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lifestyle & arts
THe North shore weekend
4/12 – 4/13/14
love & marriage Presence of concierge will make a hash of wedding
I am not too proud to admit that I spend a lot of time on social media. I enjoy Instagram photos of my friends and their kids having fun across the country. I appreciate when local stores post notices of big sales on Facebook and restaurants tweet the nightly specials. And I love a good text message. It’s no surprise, then, that my fingers were flying when a colleague got married last fall. As quickly as she could walk down the aisle, I fired off a photo of the bride and her father to a slew of our coworkers. Via text messages and Facebook posts we agreed she looked stunning, and that her gown was just the style we imagined she would pick. I sent more photos as she kissed the groom, marched back up the aisle on his arm, and mingled with guests at the reception. Our commentary continued long after I’d praised the cupcake buffet. Nevertheless, I was a bit unsettled by the recent news that New York’s W Hotels are offering a Social Media Wedding Concierge Service, for a fee starting at $3,000.
At your direction, the concierge will work during your wedding and reception to post live updates to Twitter, Vine and Instagram. He or she will also encourage wedding guests to use a custom wedding hashtag in their own social media activities. And after the wedding, the concierge will compile a book of social media highlights. (For those unfamiliar with hashtags, they are labels attached to individual posts that allow most anyone online to find photos, video and other commentary related to your wedding. It’s like doing a keyword search at the library or a really precise Google search.) My first reaction was one of disappointment. I firmly believe that a wedding is a moment in time shared among two people and the friends and family members with whom they choose to involve. I was a little turned off by the idea of another staff member prancing around the ceremony, less than discretely. After all, the concierge’s mission is to inspire action by others. But then I considered all the people who decline invitations to attend a wedding: the infirm, new parents, medical students who
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■ by joanna brown
don’t have the time off or the money for travel, among others. There are a slew of people who want to attend your wedding but don’t for good reasons, and social media is their opportunity to be a part of the action. Still, a wedding concierge isn’t the way to handle it. If your college roommate is home with her newborn baby and unable to attend your wedding, she wants a picture of you coming down the aisle with your dad in real time — but she wants it delivered with your third roommate’s commentary on the fabulous hairpiece the bride made from the beads in her grandmother’s necklace, and details of how she snuck those red cowboy boots past her mother. That new mom wants to reply with questions about when
the bride’s brother lost all his hair, did the father of the bride cry, and who is that darling flower girl. Those services are most certainly not covered in the social media concierge’s $3,000 fee. Brides, create your own hashtag and have your most charming cousin spread the word, I say, while you mug for as many pictures as time allows. Consider them your gift to those who couldn’t attend your wedding. You’ll call up the hashtag while en route to your honeymoon, for sure, and have more than one good laugh. But leave the concierge out of it. What service do you consider essential at a good wedding? Send me an email at Joanna@northshoreweekend.com. ■