Grooms often get sidelined during that most gruesome rite of passage for committed couples — planning a wedding. Most guys are lucky if allowed to choose the band or what drinks will be served at the bar. But Derrick Miller, creative director of the English shoe company Barker Black, saw his wedding as a prime excuse to try out full bespoke. "What I wore became my way of putting a stamp on the day," he says of the charcoal worsted jacket, striped trousers, white piqué shirt, matching bow tie, and waistcoat he had made in honor of his bucolic wedding to interior designer Jennifer Vaughn. Miller's wink-nudge take on the traditional English morning suit was tempered by the setting, a horse farm in Bucks County, Pennsylvania — a fitting combo for the son of a Midwestern father who commissioned most of his suits on Savile Row.

"My brother and best man, Kirk, accompanied me on all the bespoke missions," says Miller, whose first stop was to downtown Newark, New Jersey, to see Gambert, a famous shirtmaker known for dressing mobster heavies. "Not quite our lineage, but the guy does make a beautiful shirt." Miller bought five, along with a formal option monogrammed with his initials and the 9.8.7 wedding date. The verdict: "What a difference! I'd worn hand-me-downs (albeit Turnbull & Asser) from my father throughout my life and was amazed at the custom-made effect," he says. "The higher armholes allowed for all sorts of movement without twisting or untucking — a feature that would prove useful on the dance floor at the reception."

"The charcoal-gray worsted was surprisingly tough to find," Miller says. "Everything was either not the right cast or had slightly too much finishing or shine to it." But at Tip Top Fabrics in Brooklyn, he located the color, texture, weave, and matte finish he'd envisioned. For the pants fabric, he had to travel farther. "I love the vintage morning trousers that you occasionally come across in thrift stores, but no one seems to make that stuff anymore. So on my next trip to England, I scoured London and at long last unearthed exactly the right stripe at a shop I wandered into just off Savile Row."

The couple used an antler motif throughout the event — a nod to their first purchase together: a mount picked up at an antiques shop in Sag Harbor. The symbol even made it onto Miller's custom Barker Black velvet slippers: "I designed two embroideries, each slightly different, one for me, the other for Kirk." A perfect fit, in so many ways.