ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, January 20, 1997 TAG: 9701200156
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARY BISHOP STAFF WRITER
YOUNG COUPLES crowded into the Salem Civic Center for the sixth annual Bridal Showcase.
When a photographer said he needed a headshot of her, Vaunda Leftwich warned:
"This head's been up all night, so it doesn't look too good."
For a solid year, Leftwich's head had been fixated on her Roanoke Valley Bridal Showcase.
Sunday came the payoff. More than 5,000brides-to-be, fiancees, mothers and a few dads from across Central and Western Virginia packed into the Salem Civic Center to shop for all the ingredients of the perfect wedding
Crowds were so thick at the bridal fashion show that young women and their entourages jammed the doorways and hallways to watch 36model brides strut their satin. With all the model grooms around, it looked like a mass wedding orchestrated by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church.
A worn-out Leftwich, the wedding industry's local guru, proclaimed it the biggest wedding market the region has seen yet. "We had as many people by 12noon today as we had all day last year."
There's hard money in what is too often seen as a soft industry. The average wedding costs $15,000 to $20,000, Leftwich said. She's been a wedding director for a quarter-century and publishes the Southwest Virginia Bridal Guide, the handbook worn to a pulp by many a bride.
Consider the vendors at the civic center:
Wedding gown salons, hotels, photographers, videographers, caterers, cake-bakers, rental companies (candelabra, dinnerware, you name it), tuxedo shops, cosmeticians, jewelers, disc jockeys. (One veteran DJ wondered why brides' families love him to play ``Strokin''' at receptions. ``Even when there are kids there. It's kinda dirty.'')
And there were harpists, string quartets, custom bra-makers, florists, tanning parlors, limousine companies, honeymoon travel agents, horse-and-carriage drivers, dyeable- shoe sellers, balloon companies, manicurists. And you can hire a wedding superintendent - somebody who will do all your shopping and organizing for you.
Electrolysis is apparently hot, too, with the pre-wedding set. "Shape your eyebrows!" a young female vendor urged as she handed out fliers.
In one small section of the fair, sellers of multitiered wedding cakes - serving up heavily iced slices - competed for the brides' attention with weight-loss experts who warned them to get that fat off before they outgrow their gowns.
Never mind. One of the busiest booths was the Hotel Roanoke's, which was giving away a mountain of its famously rich chocolate-chip and nut cookies.
Wide-eyed young couples fought their way up and down the aisles, seeing just how much money they - or their parents - could spend if money were no object. How about giving away Godiva chocolates?
Ami Foutz, a list-bill examiner at Shenandoah Life, and fiance Chris Meadow, a computer technician, are doing it the modern way. The couple, both 21, are paying for most of their May wedding themselves.
"I don't want to bug my parents for it," Foutz said. "We've been planning and saving money for two years," Meador added.
Leftwich, 50, broke into the business years ago after she took the well-known Wilton course in cake decorating. Her husband, Norfolk Southern computer consultant Rob Leftwich, set her up with two Brides of Virginia wedding stores at Tanglewood and Valley View malls.
She closed them after 10years and decided to start the annual bridal fair. Sunday was her sixth.
She said young women need to connect with all parts of the wedding business at one place. "They're working," Leftwich said. "They don't have time to call all these people."
Arranging a wedding is so complicated and stressful if you don't start early and get organized, you'll be beat by Wedding Day and won't remember a thing, Leftwich said. "If they plan well ahead, that day is not a haze."
Even before Sunday's showcase was selling its last satin garter, Leftwich was refining Showcase '98. Next year's fashion show won't drag on so long, she said. And she'll have a bigger room for the champagne brunch.
Practically the whole Leftwich family and half its friends were working Sunday. Her mother baby-sat the Godiva booth when the company representative couldn't come. Her daughter and son-in-law ran the brunch. Her son-in-law's father did the public announcements. Her husband's best friend from Cub Scout days put on a tux to help out.
Leftwich's daughter, Miki, got married last year. Now her son is engaged - to the daughter of Lynn Henley, Leftwich's close friend and fellow wedding director of long standing.
Which mother is planning the wedding? Neither, said Henley. The kids said they will get married out of town, ``so neither one of us will have anything to do with it.''
LENGTH: Medium: 91 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: ERIC BRADY STAFF. 1. Models with the bridal fashion showby CNBwait to go onstage Sunday during the Roanoke Valley Bridal Showcase.
color. 2. (headshot) Leftwich.