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Thirty Wedding Vendors Walk Under a Bridge

Writer: Courtney Specht
Courtney Specht
6 days ago
8 min read

At Monthly Merriment, Kansas City's wedding industry stepped outside for a smoke break and came back with a different idea of what it wanted. A photographer's account.


The strange thing about wedding vendors is that we spend our working lives inside other people's best day. We know where the bride's mother hid the flask and which groomsman will cry during the toast. We arrive before anyone else and pack out long after the last guest has been poured into a rideshare. For all that intimacy, most of us go home alone, professionally speaking, and stay that way for years.


Which is how, one night in October, more than thirty of us came to be standing under a bridge in Kansas City, some smoking and all of us talking, while the Bad Romance edition of Monthly Merriment carried on at The Rumely without us.


I've been in this business, in one form or another, for most of my adult life. I've done the galas and the open houses and the networking brunches where everyone wears a name tag and nobody says a single true thing. Nothing I've attended came closer to what this industry actually needs than that of a semi-planned smoke break. This is an account of how it happened, and why I think it's the beginning of something.




The invitation


When Heidi Johnson of Cake & Champagne Event Planning asked me to photograph and guest host this month's Monthly Merriment, I said yes before my better judgment could weigh in. I seldom do styled shoots. I seldom do mingling events. That day I did both, back to back (my feet have since filed a formal complaint).


The decision we made early was to invite people the old way. Sure, there was flyer posted to a Facebook group, and an open call promising great vibes and great connections. But I decided I want tbig to write to people individually, by name, people whose work we'd watched and admired, some for a decade and some from across a single reception hall - a few from some likes and follows. The message underneath every note was the same: I see what you're doing, and I want you in the room.


It sounds quaint. It also works. A person who's been asked on purpose arrives differently from one who saw a post. They stand up straighter. They stay longer. They assume, correctly, that the people around them were chosen too.




The hosts


Heidi dreamed up Bad Romance, the theme that ran from the styled shoot we photographed earlier that day straight through the evening, and it deserves a word. The styled shoot is a strange genre. Designed to sell vendors to future couples, most aim for the broadest possible appeal and end up looking like a catalog nobody ordered. Heidi went the other way. Bad Romance had a point of view and the nerve to stay with it, and if you've seen the images we've already shared, you know what I mean. I don't put my name on many styled shoots. I'm glad this one carries it.


Jazmyn and the Monthly Merriment crew did the less glamorous, more essential work of making the evening exist at all. Anyone who has tried to get wedding vendors into one room in the middle of busy season understands that to be a minor act of logistical heroism. Jazmyn has the instinct the best hosts share, which is to make the space and then step back far enough that people can find each other in it. Plenty of event organizers never learn that second half.


The sponsor list read like a manifesto for the kind of wedding I want to see more of. The Rumely Tractor Event Space gave the night a home and a bar. Beyond the florals, sweets, linens and rentals, the evening had a live painter, a tattoo artist, temporary tattoos and calligraphy, custom-label cocktails, a photo booth, balloons, live entertainment and a budtender. Full credits are at the end of this piece, and every one of them earned the mention.


Two of them deserve more than a line in the credits. Jordy of Heavy Petal and Molly Van Roekel, the live painter, carried the production side of this thing with us, and their execution is the reason the images look the way they do. Without them we wouldn't have what we have, visually. Their fingerprints are on every frame.




Under the bridge


Right after Pink Velvet's rendition of blink-182's "All the Small Things," I excused myself for an herbal smoke break (not cigs). A few people came with me. A few more followed them. Before long, by my count, more than thirty wedding professionals had gathered under a bridge in the dark: planners and florists, bakers and stylists, DJs and officiants, a handful of photographers who should have been home culling galleries. Some were smoking. Most weren't. Nobody seemed in a hurry to go back inside.


What happened out there is hard to stage and harder to fake. Nobody pitched. Nobody performed. The talk went where industry talk rarely goes: to the money, to the fear of the slow months, to the couples we keep turning away because we assume no one else in town would understand them.

People who had been meaning to connect for years finally traded numbers under a slab of concrete, traffic rattling overhead, the whole scene smelling like a dispensary parking lot and good decisions. (For the record, the studio remains cannabis-inclusive, cigarette-friendly and judgment-free.)


I've spent years trying to describe the room I wanted this industry to have. It turned out I didn't need to. It assembled itself, outdoors, the moment the formal part of the evening loosened its grip.




The messages


In the week since, my phone has been a steady drip of messages. Texts, DMs, people stopping me in person. The phrasing changes from one to the next. The substance holds: the community needs this, and wants more of it. When is the next one. Who else is coming. Can I bring someone.


