like a white cardigan and she was like, I didn’t wanna outshine you. And I said, honey, no one’s outshining me today. I was like, are you kidding? Not worried. Are you kidding? And she was like, she was like, did you really just say that?

And I was like, do you really think you’re outshining me today?

Whose Day Is It Anyway?

Christa Innis: I feel like I’m not, I’m not worried in the slightest. Yeah. Yeah. I just feel like it’s like let people be themselves. I mean. I don’t know. I was not the least of my concerns of what people were wearing to my wedding. Yeah. I didn’t really care.

Okay. Let’s get into this story thing. Yeah. We’ll just react as it as we read it. Um, or I’ll just, we’ll just kind of stop and share our thoughts. Okay. Here we go. My older brother got engaged six months after I did, which annoyed my mother a bit. She would have preferred my wedding to happen first, but it didn’t bother me.

I was close to my brother and happy for him. He’d only been dating his girlfriend for a short time compared to me and my now husband who’d been together for years. My brother said, wait,

Kati Kons: wait, stop.

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Kati Kons: He got engaged six months after she got engaged, or six months after she got married, I’m

Christa Innis: guessing, after she got engaged.

Kati Kons: Okay. So what’s the problem? Because the mom got upset.

Christa Innis: I think it’s like the mom thing of like, yeah. I get so many stories sent to me where parents or siblings get mad if like they’re not engaged or married first.

Kati Kons: That’s weird.

Christa Innis: It’s weird. And it’s like this rivalry or like sister-in-laws if like the younger one gets engaged first or married.

Yeah. There’s like so many stories like that. So like she doesn’t care, but it’s like the mom seems like annoyed by it.

Kati Kons: Okay. Okay.

Christa Innis: Weird. Okay. Sorry. Continue. Yeah. No, you’re good. Um, my brother set his wedding date for exactly one year after mine. I was pregnant at at his wedding due just a few weeks after the big day.

It was very warm day, which isn’t ideal when you’re heavily pregnant. My sister-in-law had booked their wedding in a local church right after a large parish event. The car park parking lot was packed when we arrived. And we are, we were nearly reversed into, oh my gosh, my reading skills. Here we go. Let’s try this again.

The car parking lot was packed when we arrived and we were nearly reversing into, oh my gosh, why is this? Just pretend like that didn’t happen. Okay. The car parking lot was packed when we arrived and we were nearly reversed into, on my side of the car. Not a great start. Then the bridal car broke down, so everything started late, which would obviously stress out even the calmest bride.

Before the wedding, my brother asked if we could make it to family photos, which were scheduled in a location that was out of our way, not because the church and the not between the church and the reception. I asked if they could take family photos at the church and do bridal party photos at the other location, but they said no.

So after the ceremony, which was only 10 minutes from my house, we went home so I could briefly rest and eat by that stage. I was very warm and very tired having been up early. Then my sister calls in a panic asking where we were saying that the photos were starting and we needed to hurry. We were 25 minutes away from the photo location.

Everything was running late due to the ceremony’s delay. We rushed there wondering why they couldn’t take photos. In the meantime, they were waiting on the bride’s, two brothers who were notoriously late. When we finally got to the wedding, uh, to take photos, my husband wasn’t the main, wasn’t in the main sibling shot, as in it was just my brother and his siblings.

After that, the bride approached my husband and complained that we were late saying it wouldn’t have happened at our wedding. I could see the anger in my husband’s face, but I didn’t know what was wrong until I, he told me later I was livid. It sounds like a lot of like, again, like the communication and just like people.

Wanting it their own way. Uh, for the rest of the day. I kept my distance from them and honestly, it ruined the day for the side of the family. For comparison, my own ceremony had been just five minutes from where we took family photos and the reception was only 20 minutes away. All minimal travel and on the same route.

Also, no one at my family was heavily pregnant. Her own sister was,

you can’t help that girl. I’m sorry. Uh, sorry. Can’t I, people get, um, or have gotten on me before when I like critique the story a little bit, but it sounds like she’s wanting to be catered to.

Kati Kons: A little bit, uh, a little bit. If,

Christa Innis: if they found a setting they really like for photos on their wedding day, they should be able to have it.

