The guests at this wedding must have felt like the rest of the world had disappeared…it’s like time actually stopped and nothing else existed – except for this magical gathering in the forest.

The photography by Marshal Gray is breathtakingly beautiful. Love and happiness radiate from each image. It just shows that after all the options and decisions – the most important thing is celebrating your love with family and friends.

Prepare to be transported to an enchanted land!

The Great Outdoors

Sarah The Bride: fforest farm in Ceredigion, South Wales was the perfect location for us. We began our venue search with a blank canvas, and just knew that we wanted to find somewhere unique, that reflected our personalities. We found the great outdoors with enchanting beauty, and a quirky, vintage yet rustic feel, also fairly unique in what it had to offer.

Favours From Friends

My make-up for myself and my two maids of honour was done by my wonderful and all round talented friend, Emily Howells, who is beautiful and has a passion for elegant beauty.

My hair was also done by my lovely friend Nicola McRory, secondary science teacher by trade, however also very clever with sculpting hair do’s. She also did the hair for my two maids of honour.

Make-Up Recommendations

Most of my make-up is Bobbi Brown and I’m a big fan, but we also used Benefit rose tint for lips and cheeks, Urban Decay Naked2 eye shadow palette, Body Shop Lightening Touch around the eyes (03) and L’Oréal Black Lash Architect Waterproof mascara (this was needed), all of which my make-up artist – and now myself – highly recommend.

Bridal Gowns For Bumps

The bridal dress was called Eden by Jenny Packham, chosen before I knew I was pregnant and fortunately for me the design of the dress really complemented a bump. I chose it because of its pure vintage elegance, to me it was simply stunning, and stood out from the hundreds of dresses I had tried.

It was purchased at Eternity Bride in Warrington, they were wonderfully friendly and helpful, with an amazing seamstress for dress alterations (even for an unexpected baby bump!)

The Groom wore a Harris Tweed jacket which he bought for £35 from a vintage store in Liverpool called Pop Boutique.

Something Borrowed…

My shoes were from Benjamin Adams and I wore a headband from Glitzy secrets. The pearl bracelet I wore I made from my Granny’s broken pearl necklace. The earrings I wore were my ‘something borrowed’ – from my maid of honour Fiona Thompson (they were her grandmothers).

Well Dressed

My maids of honour Alana Gaffney and Fiona Thompson, wore cream lace dresses from Debenhams. They also wore beautiful pearl drop ear rings by Pandora, which was there thank you gift.

My two flower girls, (my 2 year old daughter and 3 year old niece) were dressed in ivory Monsoon dresses. They wore a diamanté headband from Monsoon, similar to the vintage style headband I wore, and beaded shoes from John Lewis.

The Best Men, brother to the Groom, Tom Shooter and best friend John Yates, wore tweed jackets from Moss outlet store in Cheshire oaks. The groomsmen all wore navy trousers from Burtons.

It All Just Fell Into Place

We didn’t really have a colour scheme but we did want vintage, so I guess that was our theme…country vintage; with a fusion of rustic and elegance. I don’t think there was an original idea or theme agenda, it just all fell into place as we found what we loved! Also the venue offered just this, adding bits of our personality with things like the floral bunting and music themed table plan.

Wild Spring Flowers

The flowers, wow, I was so impressed, they were blooming stunning!!! Again, a close friend did these, Gemma Bithell, an exceptionally talented florist. I wanted ‘spring season’ and ‘wild theme’, and I got that and so much more. As I said to her I couldn’t have imagined better!

Home Again

The ceremony was a humanist ceremony as we are not religious. It was conducted by my Uncle Rod. We did the legal bit just before the ceremony, keeping it short and sweet.

The procession was to ‘Home Again’ by Carole King. The groom had arranged for some of our amazingly talented friends to play this! It was a wonderful surprise for me. The song means a lot as it was the first song we ever danced to together.

We had a poem and two readings. The poem was beautifully written and read by my uncle Rod. We did not choose the readings as we wanted our friends to choose. The first reading by a close friend, Angela Griffin, was ‘Union’ by Robert Flugham, this is beautifully sincere and genuine. The second reading was by a close friend Craig Wakerley from ‘Captain Corelli’s Mandolin.’

Gypsy Jazz

We had The Riviera from Manchester as our band, our guests were very impressed. They played django Reinhardt gypsy jazz style covers of contemporary songs! We thought they were very quirky and unique.

Our first dance was to Dark Side from the album ‘Scissors in my Pocket’ by Polly Paulusma.

Complements to the Chef

The food was catered by fforest, with an Afternoon Tea for the more formal bit…speeches and toasts etc, followed by an informal evening hog roast. The food was stunning!!! We had complements from all our guests.

The cake was designed and made by another extremely talented family friend, Fiona Durling, the design was based on my dress. The design was a wonderful surprise for us; it perfectly complemented the day, the theme, and the dress. It was so stunning and elegant!

Designed By Us

Our save the date cards and invitations were all designed and hand made by us with recycled materials. We wanted them to reflect the outdoor, rustic theme, and our personalities.

The table plan was mainly designed by the groom after we spent hours trawling through record collections.

We had a DIY photo-booth with a digital camera, but we also had a vintage polaroid camera set up for use so that we could have instant keepsakes that couldn’t be deleted!

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Venue – fforest
Dress – Eden by Jenny Packham
Florist – Gemma Bithell
Headband – Glitzy Secrets
Grooms Outfit – Pop Boutique
Maids – Debenhams, Monsoon, John Lewis
Band – The Riviera
Photography – Marshal Gray

Isn’t it magical?
The image of Sarah and Ben’s little girl reaching up to them on the dance floor makes my heart melt.

If I was Sarah I’d look at these images at every possible opportunity.

Lots of love,

Fern x

Beautiful bride Brigitte is the polar opposite of a bridezilla. She and Sam made all of their wedding decisions together, applying their laid-back approach to life to their wedding day. The relaxed, family feel shines through in the images, as does their ‘togetherness.’ These two really, really love each other.

The ‘things we like’ theme is great as it creates weddings that are so natural, authentic and fun. Although it probably helps when the couple doing the ‘throwing things together’ are so stylish. Brigitte’s veil is stunning and works perfectly with her elegant and simple gown. And Sam looks every inch the dapper British Gent.

The venue also holds childhood memories for them both – I love the possibility that their lives crossed as children – so romantic. And the flowers make me very happy indeed – so vibrant and perfect for an Easter wedding.

Childhood Memories

Brigitte The Bride: The ceremony and reception was held in a beautiful 17th century barn at Blake Hall, Bobbingworth near Epping. We chose this venue as we both separately have great memories of this place – as children we would go here for the craft fayre.

To our luck they had the Easter Saturday available and that was it, we booked the venue. The venue has a really family feel, we’re not sure if it’s the history we have with the place or the great team they have there. Austin and Rachel were really great.

Naturally Beautiful

I did my own hair and makeup as we wanted a relaxed feel, whimsical if you like. For my foundation I used Dior Nude BB Cream (colour one) – I absolutely love this stuff.

My perfume was Diptyque Eau Rose and my nail colour was by Rococo and called ‘Whisper of Envy.’ I wanted my hair fairly natural, with a few waves and loosely pinned up with some flowers put in as well.

Subtle Elegance

I wanted a subtle but elegant dress that was not fussy so that I could accessorise. I really wanted a lace veil so didn’t want a lace dress. After going to bridal shops and thinking this just isn’t me, I opted for a J-Crew dress, a flowing, subtle and flattering gown(the Sofia dress). I’d seen this dress a long time ago and just kept thinking about it.

Sam’s suit was by The Kooples – a three-piece British check suit. He wore a burgundy Ben Sherman tie and his great great Grandfather’s pocket watch and chain.

All About The Accessories

I wore Rachel Simpson Anya peep toes, then Grecian style sandals from Oasis. I wore a gold bee necklace that my friend Jen bought me and my husband’s Grandma lent me a beautiful string of Pearls. These were Sam’s Great Great Grandma’s!

I changed my necklace in the evening, through fear of breaking the antique heirloom pearls. I opted for a mink colour petal necklace from BHLDN.

The veil was a talking point. I finally got my all lace veil. And I loved it. The rings came from Brighton, a shop called Finch Jewellers on Meeting House Lane. They were bought from a funny lady who was full of beans, we loved her.

Touches Of Burgundy

We had one bridesmaid, my sister Amy, her two boys Leo and Lucas as page boys and one Groomsman – Andy. My sister wore the Aliana Lace dress by Ted Baker; she picked it herself. She wore burgundy shoes to go with the pageboys burgundy suits, which they picked. Andy wore the York Jacket and York Trousers by Ted Baker and a Ben Sherman waistcoat with a burgundy Ben Sherman Tie.

We didn’t have a particular colour scheme in mind it just sort of grew from the boy’s suits and having little touches of the burgundy here and there really worked.

Things We Like

We wanted a colourful fun day but tried not to stick to any particular theme, we just picked things up along the way that we liked.
At the bar there were mini cocktail umbrellas, cocktail stick flamingos and loads of colourful paper straws. Around the barn we had bunting, lots of candle sticks and tea lights. We also found a great company to hire giant light up letters, these were amazing and a real talking point. There was an area with Moroccan cushions, a great place for the kids to relax after dancing.

As it was Easter we found some vintage inspired papier-mâché eggs for the children, filled them with chocolate mini eggs and little retro chicks we also hid eggs all around the barn for the children to find, they loved it!

Vibrant Flowers

Our florist was fabulous, very laid back and knew exactly what we wanted. We asked for colourful, vibrant flowers with seasonal wild and garden flowers incorporated but nothing too formal. They arranged the flowers in pressed glasses on a mirrored base with tea lights. The colours were so vibrant; I honestly have never seen flowers that bright in colour!

My bouquet was similar to the tables with wild flowers including bluebells and peonies, my bridesmaid had a smaller version. The page boys had wee little button holes, one little bud with a tiny sprig of wax flower. The Groom and Groomsman had colourful buttonholes which had craspedia as well as other bright flowers.

The aisle had potted Primulas that we gave to some of our guests; they looked so adorable and were just right for the barn. The barn didn’t need much decorating, all it really needed was the flowers and Achillea really did deliver.

A lump In Our Throats

The ceremony was very small and personal. I walked down to Israel Kamakawiwo’ole Somewhere/What a wonderful world. As the song started my dad whispered to me ‘ooh that’s your mother in tears.’ We waited a little until we walked down the aisle. And yes, my mother was in tears. The start of the song is so beautiful I think we all had a lump in our throats.

When the vows were over we walked down the aisle together and as everyone looked back Sam held me and we kissed, this was a really lovely moment and we could hear the awwws.

I Will Wait

Our first dance was amazing! Mumford and Sons – ‘I will wait’. It started off with Sam and I dancing then we called people up to join in, we all danced then some of our friends and family made a circle by holding hands and all the sudden we were in the middle, as we danced they span round us, it was a great moment that we could not have replicated.

At the end of the evening we had Green Day – Good Riddance (Time of your Life) and everyone held hands in a circle around us again. During the last chorus Sam picked me up, he timed it perfectly, again my mum was crying! Sam’s Dad David then walked into the circle and welcomed me to the clan!

Gaz from Discowed was our DJ, they made it into a great night out. Before the wedding Paddy even put us on the guest list of a few club nights they were doing in London, they didn’t treat us like customers; more like mates.

Let Your Hair Down

On our guest book table we had a big jar of chocolate eggs, champagne truffle hearts and wee little bags with a packet of lavender seeds and a chocolate coin as favours.

We also had a Polaroid camera with peel off sticky back prints so people could stick them in the guest book, this went really well and we had some VERY interesting photos from it.

On each table there was a small glass with chocolate eggs. For the evening we had a buffet with Sam’s favourite – beef and horseradish rolls. We paid for the bar which made a big difference as people really let their hair down. On our table we toasted with Perrier-Jouët Belle Epoque Rosé Vintage Champagne, which was amazing and a fabulous bottle!

The cake was made by my cousin Keeley (she appeared on Master Chef) it was bright, colourful and full of flowers, it looked stunning. We left it up to her to design and she got it spot on. It was a mix of flavours and everybody enjoyed it.

Minty Fresh

The stationery was important, it had to be personal. We don’t know where the idea came from but thought flags in lemonade bottles would look good. We painted card a mint green colour and wrote on them with a gold pen. The name tags were painted mint green manila tags with bakers twine. The menus had blossom from Rifle Paper co. We bought some cards from there and DIY’d our menus. I made the table plan, bought an old frame and used a chalk pen.

Disorganised & Laid Back

We wanted our wedding to be colourful, fun, happy and as disorganised and laid back as we are. We tried not to have a theme as we felt that it puts added pressure on people to get it just right. We wanted to just go with the flow and for it to be all about close friends and family.

Team Work

We tried to do everything together, I’ve heard of brides giving their grooms specific tasks to do like music or entertainment and they don’t get a look in for anything else.To us we didn’t think that was fair, it should be a great experience for the both of you, enjoy looking up things together and deciding on what you want, don’t task each other to do separate things, work together, that’s why you’re getting married because you do work well together!

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Venue – Blake Hall
Brides Dress – J-Crew
Shoes – Rachel Simpson Oasis
Veil – Delphine Manivet
Necklace – BHLDN
Grooms Outfit – The Kooples, Ben Sherman
Bridesmaid and Groomsman – Ted Baker
Décor – Pipii, Vowed And Amazed
Stationery – Rifle Paper Co.
Florist – Achillea
DJ – Disco Wed
Cake – Cakes by Keeley Louise
Photography – Peachey Photography

A gorgeous set of photo’s from Katherine at Peachey Photography, who informed me that this wedding was shot entirely on film, rather than digital.

“…I’ve actually moved from shooting in digital to film early this year. It’s so much nicer – the colours and tones are lovely, much more flattering and it all feels much more special.”

The gold and mint green combination for the table names looks amazing and exposed beams bathed in golden light at Blake Hall makes for such an atmospheric reception venue too!

Not bad for such dis-organised and laid back people hey??

Lots of love,
Fern x

As soon as the engagement shoot of Ali and Ricky appeared in my inbox I knew the wedding was going to be EPIC.

And I wasn’t wrong.

The styling is simple yet perfectly bohemian and the fashion is delicious, Ali’s 70′s Biba dress is stunningly beautiful and she exchanged her pretty floral crown headpiece to a statement beaded number for the evening reception, a quick and easy way to change up your look.

