This is our annual fashion issue, and as you'll see from the spectacular wedding gowns and wedding planner story inside, nothing is more fashionable right now than a Southwest Florida wedding. I've been to four in recent months; they ranged from an intimate, elegant ceremony in the garden of the Ritz-Carlton to an over-the-top, black-tie New Year's Eve bash, and each was wonderful in its own way. But I think the most enchanting was the wedding of our art director, Tessa Tilden-Smith, to Roger Mann, last May in Naples.

They're a creative, well-traveled couple, and this was a second marriage for both, so the guests were a fascinating mix of family and friends from all over the globe. The weekend kicked off with a poolside barbecue where we all met and mingled; the next day, some of us lazed on the beach while others played in the "Tessa Cup" golf tournament or went charter-fishing out in the Gulf.

Late in the afternoon, wearing casual tropical attire (and in many cases, rosy new sunburns), we gathered at Pelican Bay to take the little trolleys down the boardwalk that winds through the tangled mangrove forest to the bright-white beach and gentle green waves of the Gulf of Mexico. As we walked into the covered wooden pavilion, we were misted with bug spray from a bottle wrapped with a festive ribbon and handed a pretty paddle fan imprinted with the couple's names. Sipping cool drinks, we watched the sun sink toward the sea and great blue herons and pelicans wing their way home past puffy, pink-hued clouds. Just as we were beginning to wonder where our bride and groom could be, a boat sped into view and headed for shore, anchoring a few yards out from the beach. Several of the young male guests, carrying beach chairs on their shoulders, waded out to meet it; and Tessa, elegant in a simple, white vintage dress, and Roger, wearing a flowered shirt and white, rolled-up pants, were regally borne ashore. After the ceremony, we sat down for dinner and a tropical wedding cake-an enormous, custom-designed key lime pie. A few hours later, everyone reconvened at a beachside tiki bar for a reggae party that lasted long into the night.

It couldn't have been more perfect, and it could only have happened along the Gulfshore. As you'll read in our wedding planner story in this issue, couples from all over are discovering the joys of tying the knot in Southwest Florida, with wedding business jumping by 30 percent or more in the last few years at many resorts. Most of those weddings are "destination weddings," say local planners, with family and friends flying in for a weekend-or week-long-celebration, reunion and vacation all in one. Town & Country led off its annual wedding issue this spring by noting that "destination weddings" are the latest rage; and we have exactly what couples want in a destination-sunshine, beaches (about 75 percent of ceremonies at local resorts take place on the beach) and a sophisticated array of support services, from top-drawer restaurants and caterers to entertaining diversions. Many couples embrace the tropical theme, like the Michigan pair whose invitations were real coconuts in a box of Spanish moss-postmarked from Florida, of course.

That kind of creativity was certainly in evidence at the weddings I attended this year. I'm thinking of a ceremony at Selby Gardens in Sarasota, where the wedding party walked down a meadow to a bayside pavilion on a chilly, windy February night. The bridesmaids were dressed in empire-waisted, eggplant-hued dresses, and each had accessorized hers differently-one with a mink-trimmed sweater, another with spiky peacock feathers in her hair. Accompanying them was the couple's Lab, on a leash entwined with vines and flowers and bearing the wedding ring on his collar. And as in many weddings these days, family and friends were part of the service, adding laughter and warmth to the occasion. Afterwards under the spreading canopy of the garden's magnificent banyan trees, we huddled around the big, outdoor heaters-as cozy and congenial as any fireplace-until wine and conversation had warmed us enough to sit down to the wedding feast.

Nobody minded the cold a bit-including the bride, still flushed and radiant in her stunning strapless gown. When you put an elegant event in a tropical Southwest Florida setting and add romance, originality and overflowing love, that kind of magic happens, even on a blustery winter night.