Kati Kons: Uh, and yes, her comparing the, um, the route being only five minutes away, like, I don’t know, we literally walked a mile from our apartment to the national Mall to go like, get food. And that’s like a 20 minute walk. Like, and we just did that for Fonzie.

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Kati Kons: Like it’s, I dunno. And it was, it was cool and it was fine.

If it was 30 minute walk, we probably still would’ve done it. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Like, here’s the thing, like I, it sounds like a lot of people like were late and maybe, maybe they also got yelled at, you don’t know, right. Maybe you shouldn’t have gotten yelled at, but.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I mean, yeah, I’m sure. I mean, I’ve, I wasn’t maid of honor pregnant at a wedding.

I don’t, I wasn’t, I wouldn’t say heavily. I was like, well, I was, I was seven months, so I was pretty big. But like, I wouldn’t never have expected them to cater things to me, and I, I

Kati Kons: didn’t, yeah, that part of the story was kind of wild when she was like, I called to see if they could do photos at a different location.

Yeah. I was like, changed. I, I literally, I was like, was I supposed to react to that? ’cause I was like,

Christa Innis: I know. I was like waiting for the punchline. And I’m like, I’m not trying to come out hard on this ride, but like. Like we, the wedding I was in was like in December, we’re talking Chica, like this was downtown Chicago.

Cold. Yeah, cold. We’re outside. I’m not gonna be like, you know what? I’m pregnant. I’d rather not be outside right now. ’cause No, you just skip the photos. You’re not in ’em If you just skip it, just skip it. Yeah. It’s not, not, you’re just not

Kati Kons: in ’em. And like you say, sorry, I just can’t do it today. I’m pregnant as f*ck.

And like you walk away and like they do their thing and you do yours and that kind of sucks. But it is what it is. But you know.

Christa Innis: Yeah. We can’t, we can’t have our own expectations for other people’s weddings.

Kati Kons: No, no, no, no. That’s where you

Christa Innis: start getting irritated because it’s like. Let them have their day.

If you don’t agree with it, you don’t have to be a part of certain

Kati Kons: No. And I think that conversation probably should have happened before even she asked, can you move the pictures? Because if the bride was like, I’m so heartbroken that you couldn’t be here, let’s move the photos for you. That should have been a ball in her court decision rather than a I’m gonna ask you to move them,

Christa Innis: you know?

Yeah, a hundred percent. Yeah. Oh my

Kati Kons: God.

Christa Innis: Oh my gosh. Okay, so this says her own sister was heavily pregnant at her wedding too, so she should have understood, but it doesn’t seem like there’s a problem with the sister.

Kati Kons: I thought she said no one was heavily pregnant at her wedding,

Christa Innis: um, at her own wedding. So this is at her brother’s wedding.

Kati Kons: Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, yeah. Yeah.

Christa Innis: And she said, so no one was pregnant at her wedding.

Kati Kons: Okay.

Christa Innis: But at this wedding, she’s pregnant as well as the bride sister. She couldn’t stand.

Um, a few days later when my brother and his now wife stopped by my mother’s house, she said to me when my brother was out of earshot that she should have had a word with me about everything. My mom shut that down and said she absolutely would not say anything to upset me, especially just weeks before I was due to give birth.

I mean, saying you’re gonna have a word with someone sounds very like, like, I don’t know, like older, like I’m gonna have a word with you. I don’t know. That sounds like someone trying to like, put you down. Like I feel like they maybe should communicate, but to say you’re gonna have a word with someone, I don’t know.

Um, I’d gone outta my way. Oh see, I’m already reading like, okay, this bride just want, or not bride. The sister wants to complain and I hate that it’s coming from the person that sent the story. ’cause it’s normally not. This way, but I feel like she feels like she was owed something. It says I’d gone out of my way to attend her bachelorette party, even though her own sister who was pregnant didn’t feel up to it.

So like she feel like, feels like she deserves a pat on the back, but I’m like, you didn’t have to go if you feel like she owed you. Um, and I was further along than she was the whole situation. Yeah. That

Kati Kons: doesn’t, yeah, girl, she could have been having like health issues with her pregnancy, right? Like you don’t know.

Christa Innis: Yeah. And it’s not like, well I did this for you, so you should move your photo shoot. That’s the thing

Kati Kons: is love is not transactional. Yes, yes.