And the bouquet?! like nothing I’ve ever seen before.

Just about every single image from this affair is wall-worthy and every detail completely covetable, make sure you check out the gallery for even more magical moments.

Check

The amazing Fforest in Cilgerran Wales was our chosen festival wedding venue and my god did it tick all the boxes! Vintage tea party…check, giant hat tipi…check…, pub…check, log fires…check, Beautiful landscape…check, glamping…check, amazing food…check, super staff…check, perfect for a festival wedding…CHECK !!

We wanted a relaxed, bohemian party and Fforest delivered our festival dreams and then some! Our wedding lasted an entire weekend with guests camping onsite with us. SHEER BLISS. Would I recommend this venue to everyone? YES!!!!

An Era I Love

My hair and make was relaxed & bohemian to reflect the tone of the wedding. Pinterest was amazing for inspiration on this genre and I also love all things boho! Simple plaits amongst loose curls created the look for my hair. My make up was simple with a touch of colour on the lips and a heavier eyeliner on my eyes to a represent the 70s; an era I just LOVE!

Nicky from Beauty call (nationwide hair & makeup artists) created the look with such ease & perfection & was a total gem on the day!

Vintage Glamour

My dress was BIBA. I have always admired the fashion heritage of this brand. When I found out they did an exclusive bridal range I just had to source one of their dresses! My dress is the Alexia Dress and totally captures the 70s; I just loved the simplicity of it. A simple embellished waistband & open back adds a touch of vintage glamour.

I was in love with this dress from day one & it did not disappoint on the day! Thank you BIBA!

A Dream

Ricky was suited & booted in a Ted Baker navy herringbone suit. We mixed up textures & prints to add that boho touch and his shoes were from Dune. He looked a total DREAM!

Vintage Pinks

Dressing my best girlfriends in the world was easy & a delight! The colour scheme was vintage pinks, creams, peaches, nudes. All three of the girl’s dresses were from Miss Selfridge, each dress was different but matched together by colour. Textured flowers, pretty jewel detail & pearls are all on trend features for SS13 & fit perfectly with my vintage boho wedding!

To finish the look each girl wore a super cute floral trim cape by Lashes Edit featured in Topshop and on Lashes Of London.

From Boho To Flapper

During the day I wore a flower crown headband with satin ribbon & heart detail to add a pretty bohemian touch to my look. The crown was made by Whichgoose from the online handmade marketplace Etsy.

In the evening I wanted to make a point of difference & add glamour. I found my flapper style vintage headpiece from Rouge Pony, an amazing handmade store on Esty.

My shoes were 70′s matt gold platforms by Bertie – perfect for my 70′s boho look! I also wore a pearlised ring – from the prettiest, sweetest shop in London ‘Little Paris’ in Crouch end.

The Boys

The groomsmen wore shades of navy & blue – each boy had a different boho look mixing up different prints & textures. Their outfits were put together in Topman & accessorised with vintage pieces. Brown brogues topped off the look.

A Spring Fete

My colour scheme was vintage pinks, creams, peaches, nudes and pastel colours, for décor we designed around a spring fete/vintage tea party with bunting, mix match vintage china, cake stands, pastel balloons, ribbon, fairy lights, jam jars, vintage bottles, crochet blankets, crochet jam jar covers, tipi, festoon lighting, log fires, candles, vintage buttons, lace, wild foliage and…(breathe)….and wicker baskets!

A Touch Of Whimsy

My flowers were from the fabulous Jill at blooms. I wanted my bouquet to be really whimsical & my god did Jill get it right! The flowers were beautiful in an arm sheif bouquet draped with lots of vintage lace & ribbon to add a totally boho feel! Jill was a dream to work with & totally got what I wanted.

My bridesmaids had a simple whimsical bouquet mixed with wild flowers to add a pretty rustic touch to their gorgeous dresses and finished with vintage ribbon.
The table flowers were various pretty flowers in jam jars, simple gorgeous and totally vintage!

We also had Wilde foliage in the barn, floral wicker hearts and various foliage and flowers to decorate the tipi.

Marrying My Sailor

My favourite part of the ceremony was marrying my sailor! we had an intimate candlelit ceremony with parents for legal words and then a Humanist tipi ceremony so we could have everyone we LOVE under one tipi!!

All of our fabulous friends and family watching us get wed! Sheer bliss! I also remember the moment my Dad first saw me in my dress – A special moment to remember for the rest of my life.

Local Produce

We had a great band – RADWN, a Welsh folk band Acoustic set & live gig we also had some great DJ’s – James LeRouge, Leon & Lewis & X-Bo !

All food was handmade made on the farm with Welsh local produce – The Fforest catering team have this down to a tea & are brilliant!! For the Vintage tea party we had cakes, sandwiches and a hog roast.

We had a selection of drinks, wine, cocktails, processco, real ales, real ciders and homemade lemonade. The brilliant Fiona Perenaras a member of the Fforest team made our victoria sponge wedding cake.

Personal Touches

Detail was super important to me as I really wanted make my own stamp on the wedding!! Our tables were named after our favourite places & cities that Ricky and I had travelled too. We made name cards which had our initials & wedding date on them!

For the table plan a chalk board decorated in shabby chic lace & bunting, names were printed on vintage luggage tags. For place names we had super cute heart shaped shortbread biscuits!

The Best Time Ever

Enjoy the build up & try not to get too stressed, Don’t worry about your guests, they LOVE you & will be happy whatever the circumstance! Having a festival wedding in Wales, I totally freaked out about the weather & worried my guests would too when in actual fact they just embraced every aspect. Luckily enough for us it stayed dry… for majority of the weekend anyway!

Having people around you that are calming & used to weddings on the wedding morning is a massive advantage! Think about who you hire as your photographer & hair & makeup artist – do you get on with them? Our photographer Claudia Rose Carter & my hair & make up artist Nicky from BeautyCall were both AMAZING!!! They made me feel totally brilliant & really helped to calm my nerves.

JUST LAP IT ALL UP, IT’S THE BEST TIME EVER !!!

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Venue – Fforest
Hair & Make-Up – Beauty call
Brides Gown – Biba
Brides Floral Crown – Whichgoose
Brides Flapper Crown – Rouge Pony
Brides Shoes – Bertie
Grooms Suit -Ted Baker
Maids Dresses – Miss Selfridge
Florist – Jill at Blooms
Catering And Cake – Fforest
Photography – Claudia Rose Carter

Told you so.

I want Ali’s dress. And headpiece. BOTH in fact.

I also want that cake. For my breakfast.

Big 70′s Love

Charlotte xxx

Denise and Chris make my heart melt.

Possibly because in nearly every single image of this gorgeous pair they are laughing, smiling and clasping each other so tightly that you can’t help but be swept up by the love they have for one another.

And then there’s the horse.

Yes folks, the day has arrived. I finally get to blog a wedding with one of our equine friends making an appearance. Frankly any couple that chooses to have some of their portrait shots alongside this most noble of creatures are heroes in my book.

I’m also lusting after Denise’s gorgeous bonce which is exactly how I would have liked my barnet to have looked on my own wedding day except that my hair isn’t a) as luscious or b) as thick. There’s a serious case of the green-eyed monster from over this side of the screen.

Why not check it out for yourself…

Nurstead Court

Denise The Bride:We chose Nurstead Court as we had come across it whilst walking our dogs! It is set in amazing grounds and the bonus was that we were able to marry at St Mildred’s which is the church attached to Nurstead. An even bigger plus was that it’s only 5 minutes from where we live and extremely pretty!

The old house and grounds were great for photos and there is a permanent marquee which was ideal for the evening reception. I wanted to keep everyone in one room and as the weather on our day was so beautiful, the side walls were brought back to let the amazing countryside in.

Natural Beauty

I wanted to look like me but a bit better! I didn’t want to go overboard with the make up, but wanted a more natural look and found a lovely lady, Carla Nicholls who has worked for 10 years in the beauty industry, mainly with MAC and Christian Dior.

She knew exactly what I was looking for and made me look and feel brilliant. The make up lasted all day even though the day was pretty warm with lots of dancing in the evening! I wore Givency Dahlia Noir perfume.

My hair was done by my best friend, Sophie Marks, a senior stylist at Stephen Casali Hairdressing Salon in Sloane Square. We had a bit of a play around, going from massive hair to something a little more restrained! I also had a headpiece that I had bought which was very 1920s but when I put it on I felt more like Wonder Woman than a 1920s goddess, so opted for something less flashy!

A Last Minute Swop

The dress was a bit of a nightmare! I had originally visited a few shops where I’d tried on various styles and whilst feeling a little jaded tried on, and then ordered!, a Benjamin Roberts dress from Bride And Groom in Gravesend. It was fishtail, tulle and a bit of bling and, although very pretty, I always knew it wasn’t ‘The One’.

After fretting for a couple of months myself and Chris’ mum went back to the bridal shop and found the Justin Alexander dress, and luckily I was able to swap it! Although the timing was pretty tight as the dress only turned up two weeks before the wedding! The dress did come with a beautiful veil, but I thought at the grand old age of 43 I may be pushing the veil thing a little bit! Linda, the lovely owner of Bride & Groom also made me a lovely satin belt with crystals to finish the look off.

My shoes were a bit of a bargain from the Next sale – at only £12! My only jewellery was my nan’s pearl bracelet, which I know she would’ve been thrilled to know I was wearing. My hair accessory was a rushed, day before purchase in Claire’s Accessories for the grand price of £6!

He Did It His Way

My bridesmaids were my best friend, Sophie and my niece Becky. We had decided pretty early on that we wanted a navy and ivory colour theme and I also didn’t want strapless dresses. By chance I stumbled across some midnight blue chiffon dresses in Coast at House of Fraser and made the rash decision (without them present!) that they would be perfect. Jessica, our flower girl, and Chris’ daughter, had an ivory lace dress and matching shoes from BHS.

The suits were solely Chris’ domain and whilst I was very clear that I didn’t want traditional tails, this is exactly what he got from the lovely folks at Well Suited! I guess I wanted him to go down the retro-vintage vibe, but at the end of the day they all looked great and I think I may have had to admit that he was right!

Navy And Ivory

We never had a theme but always wanted a navy blue and ivory colour – more I think because of Chris’ love for Tottenham Hotspur but as an Arsenal fan I was never going to have any football themed wedding cake – which he wanted! A lovely lady called Maria from Bridal Wonderland decorated the marquee – with the ivory chair covers and navy tie-backs. We also opted for ivory and navy feather centrepieces – as we wanted some height to them and flowers, although gorgeous, are expensive! The look was exactly what we wanted!

Heavenly Scent

The gorgeous church pew ends, bouquets, button-holes and top table arrangements were all produced by my friend Louise Barnard, together with Rachel who together run Heavenly Scent, a workshop based florist in Gravesend.

I wanted something very wild, not too structured and both my own and the bridesmaids’ flowers were full of roses, peonies, freesias and gypsophila and looked and smelled amazing! The pew ends in the church were kept simple using gypsophilia tied with a blue satin ribbon and twine. Louise and Rachel did such an fantastic job, I absolutely loved the flowers and had many comments from guests about them.

Swanlike Serenity

I was totally calm before walking into the church, something I never thought I would be. I imagined sweating, fainting, crying, but no, I just wanted to get in! Both our sons read gorgeous readings (John 15:9-12) and a poem “God binding you together, love for each other. Love in your thinking. Love in your actions. Love in your home. Love in your lives. Love sustain you in sorrow. Love shine in your joy. God binding you together. Love for each other.”

I walked down the aisle to Pachelbel in Canon D and we sung three hymns – Morning Has Broken, Lord of Hopefulness and Give Me Joy in My Heart. I was impressed with the gusto of the congregation!

After the meal Chris Till took to the floor and belted out a blinding set (including Frank Sinatra and Michael Buble). DJ Alan Howard had provided uplighters for the marquee which set the mood and also a white LED dance floor, which I had coveted since falling in love with one at a previous wedding! He kept the party going with a mixture of both reggae (Chris’ favourite) and my love of old school rave (“On a Ragga Tip” will live long in the memory!)

Our first dance was to Ali Campbell’s “Happiness” which proved hard to come by as it was from a 1995 album which was no longer available to download! Luckily one of Alan’s DJ pals came to our rescue!

Food, Drink & Treats

We choose Bite-Me Catering to produce our wedding breakfast and in order to keep our costs down we decided to have canapes with bucks fizz on arrival at Nurstead Court followed by a carvery.

The amazing cake was made by a friend of mine, Sarah Tuttlebury. It consisted of two deep tiers – the bottom layer being chocolate and the top vanilla which were iced with small sugar flowers and was delicious. The guests’ favours were made by my Mum and Dad, who put a Ferrero Rocher on a stick and wrapped a blue ribbon around them! Cost effective but time consuming!

Take One DIY Phobic Bride

Being a complete DIY phobic I managed to avoid doing anything creative! Instead by using Facebook and Ebay we managed to buy a lot of things for significantly less – although not skimping on quality in the least. We had a bit of a last minute hiccup with our original table plan (getting lost in the post!) but with a day to go, Carol of Wedding-Belles stepped in and saved the day – and I could not have been happier with the table plan – totally gorgeous!

Enjoy And Savour

Don’t have a spray tan the night before the wedding – I ended up with orange hands! It didn’t really bother me, I was surprised how calm and laid back I was on the day and I managed to enjoy every second! The fact that the sun shone and everything went to plan helped too! Always try to get personal recommendations for suppliers and always negotiate!

I would recommend investing in a videographer – my husband did an amazing speech and we both can’t wait to see it again as I can’t remember half of it! We’re so looking forward to seeing it and our amazing videographer Tim Griffiths. Secondly it’s true when they say it goes so fast so enjoy and savour as much as you can!!

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Venue – Nurstead Court
Dress – Justin Alexander
Boutique – Bride and Groom in Gravesend
Hair – Sophie Marks at Stephen Casali
Maids – Coast
Groom – Well Suited
Florist Heavenly Scent
Entertainment – Chris Till
DJ – Alan Howard
Catering – Bite Me Catering
Photography – Hannah May Photography

When Denise talked about the gusto with which her nearest and dearest sang the hymn ‘give me joy in my heart’ it bought a huge smile to my face. I adore weddings where every single guest embraces the spirit of the day and really gets involved.

After all that’s what it’s all about isn’t it…love, family, friends and joyful hearts.

