LGBTQ+ inclusive training for wedding vendors, venues, and wedding professionals of all types

A self-paced certification + directory listing package for wedding pros who want to serve LGBTQ+ couples with more care, confidence, and accountability across the full client experience.

Queer-Affirming Wedding Vendor / Professional Certification + 2yr Directory Listing

$199

that's about $8 a month!

  • SEO-optimized directory listing for 2 years
  • Expert-led training
  • Queer-Affirming Wedding Professional badge
  • Verifiable certificate
  • Discounted recertification rate after 2 years
  • Payment plans available through Afterpay and Klarna
  • Access to future benefits as a certified member of the Affirming Business Institute
  • A portion of every sale gets donated to The Trevor Project 

Enroll now Wedding photographers click here

Why LGBTQ+ Inclusive Training Matters in the Wedding Industry

Many wedding vendors, professionals, and venues today are proudly LGBTQ+ inclusive. Ask how they work with queer couples, though, and you’ll often hear “love is love” or “we treat everyone the same.”

Someone who says that they treat everyone the same isn't inherently a bad sentiment.

It means:

  • You respect every couple.
  • You believe every relationship deserves care.
  • You don't want to treat LGBTQ+ couples as unusual, difficult, or separate.

But in the wedding industry, “the same” often means treating every client with the same systems, scripts, poses, family assumptions, and traditions that were built around straight, cisgender couples. 

Same sex marriage has only been legally a part of the commercial wedding industry in every US state for just over a decade. While that may seem like a long time, it's not a long time considering the wedding industry's centuries-long history rooted in heteronormativity.

Many wedding professionals were trained inside systems that assumed every couple would be a bride and groom, every couple would follow the same gender roles, and every wedding day would follow a similar set of traditions.

And this isn't anyone's fault. Wedding industry education has been built around cisgender and heterosexual norms for centuries.

While we can't change how the industry has been taught, we can choose what we carry forward into our businesses and client interactions.

 

As LGBTQ+ friendly wedding professionals, we have a responsibility to keep learning and doing better for the couples we serve. This includes noticing the straight and cisgender defaults we inherited from the wedding industry's history and replacing them with practices that help queer couples feel respected, understood, and affirmed in every interaction with us.

 

But where can you learn how to operate your business in queer-informed ways?

You shouldn't ask your LGBTQ+ clients since they didn't pay to educate you, and there isn't a formalized place where we can learn to do better for ourselves and our couples... 

Until now!

NOW INTRODUCING

Training and certification for queer-affirming wedding vendors, venues, and wedding professionals of all types.

This self-paced online certification gives LGBTQ+ inclusive wedding pros practical training to meet a higher standard of care for LGBTQ+ couples.

Your instructor, Katelyn Kristine, is a queer wedding photographer and educator with 12 years in the industry and more than 130 weddings behind her. Her course gives you practices you can start using today, from your website copy to the way you interact with LGBTQ+ couples and their guests on the wedding day.

By the end of the course, you'll know how to create experiences every queer couple can feel affirmed in without assumptions or expectations.

Inside the course, you'll learn:

  • Foundational queer literacy that goes deeper than inclusive language and Pride marketing
  • How to ask better questions and talk with couples without assuming roles, pronouns, or traditions
  • How to audit your website, intake forms, and marketing through a queer-informed lens
  • How to brief your team and advocate for your couples when another vendor falls short
  • How to prepare for unaffirming family members, gendered traditions, and wedding-day tension
  • How to vet the vendors you recommend so your referrals reflect your standards
  • How to repair mistakes with accountability and keep your practices current as your business grows

Once you've passed the final assessment, you'll receive...

A business listing in the Affirming Business Directory for 2 years

Your business will be findable in the Affirming Business Directory for 2 years so queer couples can find you as the directory grows.

A verifiable certificate and badge for your website

You'll receive a Certified Queer-Affirming Wedding Photographer certificate and badge for your website so clients know your business is trained in how to show up in queer-informed ways before they ever have to ask.

Course overview

Why LGBTQ+ Couples Need Inclusive Wedding Vendors

Explore the gaps that still exist in the wedding industry and why LGBTQ+ couples need vendors who know how to ground their work in respect, consent, and inclusion. 

Inclusive Language and Communication With LGBTQ+ Couples and guests

Build confidence using inclusive language without overthinking every word. You’ll learn how to ask better questions, avoid assumptions, and communicate in a way that helps couples feel seen.

Auditing Your Wedding Website and Marketing Through a Queer-Informed Lens

Review your public-facing presence through a queer-informed lens. Identify where your copy, visuals, forms, portfolio, and messaging may be welcoming in intention but unclear in practice. 

Advocating for LGBTQ+ Couples as a Wedding Vendor Team

Learn how your commitment to being an affirming vendor connects with the wider vendor team and wedding environment. Learn how to collaborate, communicate, brief your team, and advocate for your clients in ways that help create a more affirming experience beyond your own business on the wedding day.

Navigating Family, Traditions, and Wedding Day Dynamics

Learn how to show up for couples when family expectations, gendered traditions, or vendor assumptions create stress. Learn practical ways to prepare, advocate, and respond with professionalism on the wedding day.

Building LGBTQ+ Affirming Vendor Referrals

Your client experience is shaped by more than your own business. Learn how to evaluate vendors you recommend, make stronger referrals, and help create a more affirming environment across the full wedding team.

From Allyship to Accountability

Move beyond good intentions and into ongoing business integrity. Create a plan for continued learning, repairing when mistakes happen, and consistent queer-affirming practices as your business grows.

Meet your instructor

KATELYN KRISTINE

Hello! I'm Katelyn (she/her). I'm a queer photographer and educator with a background deeply rooted in advocacy, inclusivity, and intentional representation within the wedding industry. Originally from the Pacific Northwest, I'm now living in a small, historically gay beach town outside of Barcelona, Spain. I'm so grateful to now be planning elopements and documenting queer couples all around Europe. After traveling to 33 countries and attending 130+ weddings over 12 years in the wedding industry, I've built an international business rooted in empathy and connection. 

My work and teaching are shaped by years of examining how systems of power, gender norms, and tokenism show up in wedding spaces; especially working with LGBTQ+ couples. 

 

As a queer woman myself, my coming-out story began with rejection like so many queer people. From this though, I overcame, found and created community, and now I'm so honored to be giving queer couples wedding experiences that are rooted in deep celebration. I now use my first-hand experience to educate wedding vendors who want to be holistically inclusive allies in their businesses and their personal lives. Through everything I do, I aim to help challenge wedding vendors to create systems outside of the traditional norms, and to investigate places of assumption within their businesses. 

In my course, I'll walk you through tangible resources and actionable strategies that you can immediately implement to help LGBTQ+ couples feel safe and affirmed when working with you.

I dream of the day when all queer couples can have a wedding experience surrounded by nothing but love, acceptance, and authentic celebration. 

I'm so delighted to be your guide through this Affirming Business Institute certification and can't wait to see you in the course!

Earn your certificate, badge, and directory listing today as a

Certified Queer-Affirming Wedding Professional

Enroll today!

Queer-Affirming Wedding Vendor / Professional Certification + 2yr Directory Listing

$199

equal to about $8 a month!

  • SEO-optimized directory listing for 2 years
  • Expert-led training
  • Queer-Affirming Wedding Photographer badge
  • Verifiable certificate
  • Discounted recertification rate after 2 years
  • Payment plans available through Afterpay and Klarna
  • Access to future benefits as a certified member of the Affirming Business Institute
  • A portion of every sale gets donated to The Trevor Project 
Enroll now

Some good questions (and their answers)

FAQs