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Kati Kons: And if it feels transactional, then don’t go

Christa Innis: right. I feel like we see that so many times, like especially with weddings. Yeah. People think if I do this for you, then you owe me.

It’s like the parents paying for the wedding, you know, you hear so many, they’re like, well, I’m paying for it so I can invite my college friend who I, you’ve never met. It’s like,

Kati Kons: yeah, it’s how it works. I will actually, I’ll say a hot take on here. One of my best friends from high school, um, didn’t come to my wedding.

Um, she moved to Italy, uh, like five or six months ago. Okay. Um, to be with her fiance who like lives there. Um, and so he’s like from there and she just like couldn’t, she started a new job recently and she just like couldn’t make it back for the wedding. Like, I mean, very reasonable. Yeah. Um, and is also planning her wedding for September and like she liked to, didn’t confront me or tell me that she couldn’t make it.

She just like, a couple days before the wedding was like, I’m so sorry, I can’t come. And I was like, I wish you would’ve told me sooner.

Christa Innis: Oh yeah. And

Kati Kons: I was like, that sucks. ’cause I just like didn’t know. And I asked her a few times and she just like wouldn’t respond. And I was like, I wish she wouldn’t have ghosted me about it.

Yes. But like, that’s the problem is, and now I’m like, expected to go to her wedding in Spain in the fall. Um, but I’m gonna go, and I thought about this for so long because I was like, oh, I’m kind of upset that she did that. But I’m also like, she probably just like, feels bad and didn’t know how to handle it.

And like, like I just said, it’s not about transactional. Like, I’m not just not gonna go because she just like couldn’t come to mind.

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Kati Kons: And she would’ve, but she could’ve, you know?

Christa Innis: Right. You’re such a good friend. No, I feel like, no, that’s. That’s really hard to pull yourself out of and be like, okay, would I not go because she did this?

Or, you know, because this happened, or it feels

Kati Kons: so sh*tty of me, right. To just not go to her wedding, you know? Yeah. That feels like so dumb. And I feel like, I don’t know, I feel so

Christa Innis: good. I, I catch that so many times with people and I think we do it like, and I’ve done it too, being like, oh, they didn’t come to this.

And it’s like, well wait, it’s not, they didn’t come to this, so I go to that or don’t go to that. It’s kind. I go to it and do I want to go to it? Like, yeah. And I

Kati Kons: do wanna go. Yeah. I’m like, even if she couldn’t be here, even if she could have handled it better, I’m like, she still like my friend, I still love her.

I like flew to Italy and I picked out her f*cking wedding dress. I wanna be there. I wanna see it on her. You know?

Christa Innis: Oh, that’s amazing.

Kati Kons: Yeah. So I’m like, that was kind of weird. And I forgive her and I haven’t talked to her. She actually sent me a gift. I should open it. But anyways.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Um, anyways, yeah. But RSVPs are important.

Like I, I. Hate

Kati Kons: response. I hate, yeah. Rss. VP people. Yes.

Christa Innis: I hate when like, you have to reach out to people and be like, Hey, I haven’t heard from you. Or when people give you a maybe or like, they’re just like, we, we had, we had that, we didn’t have to deal with it too much. But I’ve heard of that. That happens all the time where people just, it slips their mind or they’re like, oh, maybe like, I’ll get off work.

Or, you know, little things like that where they just kinda like keep you on on a tentative, I guess.

Kati Kons: Yeah.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Um, it says the whole thing caused friction between me and my brother. And we had always gotten along well, honestly, I think she was just, oh, just jealous that we got married first and that I was pregnant at her wedding as if I was stealing her limelight.

I don’t, I hate that. I just, girl, I don’t

Kati Kons: know if that’s the case.

Christa Innis: I

Kati Kons: know. That makes me so

Christa Innis: sad. I know. ’cause I normally. I wouldn’t say side. I don’t wanna, I don’t pick sides, it’s just when I read it, I just respond, right? Mm-hmm. I’d say most of the time when whoever sends it to me, like they witness whatever happens, and I’m like, oh my gosh, that’s terrible.

This is the first time. I’m like, no, I think you’re reading. And is

Kati Kons: this really the first time that this has happened to you?

