The Bride Wore a Monique Lhuillier Dress to Marry on a Jetty in the Middle of the Pacific Ocean
Morgan Selzer and Matt Bagnard dated through most of college while they were both attending the University of Southern California. When Morgan relocated to New York to continue her studies at Parsons, they decided to take a break. But a few years later, when Morgan moved back to Los Angeles to start a new job, it didn’t take long for them to reconnect. “Both us had grown a lot since we first met,” says Morgan, who is now an agent at The Wall Group. “And we were excited to be together again and take our relationship to the next level. We moved in together right before the onset of the pandemic in early 2020 and the rest is history.”
After discussing marriage for some time, they decided to go for it. “We designed the ring together, which was a really cool experience,” Morgan says. “Since we are definitely more on the private side, neither one of us wanted to have a lot of fanfare around the moment—like a hidden photographer or people watching—but the morning after Thanksgiving, Matt walked into our bedroom with breakfast in bed, a note tied to our puppy’s collar, and proposed. It was really sweet, and I loved that he proposed in the home that we have created together. It was also nice since my family was in town for the holidays, so we all got to celebrate right after.”
They started planning their wedding during the pandemic, right at the start of 2021, so the decisions they made about the location and the guest count were all done with COVID in mind. “Originally, we wanted to have a wedding destination in Europe, but we ultimately chose a closer location in Mexico so there would be less travel for guests—most of whom were coming from California or Texas,” Morgan says. “We also decided to limit the total guest count to around 38 people, which was only immediate family and our best friends.”
The couple worked with Lisa Vorce to plan their destination wedding at One&Only Mandarina in Mexico’s Riviera Nayarit. “About five years ago, I helped coordinate getting makeup artist Vincent Oquendo to Colorado to do a wedding that Lisa was planning,” Morgan remembers. “Not only did I remember how amazing Lisa and her team were to work with, but the pictures from the wedding and attention to detail was incredible. Her name just stuck with me all those years! After I got engaged, I revisited her website and knew she was the one.”
The wedding was planned in about three months. “Lisa is so hands on from start to finish that we were never worried,” Morgan remembers. “She really just understood the vision and made it come to life and in a way we could have never imagined. We were really inspired by the works of Georgia O Keeffe and Frida Kahlo, in addition to the tropical surroundings of Mandarina. We ended up taking these loves to build out our events over the weekend.”
Morgan wanted to instill as much color as she could into her outfits over the weekend. “One of my favorites was this pink Rodarte dress that reminded me of the Frida Kahlo painting that is titled Self-Portrait Along the Borderline Between Mexico The United States,” she says. For the day of the wedding, she wanted a dress that felt romantic and unique, but could also be worn again throughout her life. “I never understood why so much money is spent on a wedding dress that you tuck away for years on end!” she says. She loved the lace from one of Monique Lhuillier’s designs, so she worked with the brand to create a deconstructed version of a dress from her collection. “During my first fitting, the dress was beautiful, but wasn’t exactly what I had envisioned, so I asked to flip the dress inside out so the boning was exposed and thankfully the brand went along with my crazy idea,” Morgan remembers. “I extended the train to give it a super-dramatic effect and added some thin white straps which gave it more of a ’90s vibe.” She paired the dress with a deep red bouquet to walk down the aisle.
