Oaxaca: A City for Quiet Mexico Destination Weddings Without the Parades and Traditions You're Expected to Include

Not every wedding in Oaxaca has to include a calenda, fireworks, or a 300-person guest list. If you’ve searched for Oaxaca destination wedding inspiration, you’ve probably seen the big stuff—giant puppets, brass bands, ornate Mexican traditions. But what if you just want to keep it simple? Will it still feel like a destination wedding in Oaxaca without the spectacle? My clients would argue yes. And it’s exactly what they did: a week-long celebration with ten of their favorite people, a Mezcal tour the day before filled with slow laughs and no schedule, and the kind of wedding that didn’t feel like a wedding at all.

A Moment They Wanted to Remember. A pause.

They chose to symbolically elope in Oaxaca because it felt right—like the city had always been waiting for them. They legally married at the Beverly Hills Courthouse. Quietly. No champagne. No Instagram story. Just them and a witness. This trip was for the part that mattered. Because Oaxaca doesn’t need much. The colors are already on the walls. The cobblestone does half the storytelling. You walk around and realize—this is what so many destination-themed weddings try to recreate with décor.

We met in Oaxaca Centro by Santo Domingo, in front of the Jardín Etnobotánico, late Wednesday morning. Bright midday sun. We wandered through the streets they’d explored the day before, even stopping by a few familiar backdrops from Nacho Libre. She wore a simple two-piece white linen dress she found at a local shop. The bouquet? A handful of flowers pulled from a bucket at Mercado Benito Juárez.

The Aftertaste of a Quiet Oaxaca Wedding on 35mm Film

Later, there was something like a ceremony. Their friends said a few words at the dinner table, holding glasses of Mezcal. It was short, funny, and emotional. They exchanged vows in front of the people who mattered most. Dinner came after with a small, private reception at Criollo. Family-style plates and all. With Oaxaca in the background doing what it always does: showing up without needing to show off. Beckoning to that certain kind of couple that ends up in Oaxaca.

The ones who care more about how it feels than how it looks. No printed menus, no schedules, no seating charts. And I suppose that’s the magic of a simple, minimalist wedding in Oaxaca, photographed on 35mm film—photography that doesn’t interfere with quiet moments between friends. Like the perfume Wedding in Oaxaca: notes of mezcal, warm wood, crushed flowers. It smells like the aftertaste of a night like this one—intimate, fleeting, and hard to explain.