All my love Lolly xxx

I feel so incredibly privileged to be sharing this morning’s wedding with you lovely lot. For today’s bride has been a prominent and much loved member of the RMW community for some time now, offering up her creative thoughts and sharing her golden nuggets of advice in the comments section with both the RMW team and you gorgeous folks too.

So when we heard that Sama, of Utterly Wow fame, wanted to share her big day on our still-kind-of-polka-dotted pages we all squealed a collective ‘ahhhhhhh’ (yes even Adam!) and fought over who would blog it.

This wedding has style in abundance; from the festoon lighting, the rustic venue to the colourful and fun stationery and the mismatched maids to.. wait for it folks…’The Great Wedding Bake-off’; I defy you not to relish in every detail. I particularly love Sama’s off-white peeptoes and her beautiful Claire Pettibone dress which has a story that proves to me at least that if something is meant to be then it will happen.

And there’s sentimentality by the bucketload too; I’ll let Sama tell you about her beautiful floral crown herself. I promise that you’ll love it.

Without further ado then lovelies, I give you Sama….

Chantilly

Sama The Bride:Ahhh, the dress.

My beaded beauty was Chantilly by Claire Pettibone. The dress hunt was never going to be entirely conventional for me as I work at Blackburn Bridal Couture in Blackheath, London, meaning I didn’t have to ‘do the rounds’, so to speak. I’d always thought Chantilly was beautiful but we sold our sample shortly before I got engaged, so it wasn’t even an option when the dress search began. Instead I’d fallen in love with Luna by Jenny Packham, a blush pink sparkly number that I still like to stroke regularly in the shop. However my Mum wasn’t convinced, hoping, as most Mums do, that I’d choose something a bit more bridal, so despite my best intentions to ignore her I held off from ordering.

When we got Chantilly back in at the boutique, I tried it on more on a whim than anything else; it was considerably out of my price range and I’d been ruling out bias-cut dresses on the grounds that my stomach wasn’t flat enough. However, it felt amazing on and I pretty much knew instantly that it was the dress I wanted to wear the day I married Paul. Those beads can hide a multitude of sins!

Crowning Glory

Being a self-proclaimed ‘boho bride’, I knew I was going to wear a flower garland from day one. I’d originally envisioned fresh flowers, but when my Mum produced the wax flower garland she wore on her wedding day, the sentiment of wearing ‘something old’ was too hard to resist. In its original state it was a very thin, delicate crown of ivory flowers, so I enlisted the super-talented and super-lovely Sophie of Crown & Glory to give it a new lease of life. The end result was the most beautiful thing I could have ever imagined, and something I may even be able to pass on myself one day.

Other than that, the only jewellery I wore were rings left to me by my grandmothers, and a pale pink diamantine bracelet by Les Nereides which was a pre-wedding gift to myself.

Sexy Peeptoes

My shoes were the Emilia peep-toe sandals by Juicy Couture, believe it or not, who I’ve only ever associated with velour tracksuits but who I now know make beautiful footwear! They were a bit of a last-minute purchase after the first pair (£15 nude t-bars from eBay that I painstakingly glittered up the heels of) crippled me at my first dress fitting. I love the Juicy Coutures now though; comfortable and versatile and just a little bit sexy.

And who doesn’t love a sexy shoe?

Va Va Voom

I’ve always loved doing make-up so decided to do it myself on the day. Being able to spend a ridiculous amount of money at the Bobbi Brown counter was a particular highlight of the wedding planning. I also decided to get eyelash extensions a couple of days before which wasn’t the most pleasant of experiences, but do look fab in the pictures.

My hair, on the other hand, is the bane of my life. It’s a decent length but it’s very thin, meaning the luscious, boho locks I envisaged were an impossible dream. Step in the magnificent Cassandra Rizzuto who told me to stop being a negative Norman and used a mixture of clip-in and glued-in hair pieces for Cheryl Cole-style volume. I literally wish I could have hair like that every day. Sigh.

Cass also styled my bridesmaids to perfection with a mixture of tousled, braided up-dos and was a general dream to have with us in the morning. Calm, fun and ridiculously talented; hire her and your hair dreams will come true. Fact.

Green Fingered Goddesses

Gayle of Bloomin’gayles made the bouquets and buttonholes, whilst we DIY-ed the table flowers (ordered on the internet by me and beautifully arranged the day before by my Aunt Leslie).

Our wedding was a very joyful affair… as you can see by my gurning face in most of the pictures. Paul and I grinned at each other all through the ceremony, and although I wobbled during my speech when talking about my Gran, the only tears that fell were in the morning when my Mum presented me with my bouquet. I wanted lavish, vibrant, blousy blooms and it was exactly that- but so much better. Gayle is a green-fingered goddess and a delight to work with too. Thoroughly recommended!!

A Little Bit Sharp, A Little Bit Sexy

I’m not a massive fan of the matchy matchy look, so wanted my bridesmaids (my oldest, oldest friends from school) in different dresses but the same colour palette. Oh, and I wanted them to look FIT which I think they totally achieved The dresses were a range of purchases from French Connection, Oasis and ASOS, and they managed to bring coordinating pashminas on the day too- which was a blessing as despite the glorious sunshine it was a little nippy. Paul’s best man, Alex, wore a grey three-piece suit to match his, and along with Paul’s two brothers, they all wore burgundy ties from Moss.

Paul is a teacher so I’m used to seeing him in a suit. Having said that, it wasn’t a tails kind of day so we were after something a little bit sharp, a little bit sexy, and in my head, a little bit Tom Ford. In the end it was a charcoal grey Cerruti three-piece from Moss that had me swooning- which he accessorised with a Ted Baker pocket square and colourful buttonhole courtesy of Bloomin’gayles.

He looked stonkingly handsome.

Worth Every Penny

I began stalking Dominique Bader having seen her work on these very pages actually! Well, they were blue and polka dot back then, but you know what I mean. Dominique is a phenomenal photographer; her work is natural, timeless, real, crystal-clear and ridiculously romantic. We are so utterly thrilled with our photos, and as Paul said emphatically after we’d watched our slideshow for the first time- WORTH EVERY PENNY. And coming from the man who had initially become hysterical at the cost of wedding photography, this is high praise indeed.

The Great Wedding Bake Off

The Great Wedding Bake Off came about largely in a bid to reduce costs! My Mum was originally going to make a cake which we’d serve as dessert with cream and berries, but she had so many other jobs to do in the lead up we decided to open it up to our guests instead. Despite protests from Paul that “no-one would bother”, our cake table was heaving and the efforts people went to were just brilliant! It’s one of my few regrets that I didn’t get to fully appreciate the vast array of offerings at the time…

Meant To Be

I first discovered Kate Ruth Romey when I saw some amazing rustic invitations on another blog that were on pieces of hand-carved wood. When I went on her website I realised she was based in Blackheath where I work, so I felt it was ‘meant to be’.

I had a clear idea of what I wanted to say, but Kate designed me a really fun, modern, colourful invitation suite which really caught people’s attention. And I’d definitely recommend making your RSVP as interactive as possible. Bar one person I had all my RSVPs back by the deadline. Kate is super-talented and very patient; I’m very glad I found her!

Floor Flooders

I’m lucky to know lots of talented, musical types so we took full advantage of this during the day. A few years ago I’d sung at my friends’, Alice and Jeff’s, wedding, so they repayed the favour at mine, singing ‘You and I’ by Ingrid Michaelson during the signing of the register. Then my very cool Canadian cousin, River, entertained the crowds afterwards out in the orchard.

In the evening we had a freakin’ amazing band called Flood The Floor, who I’d booked purely because a) they were fit and b) they did a very funky version of Boom! Shake The Room. We started dancing during their sound check and literally didn’t stop all night.

We didn’t have a first dance at Paul’s request but I didn’t mind at all. I knew we’d have a drunken ‘last dance’ instead and asked the band to learn ‘Love Is In The Air’ which is the
end song from the greatest film of all time, Strictly Ballroom. As I’d hoped, Paul and I ended up in the middle of the dancefloor surrounded by everyone and it was perfect. And being lifted up by friends to the sound of ‘Sama’s in the air’ was a pretty epic way to end the evening, I must say.

The Great Barn

The venue hunt was probably the hardest part of all as I had such specific criteria. I wanted a dry hire venue in Kent that was rustic, had character and didn’t charge corkage. The Great Barn was the perfect blank canvas venue- they literally give you the keys for up to a week and you can do what you like as long as you leave it how you found it!

Paul had very little input in the styling or planning other than to say he wanted a relaxed, fun day. As I was in the process of setting up as a wedding planner when we got engaged, I was already a blog addict and had fantasies of creating a colourful, eclectic, bohemian-inspired day with just a touch of sparkle.

Festoon lighting was an absolute priority, as were the paper lanterns which we arranged in a cluster over the dance floor. I love the natural linen tablecloths as seen on the American blogs, but they are SO expensive to hire so my clever Mum decided to make them herself- as she did the table runners which were a mixture of gold sequins, black and white stripes and burnt orange shot silk.

Flowers were arranged in a variety of pimped-up jam jars, and these very cool brown beer bottles which we collected from a local restaurant in Blackheath. I think they did pretty well out of us over the last year…

Bring Me S’More

We didn’t do favours- we had a free bar instead which, in my mind, is way more preferable!

We borrowed a dodgy khaki-green bar which was a prop from the local Am Dram society, and my clever, artistic Aunt Leslie (she of flower arranging fame) turned it in to a wood-effect, steel-topped beast which blended in with the barn seamlessly. And we hand-painted all the signs, drinks menus and table numbers which were littered about the place. Out in the orchard we had ribbons hanging from the trees, and in the evening a firepit was lit and s’mores were toasted (a North American tradition brought over by my Canadian relatives).

And I can’t not mention Van Dough, the wood-fired pizza van that turned up in the evening to provide the evening food. Absolutely delicious pizza and genuinely lovely owners.

Trust Your Gut

Our wedding was quite simply the best day we have ever had and people didn’t stop laughing or smiling all day. Weather-wise, May was appalling- it rained solidly the two days before the wedding and was so cold we had to order a last-minute heater. Yet on the day itself I woke up to sunshine and it was just glorious- a wedding gift from my Grandmothers, I like to think.

We were both so relaxed on the day and this was down to two things: 1- My amazing friends and family who got stuck in and helped set up (and take down), and 2- my friend Laura who I met on the UKAWP wedding planning course a couple of years ago, and who coordinated for me on the day. In the run-up to the wedding everyone was worried that I wouldn’t be able to relinquish control but I knew I was in safe hands with Laura running the show!

I can’t stress enough how important it is to hire an on-the-day coordinator if you are using a blank canvas, dry hire venue. The barn got turned from ceremony space to reception space seamlessly, the candles were constantly lit, the wine was constantly topped up, and any problems or questions people went to her, not me. Not to mention the million other things she was doing throughout the day.

But other than that, trust your instincts, choose good suppliers, kiss your husband LOTS, hug LOTS, laugh LOTS, and don’t spill pizza down your dress. Just sayin’.

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Venue – Great Barn Weddings
Dress – Chantilly by Claire Pettibone
Boutique – Blackburn Bridal
Hair – Love Your Hair
Flower Garland – Crown And Glory
Groom – Moss
Florist Bloomin’gayles
Band – Flood The Floor
Catering – Tatlers Catering
Photography – Dominique Bader Photography
Pizza Van – Van Dough
Stationery – Kate Ruth Romey
Planning/Design – Utterly Wow
On The Day Co-ordination – Your Wedding Your Way
Furniture Hire – Academy Furniture Hire

Oh boy! Immense, right? Shall I leave you for a wee moment to pick your jaws up off the floor?

And can we just take a moment to talk about the florals. Talk about breathtakingly, blowsy, beautiful blooms, it’s no wonder that Sama shed a happy tear or two when she saw them. I for one will be pinning these bouquets to within an inch of their lives!

When I sneaked a peek of Sama at the weekend in all her glory on the RMW Facebook page, one of her friends responded with a comment that’s stayed with me ever since. She said, ‘It was the BEST wedding. Style AND substance’, and you just know that this statement encapsulates Sama and Paul’s wedding perfectly.

This wedding oozes style, creativity and charm but you can see from the beaming smiles on the faces of this gorgeous pair and all their friends and family it was so much more than that. There’s enough love in these photos to last a lifetime or two and this makes me very happy indeed.

Congratulations you two.

All my love Lolly xxx

P.S. If you want to see more and hear more from Sama herself why not check out her blog – Utterly Wow – here.

Yes – that’s right…this wedding has horses. I can virtually hear the ooohs and awwws from here. I think Steph and Tom’s venue may be one of the most idyllic I’ve ever seen and luckily the British weather held out for their ceremony. Everything just looks so beautiful bathed in the Spring sunshine.

Steph and Tom seemed to keep the music pumping, the food coming and the drink flowing all day long – they even had a late-night campfire with marshmallow toasting. I know. AMAZING.

I’ll pass you over to Steph who makes a very stylish Bride in her fitted lace gown – which by the way she rocks in the unusual champagne tone. It works so perfectly with her skin tone. AND it was the first dress she tried on!

Winding Country Roads

Steph the Bride: The perfect venue was at Clavelshay Barn, North Petherton near Taunton. Tom and I had spotted it online and thought it was worth a visit and were definitely not disappointed. We knew on the first visit that it would be perfect. Winding country roads, humming birds, sweeping hills, cows and quaint country houses , beautiful gardens … and a chance to make something truly our own. Sue who owns the venue was also a lovely and very genuine host who went above and beyond to help us create our special day.

Timeless Glamour

Hair and makeup wise I was inspired by 1950’s classic glamour as for me it’s timeless and would really compliment my dress. My makeup was very simple, just a simple black eye flick, false lashes and a touch of Bobbi Brown’s Plum Rose lipstick which is a fabulous colour that I would definitely recommend.

Mine and my bridesmaids makeup was done by the very talented Lucy Davis. I had hair extensions for the day to add thickness to my hair which were perfectly coloured matched and put in by my wonderful mother Loraine Williams put in a few weeks before, she is an absolute pro and has her own business from home doing this. To compliment my hair Louise Alway (available through Lucy) beautifully styled and curled my hair to have luscious volume and bouncy waves. I also wore Chanel Chance on the wedding day which was a classic scent.

