The Woods in Oakley<\/a> near Basingstoke.\n<\/p>\n\n Zoe and Kirby – who does ‘lightsaber fencing’ out of hours – got engaged at Disneyland two years ago after meeting at college in Swindon 10 years ago.\n<\/p>\n
\n The pair confessed they find ‘traditional weddings quite sterile and boring’ and wanted to share their ‘passion’ for the movies, which were some of the first they watched together.\n<\/p>\n
\n ![]()
Guests in costume create a ‘Saber Salute’ as the newlyweds walk down the aisle (Image: Andrew Croft\/Solent News)\n<\/p>\n
\n Guests at the wedding included the bride’s father as the bounty hunter Boba Fett, her brother as Pedro Pascal’s The Mandalorian, and her sister as Natalie Portman’s Padme.\n<\/p>\n
\n Actor Danny D’Arcy, who played a stormtrooper and a rebel soldier in The Return Of The Jedi, surprised Kirby as a secret guest.\n<\/p>\n
\n Zoe wore a wedding dress passed down to her from Kirby’s mother – modified with armour, a helmet and a ‘blaster’ modelled after Sabine Wren from the Star Wars Rebels cartoons.\n<\/p>\n
\n Guests were armed with 26 lightsabers from the pair’s personal collection, and the couple walked under a path of crossed lightsabers after the ceremony.\n<\/p>\n
\n The wedding rings have been modelled after a red and blue lightsaber, so the happy couple can have ‘lightsaber clashes’ when they hold hands.\n<\/p>\n
\n And to top it off, the ceremony was officiated by a giant ‘life-size K-2SO droid’ – the robot companion of Cassian Andor in the titular TV show and Rogue One movie – designed by Zoe’s dad.\n<\/p>\n
\n Officially, the theme for the wedding was science fiction, and guests were invited to wear anything sci-fi related; however, Star Wars took centre stage.\n<\/p>\n
\n Zoe recalled loving the ‘weird and wacky characters’ as her entry point into the series.\n<\/p>\n
\n She said: \u201cWe have both always been Star Wars fans. My dad very much got me into the films when I was little.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cI know it\u2019s controversial but I loved Jar Jar Binks growing up, I don\u2019t know why. He was the comic relief character, loads of people found him really annoying.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cBut I also loved the wookies and all the other weird and wacky characters in there. They\u2019re my childhood.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cWe are both giant nerds. My first memory of being with him is being sat on the stairs at college watching How To Train Your Dragon with him.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cThat was our first film together and so we\u2019re dressing as Astrid and Hiccup for the first part of the ceremony.”\n<\/p>\n
\n Zoe described some details from the wedding: \u201cMy dad is dressing up as Boba Fett, my brother is dressed as The Mandalorian and my sister will be dressed as Padme.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cWe\u2019re walking back down the aisle under loads of crossed lightsabers after the ceremony.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cAnd, not that I have any dancing skills, but we\u2019re due to have a lightsaber fight with Darth Vader happening while we dance.\n<\/p>\n
\n ![]()
Zoe and Kirby in costume for their Star Wars themed wedding (Image: Andrew Croft\/Solent News)\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cEveryone absolutely loves it. They\u2019re having so much fun trying to think of outfits. I have lots of guests saying they have three outfits picked out – even more than me!\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cBut everyone is bringing their own personality to the wedding as well and I love it. If they\u2019re coming as an alien or a Jedi that\u2019s their favourite, that\u2019s great.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n Kirby explained his own love of the franchise: \u201cI was basically brought up on Star Wars. My granddad is massively obsessed with science fiction.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cWhen I was four or five and The Phantom Menace came out I watched it on repeat.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cMy real love for Star Wars comes from being a teenager and Revenge of the Sith being one of the first sci-fi films I saw at the cinema.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cThen in college I got involved in Ludosport which is basically fencing with lightsabers.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cWe now own about 26 lightsabers because of that. Each of the guests sitting on the end of the aisle will be given a lightsaber for the ceremony.”\n<\/p>\n
\n Kirby said that watching The Phantom Menace as a child was when he first experienced the franchise but that it eventually grew so much he joined lightsaber fencing in college.\n<\/p>\n
\n He continued: \u201cI have always found traditional weddings to be quite sterile and boring.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cAnd it\u2019s a case of Star Wars being such a high point for our relationship, and sci-fi and fantasy as a whole has always taken precedence for us.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cThe first time we hung out together was watching these movies and we wanted to push that passion into the wedding.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cIt\u2019s on brand for both of us to not be on brand.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cWe got engaged at Disneyland a couple of years ago, then going into Star Wars Land was like stepping into that world.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cBecause we got engaged there there was going to be some level of it at the wedding. We wanted to keep that aspect of our relationship.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cWe didn\u2019t want people in suits and ties but we\u2019ll allow Jedis in tuxedos.”\n<\/p>\n
\n Kirby added that the date was a stroke of genius, saying: \u201cThe idea of doing it on May 4 – Star Wars Day – was just genius. It was one of those \u2018why haven\u2019t I thought of this before\u2019 things.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cIt\u2019s a franchise that everyone knows and everyone loves so we knew it wouldn\u2019t be a problem for people to have ideas.\n<\/p>\n
\n ![]()
Zoe and Kirby’s wedding rings in the shape of a lightsaber (Image: Andrew Croft\/Solent News)\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cOur wedding rings are a blue and red lightsaber respectively so when we hold hands we can have a lightsaber clash.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cAnd Zoe\u2019s dad John loves making things so we have a life-size K-2SO droid as our officiant, which will be the tallest thing there.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cAfter the ceremony Zoe will be wearing my mum\u2019s wedding dress which has been passed down to her – but she will also have a blaster, armour and helmet from Sabine Wren from the Star Wars Rebels cartoons.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cI\u2019ll be wearing a suit I wore 10 years ago not long after me and Zoe met – but I\u2019ll be wearing some armour of an Orbital Drop Shock Trooper from Halo too.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cIt will be awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sci-fi sweethearts Zoe Chapman and Kirby Rule tied the knot in Star Wars costumes complete with lightsabers and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":568253,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[96,2839,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-568252","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568252","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=568252"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568252\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/568253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=568252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=568252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=568252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}