There's a version of this industry that runs on scarcity, where every other vendor is a competitor and every referral is a favor you'll be expected to repay. Many of us came up in that version. It's exhausting, and judging by my inbox, a lot of people are finished with it.




What comes next


Which brings me to the part I'm only partly ready to talk about.


For a while now I've been working on something called Weird Wild Wed. It's a vendor community for the No Coast, which is what we call the Midwest when we're feeling affectionate, and it's meant for the people who were standing under that bridge. The planners, bakers, musicians and photographers who've been told their work is "a lot." The vendors whose couples show up in velvet suits, cowboy boots or no shoes at all, and the ones who've been hoping more couples like that would find them. People who believe beige is boring, and that classy can absolutely include a drag show.

It won't be open to everyone, and that's deliberate. There will be an application. There will be standards, with inclusivity at the top of the list in a way you'll be able to see at a glance. There may also be a reason, before long, to start thinking about which creatives in this region deserve recognition for pushing the work somewhere new.


That's as much as I'll say for now. The rest is coming soon, and I'd rather you hear it from me than secondhand.




The real business plan


I've been a full-time entrepreneur for more than twenty years. I've started businesses, grown them, sold them, and buried one in the 2008 crash. The lesson I paid the most for is that the ones that last are held up by the people around them: the planner who trusts you enough to send her favorite couple your way, the baker who texts because she just met someone you'd love. The conversations under that bridge were the business plan, whether or not anyone out there would have called them that.


That conviction is a large part of why I work 1:1 with photographers and creatives on business and brand, in person in Kansas City or virtually from anywhere. Pricing that holds up, a brand that sounds like the person who owns it, and the unglamorous systems that keep everything standing. The first fifteen minutes are a free discovery call, because I'd rather we both know it's a fit before anyone spends a dime.


The other half of the offer is simpler. If you want to meet another vendor, or you want a seat in a room where you don't have to wonder whether you belong, reach out to me. I have a place, a space and a connection to make for you. I keep a list, and there's room on it.



Up and out


Stag & Bird Curated Photo Experiences, Weird Wild Wed and Electric Light Studios are three names moving in one direction, which is up and out of whatever box this town assumed we came in. We are growing, we are going, and there has never been a better time to join the cult.


For anyone who wants a head start, Electric Light Studios is hosting a low-key holiday open house on Tuesday, November 10, from 5:30 to 7:30pm, in Suite 3B at 1317 W. 13th Terrace in the West Bottoms. Come let off some busy-season steam and see our early '90s Christmas set, which bears a strong resemblance to your grandad's wood-paneled basement. It's stairs only, so wear shoes you can climb in, and text me (message me for the number) so I know how many drinks to keep cold.


It's also where the next thing starts. Make of that what you will.

We are the Weirdos, Mister.

-Court


Credits

Monthly Merriment: Bad Romance, evening sponsors



Bad Romance styled shoot



Frequently asked questions

What is Monthly Merriment?

Monthly Merriment is a recurring Kansas City wedding industry gathering where vendors meet, mingle and collaborate. The October 2026 edition carried a Bad Romance theme, was planned and designed by Heidi Johnson of Cake & Champagne Event Planning, and took place at The Rumely Tractor Event Space.

Who photographed the Bad Romance Monthly Merriment and styled shoot?

Stag & Bird Curated Photo Experiences, a Kansas City photography collective for weddings, elopements, boudoir and portraits, photographed both the daytime styled shoot and the evening event as its photography sponsor.

What is Weird Wild Wed?

Weird Wild Wed, the No Coast Alternative Wedding Collective, is a new community for Midwest wedding vendors who serve alternative, untraditional and deeply personal weddings and elopements. Membership will be by application, with inclusivity as a core requirement. Full details are coming soon.

How do I join Weird Wild Wed or get on the list?

Reach out to Court through the Stag & Bird contact page or by text at 816-674-9460. Applications and details will be announced soon.

Does Stag & Bird offer business consulting for photographers and wedding vendors?

Yes. Court offers 1:1 business and brand consulting for photographers and creatives, in person in Kansas City or virtually, starting with a free 15-minute discovery call.

Is Stag & Bird cannabis-inclusive?

Yes. Stag & Bird is cannabis-inclusive, cigarette-friendly and judgment-free. The Bad Romance Monthly Merriment even had a budtender on its sponsor list.

What is Electric Light Studios?

Electric Light Studios is a rental photo studio in Kansas City's West Bottoms at 1317 W. 13th Terrace, Suite 3B. Its early '90s vintage Christmas set is available for photographer rentals and Stag & Bird sessions. A holiday open house runs Tuesday, November 10, 2026, from 5:30 to 7:30pm.

 
 
 

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