Classic, Fitted Lace

My dress was from the Carina Baverstock Couture Boutique in Bradford-on-Avon and is named ‘Mystere’ by Claire Pettibone. I’ve always been into fashion and classic lace fitted styles and fell in love with Claire Pettibone’s original designs the moment I spotted them online. I discussed my day and theme with the boutique owner and she just knew. It was the first dress I tried on and I never looked back! My dress was champagne coloured, fitted, had capped short sleeves, features intricate beaded detailing and a stunning vintage lilac flower on the lower back which was absolutely stunning. I loved every minute wearing it and felt extremely glamorous.

Tom looked very dapper on our special day and had his bespoke air force blue three piece suit and white shirt handmade by the very-talented P J Robinson and Sons tailor in Alcester. They are a proper old-school four generation tailors and he knew immediately after meeting Lawrence that this was the place for him. His shoes and socks were from Reiss and the groomsmen’s ties were from TM Lewin.

Cute Kitten Heels

I wore a gorgeous Jenny Packham headpiece that complemented the colours and design of my dress. Otherwise I am pretty tall so couldn’t really go for a high heel but found some cute jewelled kitten heels from Nine West online on sale for a bargain of £19. I was really pleased about that, what bride doesn’t like a bargain?

I actually brought the bridesmaid dresses before I had brought my own which was risky, but we were having a Spring wedding and I thought the colour and style would suit everyone’s body shapes and skin tones perfectly. All the bridesmaids wore a nude / pink dress from Fever Designs and accessorised as they liked with beautiful headbands and netted underskirts. The flower girl Elsie’s (my niece) dress was from Monsoon whilst the pageboy’s suit was from Marks and Spencer’s.

A Country Tea Party

Once our venue was sorted everything else sort of came together. We did most of our research on Pinterest and fell in love with the idea of a country tea party style wedding. The colour scheme naturally progressed after purchasing the bridesmaid dresses and my own.

Decor-wise we knew we were having a marquee so wanted to spruce it up a bit and make it a bit country glam. We had fantastic hand-made table-clothes by Tom’s mum Barbara with lace runners hand-stitched along them; old bottles and jam jars lined the table centres, whilst shattered glass and gold tea lights set the mode. We also had beautiful splashes of colour in our flower displays and home-made jam with luggage labels as our guest’s favours.

A Perfect Splash Of Colour

My flowers were absolutely stunning and beautifully arranged by one of my best friends and very talented florist Christiane Simmons. The flowers were the perfect splash of colour for our country themed day and were vintage lilac, purple, pastel pink, cream, blue and yellow. I had English garden roses, roses, peonies, muscari and ranunculus in my bouquet.

On the day we also had beautiful bright bouquets lining the chairs down the aisle, finishing with two olive trees tied with lilac ribbon. Tripods dotted around the garden, whilst other cute arrangements filled jam jars and bottles down the centres of all the tables.

A Very Moving Ceremony

Tom and I had a humanist ceremony outside as our venue wasn’t licensed for our big day. The ceremony was conducted by Jennifer Constant at Tailor Made Ceremonies and felt really special for the both of us as we had a lot of personal input. Jennifer had asked us to fill in a questionnaire about the two of us, how we met and why we loved each other and brought it all together in a very moving ceremony. I had two of my dearest friends Bryony and Nat do a reading which they very kindly wrote for us and was touching to the point of tears. Tom’s friend Darren also read a reading about Relativity from Albert Einstein which was beautiful.

Music For Everyone

We had two bands for the day. During guests arrival, my entrance and the afternoon tea reception we had a funky three-piece gypsy jazz band called Barnone play which really set the mood for the day. During dinner we just had motown songs from our iPod playing until our first dance which was my dad’s song Wonderful Wonderful by The Tymes (He was in this famous motown band in the 60s and passed away 9 years ago). It was beautiful and extremely sentimental.

This followed by live music from our evening band Snappa and some fun DJ sets. Their live music was incredible and would definitely be recommended for any wedding! They had everyone including my granddad up on the floor dancing the night away!

Locally Sourced Food

All the food barring the cake was lovingly cooked up and created in house at Clavelshay Barn. Tom and I are big into locally sourced foods and were delighted that Clavelshay take such pride in where they source their food and the high quality they provide. Reception was a bite size take on afternoon tea, cucumber sandwiches, cheese bites, scones and jam, éclairs and smoked salmon blinis served with Pimms. This was followed by a huge hog roast buffet with served with stuffing, braised red cabbage, seasonal vegetables, dauphinoise potatoes and scrumpy sauce. After there was fresh fruit and cream, coffee, a selection of loose leaf teas and heart shaped chocolates. In the evening the yummy five tiered Victoria sponge cake was served with a selection of cheeses, bread, grapes and chutneys. The cake was made by Kate at Living Pretty a local tea shop in Somerset.

A Helping Hand

What would I do without my best friend Gem? She designed everything from the cute forget-me-not Save the Date seed envelopes, to the invites and the seating plan. We told her about our day and she created this whole tea thing which completely stuck with us for the whole day. The colours were in keeping with the day, creams, lilacs, pinks, blues and pale greens.

We also had a lot of help from Tom’s sister Al and his mum Barbara. Allison hand wrote all the name places on the favours and lined the old suitcase (for cards) in old vintage map paper which looked fabulous. She also wrote the menu for the evening meal and painted the wooden Wedding sign we had at the venue entrance.

Barbara with the help of her husband Martin made all the tablecloths as well as all the jam favours which were delicious. We’d also like to thank David and Richard for making the easel for the seating plan and the wooden sign, it looked great!

Everything Will Fall Into Place

My advice to Brides is to relax, enjoy and make the most of every second. The last days before the wedding are so stressful organising all those last minute touches but your wedding day is just about you and your husband to be and how much you love each other, everything will fall into place.

Also make sure you book time off after the wedding even if you’re not going on honeymoon straight away as you’ll be shattered and will be grateful for the time together to reflect on your special day.

We would also like to thank the fabulous and ridiculously talented Rachel Hudson our photographer. She captured our day so beautifully and was an absolute pleasure to work with. Our photos our stunning and something we know we’ll cherish forever!

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Venue – Clavelshay Barn
Bride – Claire Pettibone Carina B Couture
Bridesmaids – Fever Designs
Make-up and Hair – Lucy Davis
Hair extensions – Ad-Hair
Groom – PJ Robinson and Sons
Cake – Living Pretty
Celebrant – Jennifer Constant
Bands – Barnone Snappa
Photography – Rachel Hudson

I still can’t believe that Mystere was the first dress Steph tried on.
Great advice from Steph too about post-wedding time off. Even if you’re not going on honeymoon straight away, I think time together to chill out and reflect would be exactly what the doctor ordered.

Lots of love,
Fern x

Fran and Duncan have got the balance of rustic AND glamorous just right. The combination of gorgeous wild flowers, candelabras and pastel tones for the wedding party alongside the simple interior of the barn and the beautiful Hampshire country side is perfect.

It’s romantic and whimsical but also sleek and stylish. And looks effortlessly so at that.

I’m so pleased that it was important to Fran to have a dress that was sexy and unusual – and her gown is definitely both. It fits her like a glove and she shines out from every single photo.

When it comes to first dances, Fran and Duncan have hit that nail on the head too. I’ve always thought I’d be too shy to have a choreographed first dance, but the images of this lovely pair have made me re-evaluate my opinion – Duncan and Fran look so elegant and lost in the moment, despite all of the watching eyes.

All of this fabulousness was captured forever by Guy Collier.

The Middle Of Nowhere Feel

Fran The Bride: We got married at Holy Cross Church in Binsted, Hampshire, before moving on to the Barn at Bury Court in nearby Bentley for the reception. When we first started looking for a venue we wanted a barn that would give us a blank canvas in terms of decoration but also had great food and a “middle of nowhere” feel.

Bury Court was the first place we looked at and we knew immediately this was “our place”. We looked at two more venues just to make sure, but we’d already lost our hearts to this beautiful location. We loved the warm feel of the barn and its beautiful gardens, plus it was very near to where Duncan’s mum lived. While I am from Germany, we were sure the wedding should be in the UK – and having it near Duncan’s Mums gave us the feeling we had a connection with the area.

Romantic Up-Do

I don’t normally wear make-up apart from Mascara so I wanted to look natural but with all imperfections ironed out. I ummed and ahhed for ages about how I wanted my hair: up, down, with flowers in it or a pearl comb. In the end, I decided a romantic up do would go best with my dress and would also show off its amazing back to the max. So Gemma Sutton created a lovely up do for me and also did my make-up.

I felt beautiful but also natural – and both hair and make-up lasted all day despite lots of hugging, kissing, crying and dancing. I kept everything else quite low-key, doing my own nails. I wore J’adore perfume by Dior – it was one of the first perfumes Duncan ever bought me and my is still my favourite.

David Fielden Keyhole Dress

Ooh, the dress. I wore a David Fielden keyhole dress made of crepe-backed satin and corded lace. The lace made up the shoulders of the dress and a satin bow at the back gave me just that little bit of extra coverage despite the open back. It was that back that first drew me towards this dress. I saw it at the National Wedding Show in Olympia a good year-and-a-bit before our big day. I was there by myself when I saw it at the Noble and Wright stand. I knew I couldn’t buy it then and there because I was waiting for my mum to fly over from Berlin for a wedding dress shopping weekend later in the year. So in the next few months I tried on another 20-odd gowns before I could show her The One. I got a great deal on it from Hannah Noble, who runs the Noble and Wright Atelier, so I drove all the way up to Leicester from London to buy it.

I loved how easy it was to wear and its simplicity while also being very sexy and unusual. It made me feel like a goddess on the day and was so comfortable at the same time. I’m just sad I can’t wear it every day.

Simple But Stunning

My shoes were an online purchase from Debenhams’ Debut range. They were very simple ivory satin shoes with a bow at the front. With the dress making quite a statement I wanted the accessories to be simple and the shoes went perfectly. I chose a fingertip veil from Kelly Spence because it was made to my requirements without costing the world and was the best match I could find. It was soft synthetic, which felt a lot nicer than it sounds and she gathered it just how I wanted it.

I did splash out on my floral hair circlet from Lila-Lila. I had found her accessories after searching for something more durable than fresh flowers on the internet. I loved that she makes the hair circlets from clay and my design had freshwater pearls and dried gypsophilia in it. Sofia, who owns the studio, also customized it to include blue blossoms – so it could be my “something blue”. Finally, I wore Links of London earrings that Duncan had given me for our eighth anniversary and a necklace borrowed from my mum as my “something borrowed” and “something old”.

Same Colour, Different Style

I had five bridesmaids – my three best friends, my sister and Duncan’s sister. They are all quite different girls so we thought it would be best to have one colour – my favourite colour green – but different styles. Because they were scattered across the UK, Germany and the US, having a traditional dress buying session was a no no. I ended up trying on a number of dresses for them, emailing them pictures and they chose their favourite style. It required a lot of trust from them but they all looked amazing on the day.

I ordered the dresses from Perfect Bridesmaids in the US as they came in a lot cheaper than if we had bought them here. The colour tied in with the colour scheme, which was a mix of pastels ranging from cream and pink to green and blue. So the girls were the green end of the scheme while the boys all wore blue waistcoats and ties with their morning suits – covering another colour in the scheme.

Country Garden Party

We had a loose theme of country garden party, which was reflected in the bunting I made and the homemade jam jar vases covered with burlap and lace. Our card box was a wicker hamper I had salvaged from somewhere and we had cream lanterns on the tables and wicker hearts on the wooden beams around the barn. The colour scheme, as mentioned already, was a mix of green, pink, cream and blue, which was echoed in the flowers and the bunting and the fabric covers for our homemade wedding jam, which doubled up as favours and name places.
We also had cream candelabra from Essential Wedding Hire.

Wild Flowers

The flowers and my bouquet were put together by the lovely Jill and Carolyn from the Apothecary’s Flower Company. My bouquet was made up of pink roses, hydrangeas and sweet peas. They did a fabulous job on the tables – alternating our wildflower-filled jam jars with birdcages they had also decorated with wild flowers. We didn’t want huge flowers and they understood exactly what we had imagined without me ever really being able to put it into words. Duncan’s mum lent us a big vintage birdcage, which is the mascot/ symbol of her interior design store Birdcage Interiors, as a focal point, which Jill and Carolyn transformed into a beautiful arrangement that looked very Secret Garden to me.

I Carry Your Heart

Where to begin? The ceremony was one of my favourite parts of the day and I loved every bit of it. We got married in a small village church, which felt really intimate. Our vicar was amazing as he was so relaxed and funny and made it a really lively service. He also gave us some amazing advice on married life. We chose 1 Corinthians 13 as our biblical reading and Duncan’s mum read E.E. Cummings’ I Carry Your Heart. The words mean a lot to us as they express exactly how we feel for each other and how much we’re each a part of the other one. It was a really emotional moment and fitted so beautifully.

I entered the church to Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring, which was great because it was not too slow but light and airy. We left the church to All You Need Is Love – both pieces were performed by the fabulous Apollo Strings. Outside the church we were showered in confetti by the Shropshire Petal Company and handfuls of rice – a German wedding tradition.

A Viennese Waltz

Apollo Strings, who played at the church, moved on to the barn to play during the wedding reception as well. After dinner, we had a DJ from Chess Disco. Our first song was Annie’s Song from John Denver – not quite the right name, but we’re both extremely cheesy people and loved the lyrics. I had also always wanted to dance a Viennese Waltz for our first dance and Annie’s Song had the perfect rhythm and lyric combination for that.

Absolutely Mouthwatering

The food was provided by Jacaranda Catering – the only approved caterer at Bury Court and they really make sure they deserve that. The food at our wedding was absolutely mouthwatering. We started with a tomato tart tatin, followed by duck confit and breast with sweet potato puree and a soy jus plus a lime panacotta with mango sorbet that was divine. Their service is excellent and so seamless.

We stocked the bar ourselves thanks to Bury Court not charging corkage and our wine and spirits were provided by Laytons Wine Merchants.

The cake was made by Duncan’s Mum Judy – it was her first foray into wedding cake making and she did a fabulous job with the traditional fruit cake. She and Duncan’s sister Sophie then decorated the cake with white edible flowers and bunting to mirror the decorations. My Gran is a super jam-maker so for our favours we wanted to incorporate that somehow. We had two different jams in mini jam jars, with the elderberry jam made by her and the raspberry jam made by Duncan and me. They felt like a really personal thank you and also worked really well for the name tags.