Christa Innis: Like this bad? I would say yeah. There’s been a few times, I shouldn’t say bad, but there’s been a few times, like I’ve done like YouTube readings of stories. Yeah. I like say like, I come hard on the bride a little bit, and I’m like, Ooh, but this didn’t happen.

Or you assumed that she was doing this. And the people in the comments are like, you’re coming up on this, coming hard on this bride. I’m like, well, I’m just trying to be levelheaded

Kati Kons: if I can. No, it, it felt, I don’t know. Changing the, changing the location of the pictures was wild to me because like, can you imagine if you were the planner?

Yeah. I’m expecting that they didn’t have a planner. The fact that she called to ask to move, I, they probably didn’t have a planner. Right. Right. ’cause can you imagine the planner’s f*cking face when she says your sister wants to move the location?

Christa Innis: Yeah. Oh my God, she’s pregnant. Like, what? What? Um, that’s bonkers to me.

That is wild. I would never ask a bride to change a location no matter who I want. Change the logistics of your day, of your whole wedding day. And we’re talking 20 minutes. It’s not like an hour away. No, no, no. And even so, you don’t have to go. I know, like for one of my friend’s weddings, we, downtown Chicago, we took buses all around the city and we just took Yeah.

Pictures in different places. And that was like a, and I think, I wanna say she had a couple pregnant bridesmaids and mm-hmm. There was food and drink on the bus. Like, we were fine. She took care of us. I would never be like, Hey, you know what, can you, that’s wild because remember everyone listening, like you can say no to bachelorette party.

You can say no to being in a wedding. They don’t have to cater to you.

Kati Kons: I hate,

Christa Innis: I

Kati Kons: hate to, the whole bachelorette thing also gets me because I’m like, you could have said no. Yeah. I went and she didn’t. Is wild to me.

Christa Innis: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Oh my gosh.

Kati Kons: I feel bad for this girly though. I know. I feel bad because it, I just, uh, I want, I want her to just be like.

Christa Innis: I feel like there must have been some kind of animosity before, because if this all happened and then she’s getting the vibe that like, oh, she’s doing these things and purposely,

Kati Kons: I feel like maybe she’s bad at telling stories and we missed some key detail about this in that there’s like some childhood trauma or something that we’re missing because I feel like there, I don’t know.

I feel like this story is like way too transparently against her for Yeah,

Christa Innis: like what I like, gotta go back and make, make sure I didn’t miss like a first paragraph or something. I, I don’t know. I think it all started when here’s my, okay, here’s my take. And again, I might be reading into it, but it’s, it’s my job here, right?

So when she said, my mom seemed to be bothered by it, but I wasn’t, I think she was bothered by it. So I think like in her mind, this whole thing, she’s like thinking about the whole time like, oh, they’ve only been dating this long. Oh, they’re getting married right after me. And so I think then everything just kind of becomes a, like a silent competition.

Yeah. Oh, that’s how I’m reading it, because like

Kati Kons: Oh, and so yourself. Because, because it’s a competition. She’s like, I went to the bachelor party

Christa Innis: and I did this,

Kati Kons: and I I went to your wedding pregnant, and so you have to change the thing because of me. Yeah.

Christa Innis: And I planned out my schedule like this. But you did it like this and you weren’t thinking about me the pregnant one.

Oh. So that’s how I’m reading

Kati Kons: it. You’re right. Uhhuh. But

Christa Innis: I’m

Kati Kons: sorry. You’re right.

Christa Innis: You’re listening. And, sorry, I’m not trying to come hard on you. Um, so she said, okay, so she said that honestly, I think she was just jealous that we got married first and I was pregnant at her wedding as if I was stealing her limelight.

But how did. How would she make you feel that way? ’cause she wanted you in the wedding, in a part of the photos. So I don’t know. We’d been together much longer and I feel like she took out her frustrations on me because her wedding didn’t go as planned.

Kati Kons: I feel like maybe it’s just the other way around. I feel like sometimes people, um, I don’t know.

I feel like I’ve seen that sometimes where people who have been together for a long time and then people get married who have not known each other, who have not known each other for very long, get married and there’s like a weird competition between those two types of relationships because they’re like, oh, well you haven’t been together for very long.

Mm-hmm. You know what I mean? And they’re like, well, you don’t have to have known each other for very long. You know what

Christa Innis: I mean? Yes. They try to like belittle it. Yes. Yeah. I remember. Okay. So like I was saying earlier, like my husband and I have, we were engaged for. No, not engaged for, we were together for six years before we got engaged.

