Aparna Mohan and Scott Weinstein were given a clay topper as a wedding gift. It is from mudcards on etsy.com. Scott Weinstein and Aparna Mohan are marrying Sunday in Jersey City. Their topper shows them in what they wore at their engagement party. "People will get a kick out of it," said their friend Dr. Kay J. Park, who bought it for $55.

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Cake Toppers: An End to One Size Fits All

New York Times
By JOYCE COHEN
Published: September 18, 2009

THREE decades ago, when she married, Diane Arcaro took the only wedding cake topper offered.

It featured ?that ugly standard bride and groom,? she said. The cake?s bridegroom wore a black tuxedo, while her actual bridegroom wore a white one.

?My cake topper didn?t reflect us at all,? she said. ?It frustrated me.?

Ms. Arcaro, from Monroe Township, N.J., wanted a special topper for her niece Stacey Pinho, who is to marry David Hernandez on Sept. 26.

She e-mailed digital photos of the couple to a Web site called the Younique Boutique (tybinc.com) and ordered a topper in their likeness made of polymer clay. It was pricey, at around $600, but that included $100 each for a likeness of the couple?s two dogs, which will be included in the ceremony.

?How amazing, how cool is that, to have yourself on your cake topper?? Ms. Arcaro said. ?Even the pets match.?

Thanks to digital technology, cake toppers are more customizable than they have ever been. Plenty of Web sites, including etsy.com, offer an abundance of prices (from about $20 on up) and styles ? realistic, traditional and quirky. They are, no matter the personality, the couple in miniature.

?It is not surprising that cake toppers have taken on this individualistic role, because everything else in the wedding has,? said Cele C. Otnes, an author of ?Cinderella Dreams: The Allure of the Lavish Wedding? and a professor of business administration at the University of Illinois.

She said weddings strive to achieve four goals: romance, magic, memory and perfection. ?It is difficult to satisfy these goals in a market that is homogeneous,? she said.

But in the special tale told by a customized topper, ?you reflect on the bond between the two of you that no one else will replicate,? she said. ?There?s a word that we use in consumer behavior ? it singularizes the couple and communicates that this couple is like no other. That is the dominant movement in the wedding planning industry right now.?

The topper, she said, ?adds another layer of uniqueness.?

Suzi Martin of Oak Ridge, N.J., calls such keepsakes ?commemorabilia.? Her topper, featuring painted wooden figures, is detailed down to the white streak in the beard of her husband, Pete Carlsson. It cost only $26 from the seller, fanciefanniesbridal, on etsy.com and had the desired effect at their wedding in July. ?There was a lot of gasping? and picture-snapping at the reception, Ms. Martin said.

It?s unclear when or why the iconic bride and bridegroom topper was first used, but such toppers were initially mass-produced in the 1890s, said Penny Henderson, the author of ?Vintage Wedding Cake Toppers.?

Hair and clothing reflected the times. In the 1940s, toppers often resembled movie stars, with men sporting Clark Gable mustaches. World War II saw bridegrooms in uniform. In the mod 1960s, topper brides had long hair and short hems.

Beyond that, there was little customization. Toppers typically showed fair-haired brides, Mrs. Henderson said. Not until the 1970s did toppers feature black couples. She even has old photos of ?black couples getting married with white people on their cake.?

Now, ?retailers and vendors have tapped into a need,? Ms. Otnes said. Until recently, diverse partnerships weren?t always publicly celebrated, and same-sex or interracial couples ?didn?t feel they had the social legitimacy, nor were there the artifacts and merchandise available for them, to craft a ceremony that reflected their identity.?

Though diverse toppers can now be bought off the shelf for $15 and up (way up), they are not customized to reflect the actual appearance of the couple.

Dr. Kay J. Park chose a flower topper for her wedding to Alex Kaplan two years ago. She never considered a bride and bridegroom topper because ?most are cheesy and generic,? she said, and hardly suitable for them as a cross-cultural couple.

But she ordered a clay topper for $55, from the seller mudcards on etsy.com, for her friends Aparna Mohan and Scott Weinstein, who are marrying Sunday in Jersey City. Their topper is all the more striking, she said, because they are ?an unusual-looking couple.? The topper bridegroom towers over his bride, who is wearing a sari.

Dr. Park liked her friends? topper so much that she ordered one as an anniversary gift for her husband. It replicates her wedding dress, down to the embroidered bodice, as well as her husband?s lily boutonniere.

?Everybody thinks they are the most adorable thing in the world,? she said. ?I like the cuteness factor."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/20/fashion/weddings/20FIELD.html