A Talented Bride

I designed all the stationery – invites, inserts, order of services, menu and thank you cards. But we had them printed at printed.com, which is a brilliant site for getting your own designs put on to high quality paper. They do a luxury paper range, which gave a lovely vintage feel to the designs.

We wrote the place names on white paper luggage tags from Not On The High Street. The table plan was also handmade from burlap and lace, mount board and a gilded picture frame from Birdcage Interiors. We didn’t bother with table names as we opted for two long banquet tables and didn’t feel we needed them.

Natural Reportage Style

Guy was AMAZING! We totally fell in love with his pictures when we first looked at his website. We did check out at a few other photographers but his natural, reportage style and the beautiful colours in his pictures just beat everyone else.
We wanted both awesome shots of us as well as “in the moment” pictures of the wedding day and our guests. And the photos we got were phenomenal. Everyone has commented on how beautiful they are – and because they really show the action of the day they will keep bringing back the memories when we look at them in the future.

We also really liked Guy as a person. It was important to us that we would get on with our photographer because he would spend quite a bit of time with us. Guy was so accommodating, lovely, in all the right places yet unobtrusive. Booking him was one of our best choices during wedding prep.

Don’t Panic

The whole wedding was an amazing day but if I could give any advice to brides is: try to soak it all in. It was the best advice I was given before the big day and I made sure I didn’t let the day pass in a blur. Duncan and I made sure we had moments to ourselves so we wouldn’t end spending our day without seeing each other. Also, DON’T PANIC – I’m a bit of a control freak and perfectionist (which bride isn’t) but after all the hectic of the last days before the wedding I stopped caring whether anything went wrong so by Saturday morning I was really relaxed, which stayed throughout the whole day.

One more thing that was really special to me: my girls did a video collage of me growing up, meeting Duncan and our time together so far. One of the pictures they included was of my Grandparents who sadly couldn’t make it to the wedding because of their health. It meant a lot to me that the girls included them so they were still a part of the day through that, the jams – and our rings, which were a gift from them.

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Bride’s Dress – David Fielden at Noble And Wright
Veil – Kelly Spence
Hair Circlet – Lila Lila
Shoes – Debenhams
Hair and Make-Up – Gemma Sutton
Bridesmaid Dresses – Perfect Bridesmaid
Groom & Groomsmen – Gieves And Hawkes
Ushers – Neal And Palmer
Venue – Bury Court Barn
Catering – Jacaranda Catering
Drinks – Laytons
Birdcage – The Birdcage Interiors
Candelabras – Essential Wedding Hire
Florist – Apothecarys Flower Company
Music – Apollo Strings and Chess Disco
Stationery Printing – Printed.com
Photography – Guy Collier

What a gorgeous, gorgeous wedding. That gown is truly to-die-for.
We have some beautiful places in our British Isles don’t we?
Fabulous images from Guy and a lovely write up from Fran.
Long may the glorious sunshine continue!

Lots of love,
Fern x

The best thing about this gorgeous weather is that anyone having a marquee wedding can breathe easy. And Clare and Richard put so much effort into their marquee wedding that they absolutely deserved the sun to shine down on them. The flowers, décor, favours and hair and make-up were all created by family and friends.

It just goes to show what you can achieve if you put a bit of time and effort in to doing something, and that a wedding doesn’t have to cost an absolute fortune! With the sun shining and your best friends and family around you, it’s easy to remember that the best things in life are free…cheesy but true.

It’s almost like Joseph Hall has captured that message in the images – the light is beautiful and the whole thing just looks so dreamy and ethereal.

Enjoy the sun dappled gorgeousness lovely readers!

Escape To The Country

Clare the Bride: We really wanted somewhere outside with lots of green. We both enjoy escaping to the countryside and wanted a relaxed country feel. We ended up having the reception at Sandridgebury Farm in St. Albans. The site is for a marquee, which enabled us to design our reception from scratch. Dorothy and Rodger at the venue were very helpful with lots of contacts. The horses in the field next to the marquee were an added bonus!

Sister Act

In order to keep costs down my sister Ruth did my make up (and ended up getting roped into doing the entire bridal party!). We went for a brilliant make up lesson at Mac on 3, in Selfridges. This cost £50 for an hour’s tuition and you then got to that money back if you bought £50 worth of products. Predictably, I ended up spending more than £50 but it was well worth it to give my sister the confidence boost she needed. Ruth’s make up, plus some eyelash extensions for the day made me feel very glamorous on the day. I knew I wanted my hair up with some plaits. I was delighted with the end result.

Heart Set On Packham

I really wanted a simple dress – I’m quite tall so wanted something slightly Grecian feeling and floaty, rather than big and puffy. I was convinced I was going to get something second-hand from sellmyweddingdress.com but made the mistake of trying on Violet by Jenny Packham. Despite not being a sparkly girl, I liked the fact that it was a very simply dress, with just a touch of razzmatazz! The headpiece (also Jenny Packham) made me feel very Downton Abbey!

Once I’d found the dress, I was checking sellmyweddingdress.com every day but to no avail. Eventually I found a lovely boutique, The Bridal Gallery, that was doing a Jenny Packham designer day with 10% off and that was worth the journey to Northamptonshire!

Precious Pearls

Accessories were something I left quite last minute. Every time I tried the dress on, I tried the Jenny Packham headpiece too, so getting it was inevitable really! I also knew I wanted a long veil to add a bit of glamour to the simplicity of my dress. The church where we got married is gorgeous and very ornate, so simplicity was key for me.

My sisters and I all got given a pearl necklace from our parents following their trip to Vietnam. My best friend Grainne ended up borrowing my set so that was the bridesmaids sorted. The night before the wedding, I didn’t have any jewellery – I felt the detail on the dress and headpiece was enough. My lovely Dad however had other ideas and presented me with a lovely set of pearly earrings to wear down the aisle.

Green And Purple

We got the bridesmaids dresses from Phase Eight. My sisters and best friend Grainne are actually a scarily similar shape so there were no dramas about finding different styles for each of them. I knew I wanted a shade of green or purple but had no fixed idea and asked them to keep their eyes out for anything they liked on the high street.

We hired suits for the men, choosing not to match the Bridesmaids in terms of colour but instead compliment it with a sage green. Rich was keen to wear tails as he wears a regular suit to work every day.

Homespun

Our theme was ‘homespun’ with huge input from friends and family. Once we had chosen the Bridesmaids dresses, we knew we wanted purple and I also wanted lots of green to show of the lovely outdoor setting. Pinterest was great at gathering ideas and we had some serious pom-pom making, bunting sewing, paper dove cutting and jam jar painting workshops as a result!

I was particularly proud of the photo bunting my mum put together, including photos of both mine and Rich’s parents on their wedding days. It was a great point of interest for guests as the majority of them featured on it somewhere.

Front Room Turned Florists

My wonderful Mum did all of the flowers. My parents’ front room looked like a florist in the days leading up to the wedding. We went to a flower market on the Wednesday morning and bought what we fancied the look of. We ended up with a beautiful combination of roses and anenomies, as well as sprigs of rosemary to add scent. In preparation, Mum went on a bridal floristry course at the Academy of Flowers in Covent Garden. Although quite pricey, I think she saw it as an investment, as I am one of 3 daughters!

A Talented Bunch

The ceremony was amazing and we tried to get lots of friends and family involved. My aunt did the reading a biblical love poem, Song of Solomon: chapter 8, v 6-7. We found the website yourchurchwedding.org very helpful when trying to pick one. We also had friends read the bidding prayers and Sonnet 116. Despite its popularity, I love this poem and its sentiment.

My friend Rosie made the ceremony particularly special by singing as we signed the register. Her husband Paul, played the organ for the whole thing too, making it feel very personal. We are lucky to have such talented friends!

Up-Beat And Fun

The reception was awesome. We had an amazing band called Motown Gold, who in-between sets provided a disco. The dance floor was packed all night long and people had to be dragged off at the end of the night. We are not a very soppy couple so the idea of a slow, smoochy love song was too much for us. Instead we opted for upbeat and fun for our first dance, with Higher and Higher by Jackie Wilson as our choice of song.

Good, Fresh Food

Food was always going to be a very important part of our big day. We both love good, fresh food so were keen that nothing felt remotely ‘mass catered’. After a disastrous few tastings (who knew you could get a jacket potato wrong?!) we came across Dan at Kingfisher Caterers. Everyone we have spoken to since the wedding has commented on how delicious it was and their team were really professional on the day.

We got our own event manager who looked after the timings etc so we didn’t have to worry about anything at all. They were also very happy to serve canapés (made by my friend Sarah) and our own desserts (made my lovely sister Martha, my Mum and Rich’s Mum). As well as this, they set out our evening buffet (lots and lots of cheese) and ran the cash bar.

I made the favours myself – two chutneys and one jam with different coloured fabrics covering the jam jar lids. I loved the hand stamped luggage labels that we tied on each one with the guests names on. We used these to label the array of puddings too and I think they helped create a lovely ‘homespun’ feel to the marquee.

Post Cards And Luggage Labels

As keen travellers, we knew that the tables would be themed by countries and we were lucky enough to have a friend who is a designer kindly offer to make these for us. James put together some amazing table signs incorporating photos of us on our travels, as well as the table plan itself. Each table list looked like a luggage label. Sadly James and his wife Erica (one of my best friends from school) were not able to come over from New Zealand for the wedding itself, so these acted as a lovely reminder of them during the day.

I enjoy making and crafting so knew that I would be making the save the dates, invitations and orders of service myself. After an initial trip to Hobbycraft, I got my ideas finalised, before then ordering the card I needed online – this was much cheaper than buying the whole lot in Hobbycraft.

Instead of a guestbook we decided to have a postcard washing line. Guests had to pick a postcard and write their messages to us on the back, before pegging them to the line. There are some hilarious ones as the night progresses, as people have drunk more and more homemade sloe gin!

Use Their Skills

My main piece of advice would be to take advantage of the skills and talents of friends and family. People genuinely seemed to relish being a part of the build-up and being able to offer help towards the big day and it was lovely to look around and see the fruit of everyone’s labour on the day itself.

I would also highly recommend doing certain things yourself. We saved an absolute packet doing things like the stationery ourselves and it made it feel very personal and special on the day. It was also another excuse to spend quality time with my bridesmaids in the months before the wedding!

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Dress – Jenny Packham at The Bridal Gallery Finedon
Bridesmaids – Phase Eight
Table Names – James Harvison
Band – Motown Gold
Catering – Kingfisher Caterers
Venue – Sandridgebury Farm
Photography – Joseph Hall

It just goes to show that you should spend whatever YOU want on your wedding, if you want to go DIY crazy, do it!
The post card pegging idea is great and I always love the idea of using photos of your parents wedding days.
Also, on the sunshine theme – doesn’t that lemon tart look like the sun? So deliciously yellow and bright.

Lots of love,
Fern x

Well I think it’s fair to say Summer Scorcher Week has been pretty fabulous. We’ve had some gloriously sun-filled weddings from all over the world – Portugal, Ibiza, Australia…but today we’re back to good old Angleterre. Because it turns out, occasionally, we actually get some decent weather here too!

Zoe and Rich’s wedding is full of colour, smiles and fun. And lots and lots of sunshine. It really is one of the happiest weddings I’ve ever seen.

And the dress – literally made for Zoe. She looks every inch the Old Hollywood Starlet.

Zoe’s write up is fabulous, full of heartfelt emotion and lots of details, so sit back, relax and enjoy this gorgeous wedding.

A Yorkshire Countryside Affair

Zoe the Bride: We wanted our wedding to be a fun and relaxed day, a Yorkshire countryside affair where guests felt at ease and had lots of fun. I am from Leeds and Rich had always said it was traditional to get married in the bride’s hometown, so because of this tradition we never discussed doing it elsewhere. What made choosing our venue so easy was our agreement on not having a hotel. We agreed we didn’t want to buy a ‘package’ and both wanted something unique – a setting we could re-create our own Alice in Wonderland world.

We chose East Keswick Hall because of the amazing views, it sits in a tiny village smack bang in the Yorkshire countryside and if offered us a blank canvas. My Nanny also lived in East Keswick all those years ago so it felt familiar and meant to be.

A Beautiful View

Right from the onset we were keen to keep the budget as low as possible, this quickly eradicated lots of venues. We started looking at places we could make our own so when Rich found East Keswick Hall we knew it was the one almost instantly – it was the first and only venue we looked at. It allowed us to have a marquee without the cost, risk of bad weather and having to set up things like toilets.

The main clincher was the view, it is set in the beautiful Yorkshire countryside with cows and sheep in the fields nearby it was perfect and exactly what we wanted. It had a large lawn behind it which we thought would be ideal for everyone to mingle, sip champagne and listen to our favourite music.

Gorgeous Long Hair

I always thought I wanted my hair up, but either way I never wanted it to look polished and hair sprayed so when my friend sent me a picture of Blake Lively at a premiere with Hollywood side swept curls I knew it was what I wanted. I’d also visited a beautiful bridal shop in Angel London and the woman in the shop had said to me, you have great long hair, show it off, show your kids that one day it was long!

Make-up wise, I’m not great at it and I don’t wear much skin make-up so I knew I wanted professional make-up. I visited MAC in Leeds and found Pam, who was very talented and had recently got married. Again, I didn’t know what I wanted as such so she just went to work in the trial and I fell in love. It was worth every penny I was so pleased and only retouched my lipstick in the evening.

Fabulous Fitted Fishtail

My dress was literally my dream dress (but I just didn’t know it), a fishtail style which was very fitted on top with a heavily detailed (beading and crystals) body, sweetheart neckline then masses of material from the thighs down which went into a beautiful long train.

I went to a designer wedding shop and found a completely different dress by the same designer. It was very white and simple (no detail) but I wasn’t 100% sure because it was £3,000. My Mum Helen is so generous and also loves to shop so when I had it on although she knew it was expensive she offered to buy it for me but my gut feeling was to keep looking. I then went to a shop in Leeds which sources one off pieces one year ahead of the current season, it’s called Abbey Wedding Warehouse.

The lady in the shop, Karen, was amazing, and you can only book an appointment once you know the type of dress you want and the designer. Karen told me she had a dress by the same designer but when I described the one I tried on she advised me she had a very detailed piece as 2013 was going to feature a lot of old Hollywood glamour.