Just ’cause like, I never wanted to be like a super young married, we were, I was 23 when we got together. So anyways, that’s besides the point. But like couples that like met after us or started dating after us, but got married before us would make comments like, oh, like, like married comments. Like, they’d be like, oh, when you’re married you’ll get it.

And I’m like, we already live together. I’ve like, what do you mean? Like, oh, just something’s magically gonna happen when we get married. And I’m like, oh, now I understand. Like there was just so many comments of like almost belittling our relationship because we weren’t legally married. That’s so weird.

That’s so weird. Yeah, it happened more times I could count, I would just learn to just like shut my mouth because I was just like, that’s so

Kati Kons: weird.

Christa Innis: Because

Kati Kons: people are always like, oh, like do you feel different now that you got married? And I was like, no. I mean, we’ve lived together for how many years? Like, we literally, our life goes on and nothing changes the f*ck.

Christa Innis: You’re just like solidifying for yourself. Like Yeah, like

Kati Kons: we, we just decided to have a party for fun. I don’t know.

Christa Innis: Exactly. Yeah. I feel like once you like already like live together and like have your stuff all in a place together, it doesn’t really change much. No. But legally we get to save money on taxes, so that is,

Kati Kons: that is a plus.

Honestly, that’s so rude of the legal system. Like why sh*t on singles like that? It’s crazy. This, but they literally have to support themselves with one person’s income. That is so hard nowadays. And not only that, you’re gonna deprive them of tax benefits.

Christa Innis: I, yeah, it blows my mind. Speaking of crazy wedding stories that someone sent me about like.

Married versus like long-term partner. This girl sent me a story and she’s like, she’s a young adult, so she’s probably in her twenties, right. She said an aunt of hers got married and said, only married couples. She goes, my parents never got married, never got legally married, so they’ve been together 30, 40 years.

Right. My math might be off, but she’s like, my mom wasn’t invited because they’re not legally married. I thought, wait, they’re inviting the dad, they’re inviting his kids, but not the wife, or not the long-term partner because they’re not legally married. I thought, what a weird wedding rule.

Kati Kons: Am I lost?

What do you mean they’re not inviting the wi, they’re not inviting the wife. She’s, well, she’s not technically a wife.

Christa Innis: Right, right, right. But the Like the wife figure. The wife figure, yeah.

Kati Kons: Sot a wedding. It was like a wedding. It was like a fake wedding per se. Without the wife figure.

Christa Innis: Yeah. It was her dad’s sister.

So her aunt, and she was like, yeah, my mom wasn’t invited. ’cause they’re, it was married, couple couples only. Oh my God. When everyone’s document what? Oh, that’s great. I’m like, that blows my mind. Anyways, there’s one last paragraph here. Okay.

Kati Kons: Oh, here we go.

Christa Innis: I didn’t say much about it afterwards, but when my brother asked what she had said to my husband, it really stuck with me.

For years, the photographer didn’t want to deviate from the list of planned shots, but surely a professional. Okay, wait. So he said the photographer didn’t wanna deviate from his list of planned shots, which I agree with, but surely a professional could have worked around people being late. Plenty of other photos could have been taken while they waited.

I had to drive 30 extra minutes outta my way to the reception just to be in three photos, photos that could have been easily taken at the ceremony.

Kati Kons: I really tried to give her the benefit of the doubt.

Christa Innis: I’m trying, I really tried. This is, this isn’t, I hate to say this, but this is entitled, this is really entitled, Uhhuh. Oh, that sucks. But maybe this is a wake up call. I mean, I’m no therapist. I, I’m just literally just reading a story, reading a story. So maybe I’m understanding wrong.

If you’re listening and you’ve got more context, send it my way.

Kati Kons: Yeah. Please, please send a response. Yes, chime in. But yeah,

Christa Innis: that’s the lesson is, uh, if you are a part of a wedding, I mean, you can say no.

Kati Kons: Also, let’s, let’s also, another thing to take from that is get a planner. Because your photographer shouldn’t be your planner.

Christa Innis: Yeah. 100%.

