Old Hyde Park Village was wedding central last Saturday. In Williams-Sonoma, a friend and his fiancee were cruising the aisles with a scanner zapping the bar code on the items they want to receive as wedding gifts. Do you know about this? The store will place a couple's list on its Web site, where it's updated every 24 hours. Prospective gift-givers can scroll down the registry list, see a photo of the product, its price, how many the couple want and how many they have already received.
In Stationery Square, a place to order engraved wedding invitations, a mother of the bride was emoting about her daughter's upcoming wedding. "It's going to be casual; I am insisting on it!" She had called one tony South Tampa restaurant for the reception, but it couldn't handle 200 guests, so she was still looking.
Exiting the parking garage, a young couple - the woman carrying a thick white book - headed for the stores, perhaps to join our friends at Williams-Sonoma or go on to Pottery Barn or Restoration Hardware. All three are featured on Weddingchannel.com. There guests can access several gift registries at one time. (If the couple has a Web site, you can learn all kinds of wedding info: a calendar of wedding events, directions to the reception, a list of restaurants for out-of-town guests, a photo of the bride and groom-to-be.)
Weddings are big business.
There was a time when a bride registered only her china and silver patterns - which makes sense, since the newlyweds don't want to end up with 40 soup ladles and no knives. Now wedding guests are expected to provide everything the couple could possibly use over the course of their married life. You can register just about anywhere; Target's virtual registry is called ClubWedd. This weekend we're going to a 10th anniversary bash for a couple who had a wedding shower in the garden department of Home Depot. Since they're close friends of my husband, he chose the wedding gift - a weed whacker.
I checked on the Web for two recent Tampa weddings; both couples are registered with Williams-Sonoma. Both asked for, but neither has yet, received the KitchenAid Artisan Stand Mixer ($249); one is still waiting for OXO Antibacterial Soap Scrub ($5.50).
On a gray afternoon this week, a lone bride-to-be with scanner was trolling the aisles. She looked tired.
And rightfully so. Planning a wedding today is about as stress-free as defending a Ph.D. dissertation.
There's so much to do!
All that running around!
So, here's an idea.
Weddings cost money, lots and lots of money.
Old Hyde Park Village needs an infusion of cash and a fresh identity.
Why not turn it into a real wedding central? Reinvent Jacobson's as a catering hall. During the temperate months, vows can be exchanged outdoors around the fountain, champagne toasts afterwards on the lawn. Reinstate a Village tradition, and the bride can arrive in a horse-drawn carriage.
The boutique hotel on the north side of Swann - that now exists only in the Village owners' dreams - would be a perfect place to stash out-of-town guests. They'll be able to walk to the wedding events, shop for wedding gifts at the aforementioned stores or others such as Anthropologie or April Cornell, stop in Brooks Brothers to pick up a tie if they forgot to pack one. The lamentably empty retail space could be filled with bridal gown boutiques, a fine lingerie shop, a wedding cake designer.
Bridal party lunches would be lovely at Mia's, and after a day of decisions and scanning, the Samba Room would be just the place for the frazzled couple to duck in and repair with a Mojito.
CORRECTION: In last week's column, I referred to Church Avenue as Church Street. The city's confused, too: The intersection at Bay to Bay where I turn onto Church has a sign that says "Church St."
- Sandra Thompson is a writer living in Tampa. She can be reached at tampa@sptimes.com City Life appears on Saturday.