I was hesitant but made an appointment anyway because I was intrigued. I went in and looked at loads of dresses pulling a few out to try but none really stood out. Karen then pulled out the Enzoani dress and it was just unbelievably beautiful in everyway. I never thought I would want such heavy detail but it seeing it for the first time made me fall instantly in love.

The intricate detail on the body was striking and it made me feel instantly amazing. I also never wanted a big puffy dress so this dress gave me the best of both as it was figure-hugging but then expanded at the bottom. I had also tried on several very figure hugging simple straight dresses but nothing made me feel special and I wanted to feel beautiful on my wedding day. Karen’s dresses are one-offs which means there was one dress in one size and it fit like nothing I had tried on before; it was like it was made for me. My Mum said it was perfect and it really was.

Old Hollywood Glamour

When I chose the dress the lady in the shop Karen told me 2013 was all about Old Hollywood Glamour so my dress was a year ahead of time. I absolutely fell in love with this theme so opted for old Hollywood curls swept to the side with a vintage headpiece. My dress was very detailed so I chose simple stud earrings. I always thought I wanted a long veil which swept the floor but because my dress was so fitted the shorter veil fell above my bottom and accentuated the dress beautifully.

My shoes were John Lewis – simple and beautiful. I added blue diamante ‘I Do’ labels underneath. Because the dress was so detailed I didn’t want to overdo the jewellery so I kept the look simple.

A Pastel Colour Explosion

The suits were from Burtons in Oxford Street, where store manager Andy sorted us with an excellent deal! The ushers, dads and two best men had a great day all trying the suits on then going out drinking afterwards around the pubs in the area. We opted for a colour explosion rather than tying everything together with one colour – again we both agreed immediately that we wanted a ‘rainbow’ wedding so choosing the wedding party attire was easy.

The groomsmen wore pastel coloured braces and navy bowties. The bridesmaids each wore a different coloured pastel sweetheart knee length dress (blue, green, lilac, lemon and coral), they all had peach heels and a matching multi-coloured bouquet which was a mini version of mine. They wore their hair in low side buns. I didn’t want them to have matching jewellery so they all felt comfortable and weren’t too ‘matchy’ and my new sister-in-law Bells wore her late Grandmother’s necklace which I thought was really special because she was greatly missed on the day.

Love In The Sand Dunes

The theme was love, fun and laughter – a bright happy pastel rainbow wedding. Rich proposed during our eight month round-the-world travelling adventure. We were two thirds of the way through the trip and had found our way to Jericoacora in North East Brazil; a beautiful sandy village on the coast filled with gigantic powder white sand dunes, beautiful fresh water lagoons and no roads.

After Rich proposed on the very top of our favourite sand dune we quickly began filling our days discussing the type of wedding we would like and both agreed we would want a church service with a cool party afterwards – with the focus being relaxing and enjoyable for everyone who came.

An Informal Atmosphere

We wanted there to also be lots of colour so a fun and informal atmosphere was created. We had a marquee lining erected in the hall which was just beautiful. We then had 14 table dressed in cream linen each with the vintage candelabras, wild flowers in old jars and candles. Our table plan was a large antique rose gold mirror which we wrote out the tables in gold pen. Rich’s Dad Chris is a teacher and he brought an old, paint-covered easel which finished it off a treat!

We had a 12 foot cake table which was filled with vintage cake stands (including ones my Dad Keith had made from scratch from plates we and Rich’s Mum Jan had sourced and hunted for over the year). We had a huge champagne-style glass filled with marshmallows, old glass jars filled with sweets and a couple of candelabras with pastel coloured candles. It was truly a colour explosion ready to eat. The top table was a large oval because we wanted to be able to chat to everyone rather than sitting in a big long line.

Flowers Scooped Up From The Garden

I was very calm when it came to the flowers because I don’t know a lot about them, I did know that I wanted a mixture of pastel colours which looked they had been scooped up in a garden – this was the exact brief I gave to our florist. She did an amazing job. I literally couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful bouquet. Every colour was the colour of my bridesmaid dresses! We also paid for the church to pull together beautiful cream pew ends.

The centrepieces – we collected old, vintage style candelabras from various second hand and charity shops and online auctions. We then spray painted them antique gold. Originally we were going to do multi-coloured candles on each table to project the colour theme but the cream candles looked beautiful on the table so we opted for them.

In the centre of each table we had a very large square mirror plate upon which sat the candelabra with something on each point which carried from old jars and vases with single wild flowers or jars with candles inside. Each table was unique and no two tables were the same, whether that was the style of glass jar or the colour of the flower.

Until My Last Breath

We were married in the same church as my Mum and Dad married over thirty years ago, so it was already an incredibly special place in my hometown Leeds. All I remember is getting to the church and being astounded at the number of people crammed in. People were sitting right up to the back and were all staring whilst we organised the running order of the bridesmaids, my little nephew Jack who was the cutest pageboy and my niece Betsy Bo our beautiful flower girl. My best friend Erica who was also my bridesmaid comes from a very musical family and she recommended her sister Stella to sing at the wedding so the ceremony started with a welcome and then Pie Jesu sung by Stella. It is such a beautiful song and makes me feel emotional so I had trouble holding my tears back even right at the very beginning.

When it came to the vows I was completely overwhelmed by what Rich was saying to me and as I looked deeply into his eyes I was overcome with emotion, love and excitement at having met my soulmate, declaring my love and commitment in front of our best friends and family and saying I’d be his wife forever. It sounds so cheesy but it is completely true. It was my favourite moment (albeit trying to stop myself crying) and something I will remember until my last breath.

So High

My other favourite moment was our first dance. It was to our very special travelling song So High by John Legend. It was magical and at that moment we were the happiest most in love people on the planet. Rich introduced me to John Legend on our round the world adventure and I cannot believe I hadn’t listened to him before. We were in Vietnam on our way to tubing and were crammed into this tiny minibus with 4 other peoples. I can literally close my eyes and feel the heat from the sun, the air blowing through the windows whilst watching us wind round mountain tops on some of the scariest roads I have ever seen. But something about that eight hour journey was magical and it was being with Rich on our trip, listening to John Legend’s voice.

Afterwards we both agreed that So High was so perfect because we were high in the sky on those crazy roads, together, having fun, free and in love – so it was really special to have that as our wedding song. For the evening reception we hired a DJ who played all our favourite songs and our best mates Tom Vicary and Tony Bazelle got on the mic (unplanned of course).

Help-Yourself To Cake

I wasn’t initially crazy about having an expensive cake, especially because we opted for dozens of help-yourself cakes for our dessert. But I became addicted to looking at cakes on Pinterest and found a quirky vintage pastel cake which I just fell in love with. Rich’s auntie Sue found a local wedding cake designer who re-created our dream cake – at a colourful, pastel themed wedding a white cake just wouldn’t have worked!

My friend Sheryl from Fairy Caking was amazing at re-creating some of the other cakes I found on Pinterest (the amazing rainbow cake and pink frilly cake) and she also made mouth-watering glittery cupcakes to die for! As guessed arrived they were offered his ‘n’ hers vintage sweetie bags, pimms, champagne or soft drinks. We also had a vintage style popcorn machine and lots of lovely canapés from M&S.

Inspired By Travels

Following on from the travel theme we had a variety of pastel coloured luggage labels tied with ribbon around each wine glass. Some guests later tied them to their wrists as they danced the night away. For table names – as we’d travelled the world for eight months from January 2011 – September and Rich proposed to me at the top of a sand dune in Jericoacora, Brazil in August so we decided to name our tables after our favourite places and naturally the top table was the very place Rich proposed – Jericoacora. We used our own photographs for the pictures. Our invitations were passports with vintage luggage RSVP cards.

Sneaky Cuddles With Your New Husband

Advice – To make a budget and stick to it (it’s only a 12 hour day which goes quickly so ig you are saving for a house deposit or something else the wedding shouldn’t take over that), book your dream honeymoon, relax, enjoy the morning of the wedding with your mum and bridesmaids drinking champagne with your favourite music on and enjoy every single minute of the day itself making extra special time for sneaky cuddles and kisses with your new husband (don’t forget about him! I kept looking at Rich during little moments throughout the day thinking wow, you’re my husband I am so lucky!)

Make sure you give guests little surprises on the day; it is tempting to tell guests what they can expect but everyone loves a good surprise – our day included; vintage buses for the guests, a vintage popcorn machine, staff handing out old-fashioned sweetie bags – blue for boys and pink for girls. When the cows came out to say hello – in the run up to the wedding the cows hasn’t really been around but on the set-up day and the day itself they came out for photographs, a perfect Yorkshire countryside backdrop. They even ate all the bows we tied to the fence which surrounded the lawn!

We had a ‘kissing corner’ – straw bales in a hidden corner for guest wedding smooches, hot Fish and Chips straight out the fryer – we have had so many compliments on the fish and chips and even received a thank you card from guests saying they had never tried curry sauce with fish and chips so it was a new experience and they loved it!

And finally, a mankini – yes that’s right, Rich has a great group of mates who made him wear the Borat mankini on his stag, during Rich’s speech Rich pulled it out and passed it on to Alex Taylor who is getting married next – it has already been worn by their friend Raj and it will be handed down to each stag once the current stag is married.

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Venue – East Keswick Hall
Dress – Enzoani at The Abbey Wedding Warehouse
Bridesmaids – Wedding Dress Online
Bridesmaid shoes – H&M
Groom and Groomsmen – Burton
Florist – Leonora Rose
Vintage China – Felicity’s Vintage Tea Party
Vintage Cars – Adel Cars
Vintage Buses – Yorkshire Heritage Bus Hire
Wedding Cake – C and E Cakes
Cake Table Cakes – Fairy Caking and The Yummy Yank
Fish & Chips – Fish and Chip Catering
Popcorn machine and Chair Covers – Love Sweet Love
Photographer – Richard Skins

Stunningly gorgeous isn’t it?

The multi-coloured pastel theme works beautifully for the Bridesmaids and how amazing that the florist matched the colours without even seeing the gowns! Keeping things as a surprise for guests on the day is also a great idea, who doesn’t want to be greeted with goody bags full of sweets, popcorn and a Vintage Bus?!?

There is definitely more Blake Lively about Zoe than just the hair! What a handsome couple she and Rich make.

And how lovely is the story behind their first song?

Lots of love,

Fern x

There is something so romantic and beautiful about a walled garden. I think it’s the secrecy of it and the sensory experience it provides – the smells, sights and sounds of flowers, plants, birds and animals.

Nancy and Andrews secret garden wedding encapsulates those things beautifully, the colours are subtle and delicate and the flowers are fresh and natural. The ceremony looks intimate and moving and it’s just a very private affair.

The cute couple went down the homemade route which worked perfectly with this venue – the cake table looks particularly inviting. As does the very well stocked bar! One of the main reasons they chose the Walled Garden was that they could have free reign of the place – no rules or recommended suppliers.

The images captured by Laura from Babb Photo of Nancy and Andrew failing to hold back their emotions as they make their vows will have you in pieces. The film by Yay Films is gorgeous too, and reflects the atmosphere of their day perfectly. Tissues at the ready people.

The Great Outdoors

Nancy The Bride: Andrew and I knew from the outset that we wanted to get married somewhere a little different. Neither of us are religious so a church was out of the question. Andrew grew up on a farm and loves the great outdoors and ideally would tie the knot in a tree if he got his way.

We started by scouring the internet for different locations that were within budget, preferably outdoors and all contained in one space. Wasing Walled Garden was the first venue we visited. It blew us away. It is the former Victorian vegetable patch for the main house on Wasing Park estate. The guests don’t get to see inside the looming wall until after the ceremony as finished, creating fun stages to the day.

The Secret Walled Garden is very basic, having just a water stand-pipe and an electrical hook-up, but that meant we could fill it with whatever we wanted and weren’t restricted by ‘preferred supplier’ lists.

Beauty Bites

Because my dress was really decorative I wanted my hair to be modern and sleek. I was inspired by the hair of Grace Kelly in the 1950s. I didn’t want my hair to look too ‘wedding-y’; nothing too elaborate or set. I set about, with my hairdresser friend Jack to work on some style ideas, usually at each other’s houses and usually over a glass of wine.

In place of a veil I had three ivory roses with yellow centres to match my bridesmaid’s dresses. I am a fan of Bobbi Brown so visited their store for a tutorial. Their staff were excellent at giving me ideas and techniques so that I could apply my own make-up on the day. I am not used to using foundation and I didn’t want to look over made up on the day so I found mixing a dab of foundation and light face cream (ration 1:3) gives a more natural look. I used Opi nail polish which is great as they have a large variety of natural colours, specifically Bubble Bath which I found highlighted my natural nail colour.

As a treat and to get my skin as good as it could be, I would highly recommend an Elemis brightening facial once a month leading up to the wedding, it gave my skin a fantastic natural glow and it was noticeable from the first treatment. My wedding scent was a mixture of Boucheron, which I find so elegant, and mixed that with Ellie Saab.

By Chance

I am a massive fan of Vera Wang bridal and used her style as an inspiration when looking for wedding dresses. Through blog and magazine research I found this great designer, Paloma Blanca – her style being classic but contemporary – and fell in love with her dresses. By chance, when visiting the bridal shop Morgan Davies on St John’s Street in London, I happened to come across one of her dresses. At first sight it seemed far too ‘pouffy’ and big, but after trying it on I just knew it was the dress for me. I would recommend any bride to always try any dress on before discounting it as they look completely different on.

Morgan Davies pointed me in the direction of a great seamstress in Stratford who also made my long silk sash. She suggested that when buying sample
dresses, as I had done, not to buy one too far out of your own size and shape as if you take a dress in too much it dramatically changes its shape. It will also be very costly on the large amount of alterations required.

Understated Elegance

As my dress was so flamboyant I wanted some fairly understated jewellery that also linked into the theme and ethos of the day. I chose ‘Cherry Blossom’ diamond studs and matching bracelet in rose gold from British designer Shaun Leane, his designs are romantic and beautiful made. I wasn’t that fussed about wedding shoes so I wore white low heels that would be comfortable.

Andrew wore blue, cream and brown brogues from Office. Wooden tree slice cufflinks from Folksy for both himself and his Best Man. Andrew chose this as it wasn’t too formal, and also reflected his love of woodlands and nature.

Lemon Yellow

The bridesmaids wore lemon yellow day dresses by Zara. I wanted them to be able to wear their dresses again and dresses that weren’t too ‘traditional bridesmaid’ looking. The colour scheme of yellow is because my maiden name, Wong, in Chinese means yellow.

