Matt Reimer came along with his his mother, a maid of honor and his bride-to-be on Sunday as the group visited the GO Show, a wedding expo held at the Gorecki Alumni Center on UND's campus.
Wearing a flannel shirt and heeled boots under his jeans, he stopped to talk while Desirae Johnson—his fiance—spoke with a wedding decor rep next to a table with gold-colored silverware, pink and green flowers and what looked to be crystal glasses.
But he came nonetheless, and he and the group jumped in. The event sprawled through the alumni center with wedding businesses of all stripes, with a tuxedo business in one corner of the main hall; caterers filling the center with hors' d'oeuvres; and Cindy Conrad's East Grand Forks wedding decor business, The Flower Girls, up against the wall.
"The elegant look is always going to be popular ... I've got pictures of that kind of tablecloth in a barn," she said, gesturing to a sparkling gold cloth on the other end of the room, "and it goes. It's a kind of shabby-chic look."
Amy Sansaver, associate director of events at the alumni center, said the event was a chance not only for couples to take a look at wedding decorations, but for other event planners to consider using the facility—even those couples who think they'll get married soon.
That's what Johnson and Reimer, who are getting married at the center in September, already plan to do.
"It'll come by too quick, I think," Patti Reimer, Matt's mother, said.
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