Kati Kons: We hate that for planners or for photographers. That’s really rude. But, um, it like happens to a lot of photographers that they have to like, take over as planners when you don’t have one or a day of coordinator or something. But yeah.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I got that vibe from my, my photographer literally was the best ever.

She had a full on timeline. Mm-hmm. And I talked to other brides, they’re like. They’re like, I don’t have one from my photographer. I was like, maybe mine’s like used to like people not having planners or something. Mm-hmm. Little does she know I’m very anal. I think

Kati Kons: that’s what the photographer for my sister’s wedding was like.

’cause she had everything planned out. Yeah. And I was like, afraid of that. I was like, wow. I was like, my photographer was like just much more type B creative. Okay. And I was like, I don’t, I don’t want her to be like worried about things. And she was still really, and I was like, I just don’t want to be like, I don’t know, worried about things.

I wanted the most laid back wedding you could imagine. And we did have that, so that was good. But

Christa Innis: yeah, when it’s down to the minute, that’s a lot. But I, I’m someone I like to know what’s gonna happen and like, even like something about like, Krista eat was on there. ’cause like if I get distracted by other things, I’ll forget.

So it was like that. Yeah. Ours was

Kati Kons: not down to the minute. We had like a lot of like, time in between things, so for us it was like really, really relaxed. That’s good. Yeah. So it was like, not like most weddings, which is awesome.

Christa Innis: Yeah, I like that.

Kati Kons: Okay. Um, did you get these people’s names or do I that was crazy or No, for this story?

Christa Innis: Um, yeah, they usually send like their,

Kati Kons: yeah, I don’t know if I get their name, but to this anonymous person, I’m so sorry, but please reflect. Yeah. Um, that’s all I have to say. Um, I, and you know what? The best is yet to come for you. Okay. It gets better.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Yeah, I think, I think we’re either missing a lot of the story or I think there needs to like, need to figure out some, uh, there might be some like animosity that’s happening.

And so like every little thing is, it’s not against you, you’re not a victim, is what I am kind of getting from.

Kati Kons: I would just remind yourself that when you’re at someone else’s wedding, the wedding is about them for sure. Mm-hmm. For f*cking sure.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Every time. A hundred

Kati Kons: percent.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I think so many times we hear these stories and we’re like, that’s crazy.

And then like, we don’t see ourselves in them. And so my guess is she probably was like, oh yeah, they’re gonna for sure read this and be like, that’s crazy that she didn’t do that. But it’s like we need to like, like take a step back and be like, wait, you’re asking a bride and groom take out that it’s your brother and his wife?

Would you do this at any wedding you’re a part of?

Kati Kons: Mm-hmm.

Christa Innis: And if you wouldn’t, then don’t do it at your brother’s wedding.

Kati Kons: No. I feel like I couldn’t even ask my sister to do something like that. Same,

Christa Innis: yeah. I’d be

Kati Kons: mortified. I would be mortified. Oh my gosh, I don’t even both because I would, is would I, is it, would it be easier to ask my sister or harder?

I don’t even know.

Christa Innis: Right. Yeah. I don’t know. I couldn’t do it. All right. Well that’s a crazy story. Thanks for reacting with me. Um, well thanks for coming out and hanging out with me today. Yeah, of course. Can you, um, tell everyone again where they can follow you, find all your content and anything exciting that you’re working on right now?

Kati Kons: Yeah. You can find me at Portrait of a Bride on fire on Instagram and TikTok and I am always working on fun things on. Styling things. If you ever need to be styled or if you want to revamp your wardrobe or if you have a wedding coming up that you need to be styled for, let me know.

Christa Innis: Awesome. Well, thank you so much.

Kati Kons: All

Christa Innis: right.

Figure out how to stop this. Oh my gosh. Why am I, oh my God. There we go.

Queer Fashion, Wedding Etiquette and a SIL Showdown with Kati Kons

Blog Transcript:

Bridesmaids, Budgets & Boundaries: Rethinking the Wedding Party

Styling Weddings with Color Theory & Confidence

Bridesmaid Drama & Digital Boundaries

ADHD, Creativity & Queer Wedding Fashion

Reshaping Non-Traditional Wedding Fashion

Queer Wedding Fashion Beyond the Binary

Redefining the Wedding Experience

Why Dress Codes Need a Makeover

Whose Day Is It Anyway?

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