Whimsical Woodland Feel

We wanted a very relaxed wedding day, full of fun and whimsy. We originally wanted a woodland wedding, so a nod towards that theme was included. We spent weeks making and decorating papier mache mushrooms for the cake table as cake stands and personalised Heinz Soup tins as table settings there was a joke there between us to see if any of our guests would noticed that we have changed all the text in the Heinz label. It was clear that everybody loved them as they took them away at the end of night, we get regular updates from our wedding guests on how their plants have blossomed some have become very competitive on who has grown the best and biggest Pak Choi!

We went foraging for large logs to make a holder for some chocolate dipped strawberries and used anything left over as centre pieces for the tables. We needed a rain cover for the ceremony but to save money hired it without any linings or sides. To make it more attractive we bought 500 sheets of tissue paper and set about making out our own pom-poms; Green, ivory and gold. Fluffing them and hanging them up took so much longer than we thought that we ended up shipping in friends and family to assist in the hanging.

Seasonal Textured Blooms

After much too-ing and frow-ing between Covent Garden Flower Market and B&Q, we ended up getting our bridal flowers from the lovely Emma at Green Parlour in Pangbourne. The brief I gave Emma was that it had to be wild flowers but without looking too wild. I wanted to keep the classic round shape but without it looking too formal. I was after pastel colours with flowers that were in season and lots of textures Between Emma and I we chose English roses, ivory peonies, miniature daisies, lavender and scabiosa seed pod heads… I loved my bouquet. Emma really understood the brief.

Tears Of Joy

Andrew and I had planned a walk in song (Oh My Love by Riz Ortolani) which we had listened to again and again on the year leading up to the wedding day. That song meant so much to us and carried so many connotations that as soon as it started playing on the day, both Andrew and I started crying, and pretty much didn’t stop until after the ceremony had finished!

My mother and one of my sisters both did a beautiful reading that Andrew and I chose together and it meant a lot to have them speak on the day. Once we could see through our tears, we read our vows to each other, exchanged rings and had about thirty cows come up to see what was going on. It really lightened the mood and brought a smile to everyone’s faces!

Free And Easy

We had a sit down hog-roast for the wedding breakfast in a marquee. The trestle tables were arranged long-ways allowing guest conversation to flow freely. Our original DJ choice let us down a month before the big day, so we asked a friend if they wouldn’t mind standing in. It turned out to be the best decision as he already had amazing contacts to hire equipment and his music taste was exactly in line with mine and Andrew’s.

We chose ‘A Very Special Love Song’ by Charlie Rich as a first dance after hearing it on Tony Blackburn’s Pop Picker’s radio show. Andrew and I have lots of songs that are meaningful to us, but all the lyrics seemed inappropriate. We heard ‘A Very Special Love Song’ when driving back from the venue one day and both looked at each other and we knew right there that would be our first dance. We had tried to practice some moves so as not to completely embarrass ourselves on the day, but when it came to the crunch we forgot everything and Andrew ended up spinning me around for two and a half minutes.

Homemade And Heartfelt

We wanted the day to be as homemade and heartfelt as we possibly could so decided early on that we would try and make as much as possible. Andrew researched jam and chutney recipes whilst I went berry picking with my family, who were over from Hong Kong. It was the first time we had all done something like that and was such a treat. It is not the cheapest way to buy fruit but it is definitely the most fun.

We also set to work making Limoncello and raspberry vodka to add to our well stocked free bar. We had four friends assist in making the dessert table taste as good as it looked. We had tarts, loafs, brownies and fun-bags. Andrew made the wedding cake; a three tier affair made out of victoria sponge, strawberry cake and a chocolate cake. All held together with homemade jam and butter cream. It weighed 9lbs and was nearly a foot tall.

Invites Set The Tone

Andrew and I believe the invitation to a wedding set the tone early on and so put many hours of toil into getting it right. We went for the theme of Secret Garden, so had two hidden doors on a wall background. In the foreground we placed mushrooms in the style of Victorian children’s illustrations. It was a lot of fun when guests asked us when the ceremony was happening and we explained to them to fully explore the invitation to find the answers. Many people missed the secret doors! It involved a lot of cutting and sticking to get the effect right, but we were very pleased with the end result.

Under The Apple Tree

It is such a cliché, but the single most important bit of advice would be to take a few minutes out and enjoy the day for what it is. If everything goes to plan this is the one time you will be getting married, so make the most of it. My overriding memory of our day was taking twenty minutes out in the evening where Andrew and I exchanged gifts under an apple tree in the dark. It gave us the opportunity to take in the enormity of what we had achieved and was a very special moment indeed.

Also, delegate as many of the jobs as you can to bridesmaids and ushers before the day and let them deal with suppliers so you can both relax and mingle with your guests. We had so little time to get everything together that on the day Jack, my hairstylist ended up making butter icing and I was piping the wedding cake in my dress. It’s funny now when we look back at it but at the time it was all a little stressful!

Nancy and Andrew Wedding Film – Highlights from YAY! Films on Vimeo.

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Brides Gown – Paloma Blanca at Morgan Davies Bridal
Jewellery – Shaun Leane
Hair – Jack Furnival at Whites
Bridesmaids Dresses – Zara
Florist – Emma at Green Parlour
Hog Roast – Big Fat Pig
Venue – The Secret Walled Garden at Wasing
Photography – Babb Photo
Videography – Yay Films

I hope you’re all suitably teary eyed now.

I can’t believe their wedding cake weighed more than the royal baby!

Great advice from Nancy too, you can pick and choose which details you want to DIY – if things are getting too much, get someone else to do it.

Lots of love,

Fern x

The wedding of Diana and Andrew, or Mr and Mrs Droid as they are known to their friends, is the perfect way to ease you into Monday. It is bursting with colour, fun and some very original ideas.

The colour scheme of ‘Tour De France’ is definitely a first – but somehow works AMAZINGLY. There are some seriously cute knitted characters as table hosts. Mr and Mrs Droid even appear in scarecrow form. Every single guest received a hand painted peg version of themselves.

There is a Bake-Off cake table that Mary Berry herself would be seriously impressed by. And if that wasn’t enough, Diana and Andrew designed and printed all of the bright and bold stationery themselves.

The eccentric pair were lucky with not only a gorgeous summers day, but were also rewarded with Bradley Wiggins winning the Tour De France on their wedding day. Definitely in honour of the couple theming their wedding around the sporting event!

Images come from the fabulous Anushe Low, back with a bang to RMW with this wedding. As always, she captured every last detail beautifully – I really struggled to chose the images for this post!

Informal And Intimate

Diana The Bride: We knew what we didn’t want more than what we did want at the start. We are both very informal characters and so really wanted an intimate and relaxed day. Although we live in the city, we are both from quite rural areas of Wales and Lincolnshire originally and so wanted to go back to our roots without physically returning to where we grew up!

We discovered the amazing Gate Street Barn a stones throw away from some of our favourite cycling spots in Surrey and instantly knew it was the perfect venue for us. It was a beautiful blank canvas with some brilliant quirky touches. We were particularly taken by the herd of long horn cows who would later share our day.

Natural Beauty

I really wanted to look like me (but on a good day!) on my wedding day so tried to keep my look very natural. Andrew is used to seeing me in little or no make up so I didn’t want to scare the living daylights out of him walking down the aisle looking like a total stranger! One of my lovely usherettes Eleanor is a dab hand with a blusher brush and did an amazing job applying my Bare Minerals make up.

My hair was done by Sophia Mason who really got my brief of a rustic informal up-do. I decided to go a bit non-bridal with my bright red nails – thank heavens they were shellac as I was it was all hands on deck to set up the barn the morning of the wedding!

A Girly Moment

I really wanted to buy my dress in Wales with my mum (being the only girl in a family full of big brothers) and so we eventually found ‘the one’ at High Society Bridal in Cowbridge. My Sassi Holford dress (Millie) wasn’t a style which I would have automatically picked out myself (being quite fitted), but it was suggested as a style which would suit my petite frame. I felt so comfortable the instant I put it on and adored the cap sleeve lace shrug and the gorgeous floral sash.

My day to day style is very casual with a bit 50′s thrown in and so I knew my friends would all be expecting a short prom style dress – so that was immediately struck off the list as being a bit too predictable! I think people were quite surprised that my dress was quite so traditional.

Style And Comfort

My gorgeous shoes were by Rachel Simpson. The heel height was ideal for making my way round the farmyard without sinking into the grass! I can’t recommend them highly enough for style and comfort (although I did resort to my trusty red converse after dark!) As with my make up, I opted for very simple pearls for my jewellery including an antique pearl brooch on clipped to my BQ (my something old).

Mis-matched

It was important for us that our ushers and usherettes weren’t completely uniform. We wanted them to retain their differences as much as possible and basically look quite informal. Ushers wore different tones of whatever grey suit they owned with a yellow based tie.

Our usherettes had an open brief for any style of colourful patterned summer dress which they felt comfortable in, inspired by the mis-matching patterns of our plentiful bunting and crockery. They found some gorgeous frocks, usherette Vicky was even inspired to design and make her own!

Tour De France Inspired

Our theme really was just to reflect us, our ‘odd’ personalities and ecclectic tastes so the styling was purposefully a bit higgledy piggledy. One key influence was the Tour de France as we are both keen cyclists – it was only fitting as we shared our wedding day with the final stage of the Tour De France in which Bradley Wiggins became the first ever British winner! (it really was the best day of my husbands life!)

We have always loved the vibrance and quirky celebrations of the host towns along the route of the bike race so we picked a few features to try and channel that eccentric celebratory feeling! We adopted the key Tour De France jersey colours of yellow, green, white and red polka dots for our underlying colour palette, created hanging bike wheel photo-boards and with a little help from some very clever friends made our life sized bride and groom scarecrows which looked quite at home in the farmyard.

Our table hosts were another talking point. We drafted in hand knitted characters to welcome our guests to their tables, each with an accompanying personalised story to tell. With regards to décor, the Mother of the Bride made hundred of metres of beautiful patterned bunting which looked amazing strewn across the roof beams in and around the barn and really created a beautiful celebratory setting.

A Summer Flower Hotchpotch

Local florist Florartistics were brilliant and really embraced the mix’n'match, undone feeling that we wanted to go for with the flowers. We picked seasonal country flowers in a palette of yellow, green white and red which were styled together in a simple rustic way. We loved the idea that the flowers could have been swept up from the hedgerows and gardens of the surrounding area and placed directly in the mis-matching cut glass vases around the barn walls and tables.

We had everything from roses and dahlias to sunflowers, snap dragons and hypericum berries, brought together with several varieties of daisy which we also used for button holes, my hair and pew ends. My bouquet had a little of everything loosely tied up with ribbon, but to compliment their mismatched dresses, our usherettes had a different yellow flower each in a simple posy.

Like Owning A Dog

Although we were really keen to personalise our ceremony with readings, it took us quite a while to find anything which wasn’t a bit too sentimental for our tastes. We eventually found a reading called ‘May Be’ (anon) and a poem called ‘Falling In Love Is Like Owning A Dog’ (Taylor Mali). Both very simple, quirky but beautiful in their own way. Music was another key feature. We spent a disproportionate amount of time going through our CD collection putting together a playlist of songs for the ceremony which were significant to our relationship.

Praise You

Our wedding band Rollercoaster were awesome, even though it was a beautiful balmy summers evening, the dance floor was full all night! They played a brilliant set which catered for all tastes, finishing off with some expert DJ duties. Our official first dance was “Do you realise?” by the Flaming Lips, although we managed to clear the floor later on with our ‘second dance’, Fatboy Slim’s Praise You, complete with break dancing. Our outdoor games were another entertaining feature which couldn’t have worked better. From start to finish they were being enjoyed by kids, big kids and competitive uncles alike. Thank you Skittle Alley hire!

Bottomless Ice Cream Cart

Our excellent caterer Just Jane really pulled together a superb spread. To go alongside our informal day, we opted for a hot canapé ‘walking starter’ with our welcome drinks of hedgerow fizz (elderflower cordial, berries and prosecco). This was followed by a delicious barbeque of summertime favourites served at table on gorgeous mis-matched vintage crockery (collected by myself with extra dinner plates supplied by Vintage Teas & RSVPs). After speeches our guests were ushered outside to enjoy our bottomless ice cream cart from the Matt Benecci Ice Cream Co. THE perfect pudding for a hot summer’s afternoon. As massive cheese freaks, we opted for an awesome cheese wedding cake by The Norbiton Fine Cheese Company for our wedding cake which handily provided the perfect cheese board for evening nibbles.

As a keen amateur baker, I wasn’t going to be done out of sponge entirely however, so we also ran The Great Wedding Bake Off where friends and family members brought fabulous home made cakes for refuelling in the evening. They looked a picture on trestle tables on mismatching cake plates and cake stands. Contributors were awarded with their very own wedding bake off certificate and rosette!

A Personalised Peg Memento

As graphic designers by trade, we designed and made all our printed stationery from save the date postcards through to the A2 table plan. As with most elements the look for our stationery was very informal – for example our wedding invite was a sweetie bag packed with hand drawn maps including curious details, drink vouchers, playful typography, quirky images, bright colours and somewhat tongue in cheek wording.

Our previously mentioned bunting and Bride and Groom scarecrows were other memorable home made features, perfect for creating guest photo opportunities and setting the scene.

However I think the most memorable DIY feature of our day was the personalised peg portraits which we hand painted for each of our guest’s place settings. It was six months of work but the reactions from our guests made it well worth it. A significant number of guests now have peg profile pictures on Facebook which is high praise indeed – our peg wedding cake toppers still take pride of place on our fireplace!

Stop The Clock

The best advice given to me was by a very wise friend who recommended taking a moment with my new husband, ideally when everyone is together enjoying the proceedings to just stand, look around and take stock of what you have achieved. Soak up being around all your loved ones together and give yourself a huge mental pat on the back for pulling together such a special day! Everyone tells you the day goes so fast, but it is quite unreal how fast it is all over so just stopping the clock to absorb such a special moment is priceless, it has certainly stayed with me.

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Bridal Gown – Sassi Holford ‘Millie’ at High Society Bridal
Shoes – Rachel Simpson
Band – Rollercoaster
Outdoor Games – Skittle Alley Hire
Caterer – Just Jane
Vintage Crockery Hire – Vintage Teas & RSVPs
Ice Cream Cart – Matt Benecci Ice Cream Co.
Cake – The Norbiton Fine Cheese Company
Florist – Florartistics
Venue – Gate Street Barn
Photography – Anushe Low

Definitely higgledy piggledy. But SO MUCH fun.

