THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, September 2, 1995 TAG: 9509020445
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY JENNIFER CHRISTMAN, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: MANTEO LENGTH: Medium: 99 lines
To Ann Bell, work is not merely a labor of love.
Love is her labor.
For the past 15 years, the owner of Wedding Bells consulting service has made a living out of helping more than 1,000 couples live out the wedding of their dreams.
And Bell's work is not conducted behind the stuffy fortress of a storefront - it's all done with a personal touch from her home.
``Home is where the heart is,'' Bell says.
Bell's home literally is a house of love - the downstairs living room doubles as a wedding chapel during wintry weather, while a gazebo-like garden chapel complete with stained-glass ornamentation and a rose-tinted solar ceiling peeks from tree groves for summer ceremonies.
On wedding days, a wreath of twigs and silk flowers hangs near the door. White fabric is draped over the living room pool table. Wooden signs with bells and arrows point spectators and party members in the direction of her home, hidden on Garden Drive. A pig-bride doll that Bell's daughter sewed sits atop a piano in the living room to greet guests.
Bell says she and her husband Roger, who died five years ago, built the house with weddings in mind.
``It's a wedding house - that's what we wanted,'' Bell says, pointing to the wooden garden chapel that her son Gregg, an engineer, built for her eight years ago. ``We moved around a lot, and I helped a lot of people with their weddings. I was always fascinated with helping people. And once I retired, I thought well, shoot, if I'm good at this, I might as well get paid for it.''
She adds with a laugh, ``Or maybe it was just because our last name was Bell.''
Bell, who majored in home economics from Winthrop University in South Carolina and later earned a degree in floral design, first came to the Outer Banks in 1958 as a costume designer for ``The Lost Colony'' outdoor drama. That's where she met Roger, whose father, Skipper Bell, was the architect of Waterside Theatre.
The Bells were married in 1960, moved in and out of the country for 20 years while Roger was an aviator in the Navy, then returned to the Outer Banks in 1980 and began Wedding Bells.
And the business is not the typical haven for star-crossed runaways looking for a holy matrimony in the middle of the night. One of Bell's weddings might involve 2 people or 200 people, and a budget of $300 or $20,000.
She helps newlyweds-to-be select locations for their weddings. Many choose sites like the Elizabethan Gardens, a church, the beach or Jockey's Ridge, but about one-third decide to marry at Bell's fern- and flower-adorned chapel.
``It's private and romantic,'' Bell says of her garden sanctuary. ``It's a place where people who still want an old-fashioned wedding and don't want to put on airs can escape with their closest friends and family and unite.''
Bell is working 15 weddings in September. What makes Bell so popular?
``I think it's the individual touches I give to each bride and groom,'' Bell says. ``Everyone is so different, and I try to accommodate what they want.''
Bell, who grows plants and flowers in her home greenhouse, arranges flowers in her weddings just before the ceremony so they'll be fresh.
In her attempt to make each wedding unique, Bell has done everything from arranging a traditional African wedding on the beach to coordinating and witnessing ceremonies in airplanes.
``I get so excited about each wedding, so I try to make every wedding special,'' she says. ``I'm like a surrogate mother. When they cry, I cry.''
``I just get so wrapped up in them.''
And they get wrapped up in her.
Bell says she always receives a thank-you note, and is often paid visits and given gifts by couples she has married. And she has a return policy - if a couple returns, Bell will arrange a renewal of their vows for free.
On a sticky Wednesday afternoon, Bell is bustling about, arranging unity candles in her garden chapel, sweeping busy squirrels' acorn leftovers off a concrete porch and filling a white hand basket with birdseed that will be later flung at the couple.
It's not the kind of long-range wedding she is used to. Patricia Sanchez, a Kill Devil Hills resident, had called her three weeks before and said she wanted to get married. Despite the last-minute plans, Bell agreed to help.
Sanchez told Bell her dream was to walk down a staircase with the train of a long dress trailing behind her, and as a surprise, Bell draped her staircase banister with white, lacy material for the woman to sashay past.
``It's just what I pictured,'' Sanchez exclaimed when she saw it.
During the wedding, Bell served as an usher, directing guests and party members. She also acted as the disc jockey, playing wedding CDs on a portable stereo tucked among some outside plants.
After a local minister led the smiling couple in their vows and the bride was kissed, Bell guided them back to the house for a special toast. Within 20 minutes, the wedding was over.
``That was beautiful, wasn't it?'' Bell said. ILLUSTRATION: Color photos by Vicki Cronis, Staff
Ann Bell keeps an eye on Jose Hernandez Jr. and Sarah Saunder after
Patricia Sanchez's wedding recently.
Ann Bell, left, owner of Wedding Bells consulting service in
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