The New Wedding Trend We Believe In: Multi-Chapter Celebrations
When two wedding venue owners, Sarah and Michael Pavel, decide to get married, the question becomes inevitable: Do we elope… or host a full wedding?
For us, the answer was simple:
We chose all of it.
Our relationship has always lived at the intersection of unapologetic romance, artistic fashion, and vibe city, so a single celebration felt… incomplete. Instead, we imagined an entirely new wedding model: multi-chapter love—where each moment becomes a different expression of who we are, and a new invitation for our community to celebrate with us across places, seasons, and versions of ourselves.
Chapter 1: Our Vegas Elopement
One night in Las Vegas, under the neon hum of the iconic Strip, wrapped in silver glitter boots, tulle explosions, and the kind of erotic glamour that feels straight out of a Helmut Newton fever dream, we began our wedding journey with an Elvis-officiated elopement at The Little White Chapel.
Not as an alternative to a “real” wedding, but as the opening act of a much bigger love story.
We were picked up from The Paris Hotel in a classic white stretch limo by our joyful driver, Cece from Bell Limousine. Our first stop was Frolic & Folly to pick up our custom vegan, gluten-free mini heart cake—swirled with icing ruffles and blasted with sparkles—before swinging by the airport to collect our favorite fashion photographer, flown in from Austin, TX: Michael Grystenko, whose lens turned the night into a cinematic fever dream. Electric-blue limo LEDs against warm skin tones, red accents cutting through the frame, dynamic diagonals, and bodies moving in a sensual, editorial push-pull—she the flame, he the spark. The resulting images look less like wedding photos and more like spreads from Rolling Stone or Vogue Italia.
In true rebel style, Sarah didn’t wear just one veil—she wore three. One on her head, one as a trailing skirt, and a third was an impulse-purchase clipped on just moments before the chapel ceremony. The look was equal parts couture chaos, rock-opera energy, and pure instinct—a visual thesis for the “more is more” model of love we believe in.
But none of this was rebellion.
It was expansion.
“We’re not rejecting the big wedding at all—we’re adding to it,” Sarah explains. “You don’t have to choose anymore. You can have the intimate elopement, the full wedding, the vow renewal, the wild weekend with friends… all of it. Love deserves more than one expression.”
Our families felt this cultural shift firsthand. One moment stands out: when my mother went to the gym and was pressured by friends for “missing the wedding.”
“There’s still peer pressure to stay traditional. But our message is that nothing about celebrating love should be either-or. It doesn’t have to be a single day. It can be a whole era.”
As owners of Olympic Valley Stables—one of Lake Tahoe, California’s most beloved historic outdoor venues—we have watched wedding culture evolve for more than a decade. While many couples now spend $100k–$150k on a single wedding, we began to notice a liberating truth: with the same investment, couples can have multiple celebrations, each with its own texture and magic.
Why Multi-Chapter Weddings Matter
A Vegas elopement in our style can be done for roughly $2k.
A luxurious full celebration at Olympic Valley Stables can be planned for $50k and still feel wildly extravagant.
Add a honeymoon, a vow renewal, a private mountaintop ceremony… and there is room for so much more joy.
Our own upcoming 2026 celebration at Olympic Valley Stables will be the main chapter of our multi-chapter romance story. But even this is not the grand finale. After our Stables celebration, we’ll host a playa ceremony at Dr. Bronner’s legacy camp Abraxus, in Burning Man—an elemental, dust-washed ritual honoring our artist community. And even that won’t be the last. We plan future vow renewals around the world, marking our marriage not with a single event, but with a lifetime of chapters.
The Vegas photos will serve as our main ceremony event invitations, setting the tone for love, mischief, and celebration.
Our story is about giving yourself permission to celebrate love in every form it wants to take—loudly, softly, epically, repeatedly.
In the new era of weddings…
More is more.
Tradition is only the beginning.
And love above all deserves every chapter.
What We Learned as Venue Owners
Planning our own wedding reinforced something important:
Love doesn’t have to fit into one day.
Multi-day weddings allow:
• More time with guests in unique locations
• More fun and less stress on any single moment
• More personalization
• More connection
• More love and joy
Planning Your Own Multi-Chapter Wedding
If you’re considering multiple celebrations, Olympic Valley Stables is uniquely suited for any chapter in your book of love, including:
• Welcome parties
• Rehearsal dinners
• Wedding ceremonies
• Post-wedding brunches
• Styled shoots
• Vow renewals
We’d love to help you dream up your own wedding era.
Interested in planning your next event at Olympic Valley Stables—or a unique destination around the world? Book a discovery call with us and start building your own love story.
Love Always,
-Sarah and Michael Pavel