I hope this wedding inspires you to go with your personalities for your big day lovelies.

Lots of love,
Fern x

Beth and Danny made sure they included all of their favourite things in their festival-inspired wedding, from the all day live music to the glo sticks in the evening (I know – love!)

The colour scheme of pink, peach, mint and turquoise is particularly lovely as is the headpiece that’s Beth’s sister Laura made for her which included some of her Grandmother’s jewellery sewn into the detail.

And I know we say this a lot but there is so much laughter on display, you can tell that every single guest thoroughly enjoyed themselves, especially the bride and groom.

In The Garden

When we first got engaged we considered going abroad as I wanted a very ‘outdoorsy’ wedding but soon realised with the amount of people we wanted there finding a venue that would fit everyone would be difficult, so we decided to have it in my favourite place in the world, my Mum and Dad’s back garden, in the beautiful village of St Michaels on Wyre. They’ve always been great entertainers and hold brilliant parties so it was the obvious choice. At first they were a bit apprehensive about the sheer scale of the event but once I promised to have some cover, a solid floor and some posh portaloos they agreed. Our village also has a stunning 12th century church which we attend at Christmas and Easter when visiting Mum and Dad, and we know and like the vicar, Andrew, so that made the decision easy.

Finding the right marquee was not as easy, as I wanted a canvas one rather than plastic but we eventually found Wills Marquee’s a small family run company from Yorkshire, which supply stunning cream canvas marquees. The owners Chris and Lynsey, and the lads that set up the tent, could not do enough to help us, and worked well with the company that provided our solid floor, chairs, tables and heater, Evans Marquees, to ensure everything went swimmingly.

Lashed

Danny told me ages ago that he doesn’t like it when brides come down the aisle looking nothing like themselves and caked in make up so I really wanted to look like myself and quite natural, but on a really good day! I did my own makeup but went for a couple of trials beforehand to get tips, and I was really lucky because my 30th was the same weekend as my Hen Party so my friends and family treated me to a couple of facials and bought me some Selfridges vouchers so I could buy some posh makeup for the day. I spent my vouchers on some Chanel Correcteur Perfection Concealer and some Rouge Coco Shine in ‘Boy’. I used my usual Clinique Perfectly Real foundation, Clinique Blusher and Clarins Instant Sunlight Bronzer. My best beauty bargain though is Rimmel Extra Super Lash Mascara (with the Curved brush) which is the cheapest mascara but the best! It doesn’t come in waterproof though so I slipped on some Rimmel Scandaleyes Waterproof afterwards just in case.

I decided not to use fake eyelashes in the end as I have pretty good eyelashes anyway and knew Danny hates fake things! I had chopped half a nail off the week before (on my ring hand) so spent ages trying to find an opaque nude that would cover the icky bit. My best friend Rachel did my nails with Chanel Rouge Noir on my toes and a cheap Asda nude nail polish on my hands. My sister Laws did my hair. I have naturally curly hair anyway but it’s very unpredictable and can be scruffy and frizzy most days. For the wedding I wanted a more groomed look. We did countless practices with various curlers to find the right size curl. I looked like I was advertising “Soul Glo” on several occasions but we managed to get the right look the week of the wedding by adding a few discreet hair extensions to bring the curls down to my normal length. I finished by popping a non drowsy antihistimine (to stop nervous rash) and lashed on my “signature scent” Penhaligon’s Lily and Spice, which is summer in a bottle.

Like A Glove

My dress was Manto by La Sposa. I tried it on in Mirror Mirror Boutique in Crouch End, London but it was way over budget, so I got quotes from other boutiques for both the dress and the alterations and Mirror Mirror matched the cheapest. It saved me about £400 so it was well worth doing! I wanted something ethereal that would still control my ample curves and the sample fit me like a glove so I went for that. I did feel fabulous on the day but I have to say I never had the eureka moment with a dress. It just got to the point where I had to buy one so I bought the nicest I could afford.

The bridesmaids were my sister in Laws, my best friends Rach and Ang and my niece Sarah was my little flower girl. The older girls were originally in beige dresses from River Island but a couple of weeks before the wedding we were worried about the fit and quality, so the girls each went out and bought a dress they felt fab in in different colours within the colour scheme. I only saw the new dresses 20 minutes before we left the house for the ceremony so you can imagine how pleased I was that they all coordinated so well and looked so gorgeous! Danny and his Groomsmen, Anto, Charlo and Jenks, all looked really handsome in their blue River Island Slim Fit suits. Danny got the waistcoat to look a bit different and the boys had navy braces. We finished off their suits and the Dad’s outfits with Liberty print Ties and pocket squares by Moss. Our nephew Rob looked dapper in a blue waistcoat and trousers from Monsoon and turquoise converse (hand dyed by his mum Katherine!)

Hand Made

The headpiece and veil was my favourite bit of my outfit. At first I wanted a Juliet Cap like my Mum had, so we bought a couple from charity shops and were going to re -cover them but when trying them on I just felt like I had a jewish skull cap on my head! I’d been looking at Art deco styles on the internet but they were all around £400. My sister Laura is incredibly talented in loads of ways and ended up making it using geometric beaded shapes she found in Dalston Market, and sewed my Grandma’s turquoise earrings (something Blue) and my Nana’s pearls (something Old) onto it. We found out that if you wash stiff net in abrasive cleaning substances it softens it, so we bought cheap plastic net and did that and the net came out feeling like and moving like really expensive silk net, which we were thrilled about! I had a real problem with my shoes as my feet are so narrow and I tried several pairs at my fittings before biting the bullet and buying Rachel Simpson Tilly’s, which were well over budget but were gorgeous, had a narrow fit, small heel and an ankle strap.

I kept my jewellery to a minimum apart from the wrist cuff my sister had made for my 21st and of course my gorgeous 1915 engagement ring.

The Garden Of Ireland

We had an English Country Garden/Irish Knees Up theme. The English guests were really excited about it being an Irish Wedding and the Irish guests were really excited about coming to “Blackpool” for a wedding, so we tried to combine bits of both. We had a seaside peep board (that I spent hours painting), Blackpool Rock for our favours, loads of Guinness and an Irish postbox that Danny made for our card box. The colour scheme of the wedding evolved to become Peach, Mint, Pink and Turquoise. We also had a bit of a Glastonbury theme as that’s where we met. A bit of everything we are and like really! Mum and Dad worked on the garden for months and our friend Dave lent us loads of outdoor fairy lights to get it looking magical.

Peonies and Hydrangea

I love all types of flowers so found it difficult to choose. I loved the structure and silvery green hue of succulents and love peonies, ranunculas and hydrangeas. Unfortunately the ranunculas were out of season but I could have the rest and so Poppies Flowers in Kirkham made up the most beautiful bouquets, buttonholes, and corsages for the mums and sisters. The boys had the succulents for buttonholes, the bridesmaids wore matching flowers in their hair and Sarah had a halo of gyp. The flowers in the church were done by our friend Liz, who also supplied all the flowers for the marquee, and other villagers. Rach and Ang arranged all the flowers into the jars the day before.

When I See You Smile

We had the ceremony at St Michaels Church which is the local church in Mum and Dad’s village. We go to Christmas and Easter Services there and know the Vicar well so it was the obvious choice. Rev Andrew is really chilled out and welcomed my Uncle Frank, who is a Jesuit priest, to be involved in the ceremony and allowed us to have non religious readings and music as well so we could really make it relevant to us. Danny’s sister Claire read Song of Soloman, Laws read an extract from “The Gargoyle” by Andrew Davidson and my Uncle Frank read and blessed the marriage. I walked in to Danny’s sister Katherine singing “When I see you smile” by Bic Runga, and we had rousing hymns like “Give me Joy in my Heart” and “Lord of the Dance”.

During the signing of the register we played an Irish sea shanty and we walked out to masses of applause, a Belle and Sebastian song and villagers ringing the bells, which was really special.

Until 5am

Danny and I love festivals and live music so we had some very talented friends, Richard Pepper and Elaine Glover, play guitar and sing for the drinks reception. A bit later we had a brilliant band called The Northern Monkeys, who rocked out with loads of tunes til the early morning! They played loads of Indie tunes that took us back to the 90′s and some classics for the oldies. We bought flip flops for people to dance in, glo-sticks from the pound shop and Pashminas for if people got chilly and they all went down a storm! Our first dance was the Iron and Wine version of ‘Such Great Heights’. After the band finished and the bar closed we brought out the cans, Baileys and guitars and had a sing song until 5am in the morning.

Irish Themed

It took me ages to decide on food. I found it so difficult to find decent caterers in the Lancashire area that weren’t extortionately priced! We finally found Percivals from Bolton who were really helpful when choosing the menu. They helped me decide on mini English afternoon tea canapés and an Irish themed meal. We had mini scones, with jam and cream, tiny strawberry tarts and tiny triangle cucumber sandwiches, followed by a hearty meal of smoked salmon, Dublin bay prawns and Irish soda bread for starters , beef in Guinness with champ for main, and lemon tart for pudding (it’s one of my faves!). We also had an ice cream van and a sweetie table as well as our ‘Danny hearts Beth’ Blackpool rock favours.

Our friend Ruth is an expert in cheese so ordered a selection of beautiful cheeses, crackers and fig and nut chorizo from Andouret which they couriered to us and Mum ordered pork pies (they had D & B on the top in pastry!) to make up our evening nibbles. Our amazing cake was made by a family friend, another Ruth, who makes our Christmas cake every year and kept us in constant supply of the best flapjack ever in the run up to the wedding.

A Personalised Stamp

My sister spent a long time designing and making all the paper goods on her new Apple Mac which saved us a hell of a lot of money and meant we could put our own personalised stamp on things. Me and Danny wrote ‘our story’ and found graphics and fonts that complemented it and my sister designed the most incredible invite in black and white incorporating them all. She then went along the same lines with the order of service, menu cards, list of speeches and signage to and around the venue. It all looked amazing in the end. She also did name bunting for the back of each chair and bunting for the bar and ‘Acoustic Stage’ in bright colours, and a Glastonbury style table plan and table names. We puffed Pom Poms, collected hundreds of jam jars to paint turquoise to brighten the marquee and Dad and Danny made a photo board and a big B&D to go behind the band.

The Highlights

My best piece of advice is be aware how much work it is when you host a wedding in a marquee not attached to a venue and make sure you and your entire family is prepared for it, because you’ll need their help. In fact the whole village ended up chipping in with our day, doing gardening and lending us things. Also, get a good photographer as they are such a huge part of your day. Amy Murrell was great and really enhanced our day and the final photos were incredible. I also wasn’t going to have a videographer but am really glad we did now as you really want to relive moments and speeches after the day. We organised welcome drinks the night before and an England Vs Ireland Rounders Match the next day (I caught Dan out on the first bat!), which took the pressure off trying to get round everyone on the day.

The actual wedding day was amazing but my highlights were walking out the church married, the speeches and me and Dan turning out the lights at 5.30am in the morning when everyone had left, singing ‘I am the Resurrection’ at the top of our voices and revelling in how successful it all had been!

Brides Gown – La Sposa at Mirror Mirror
Brides Shoes – Tilly by Rachel Simpson
Grooms Suit – River Island
Blooms – Poppies Florist
Entertainment – The Northern Monkeys
Catering – Percivals of Bolton
Photographer – Amy Murrell

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Ok so I want cucumber sandwiches now. And strawberry tart. AND scones with jam and cream.

Delicious. All of it.

Big Irish Love

Charlotte xxx

Yes, I know it’s midsummer, but sometimes we like to mix things up a bit here at RMW, especially considering lots of you lovelies may in fact be planning your very own Christmas themed wedding right now.

Becky and Tristan’s wedding is gloriously cosy and snuggly. They have literally combined all of the BEST things about Christmas…mistletoe, candle light, open fires, family, friends and good food. And of course Mariah.

And, maybe if we are all good this year, Father Christmas will bring us two gorgeous gowns and an amazing feather shrug just like beautiful Becky.

Make sure you read her tale of the dress hunt though and take note. With a bit of dedication, good timing and risk taking perhaps we won’t have to rely on Santa afterall…

Bright And Crisp

Becky The Bride: We got married on 8th December 2012. Aside from the fact I’m a winter junkie (log fires, candles, hot chocolate) an out of season wedding appealed to both of us because it meant there would be no surprises with the weather, it was going to be bad and we would plan accordingly. However as the week of the wedding dawned I couldn’t help but obsessively check the weather app on my phone much to Tristan’s annoyance – ‘Becky it’s December it’s not going to be sunny. I don’t know why you are so bothered about the weather all of a sudden?!’

Anyway the first thing I did when I woke up on the day of the wedding was look out the window. Anyway, turns out we lucked out with the weather. It was bright, crisp and not that chilly, I didn’t feel the cold all day and there was no rain.

We did the official bit at Forde Abbey in Somerset then headed ten minutes down the road to the Lord Poulett Arms for the reception.

Swoon Worthy

Dress shopping was a bit of an anti-climax for me. The one thing I knew was that I definitely didn’t want a strapless dress as it didn’t feel right for December but the first few shops I went had only one or two dresses with straps which were frumpy and urgh. I realised that I needed to try another tact so after much googling I discovered Swoon in Surrey. This shop was a bit of a breakthrough, they had hundreds of dresses from every designer you could think of, loads of dresses with straps and it was all affordable. I would seriously recommend it.

I tried on fishtails, princess skirts and everything in-between. It was here that I tried on Alice by Jenny Packham and fell in love. So I came away from Swoon knowing that I had to have Alice but there was a niggle in my mind about whether she felt weddingy enough so I decided, as you do, that I needed two dresses. Weddingy lace for the day and slinky Alice for the evening. Problem was I needed to get both for £1000.

Lone Ranger

A week later Alice popped up on Ebay, she was a ten and I was most definitely a good twelve at that point but I bought her anyway as she was a bargain at £500 (this was to become the most stressful decision I made). Another week later I was visiting Tristan’s parents in Reading. I was heading into London later to meet friends and needed some bits so I drove into town early in my joggers with no make-up on looking nothing like a bride-to-be. I noticed a wedding dress shop near the car park and there was a sale sign in the window so thought I’d pop my head in.

Hanging on the sale rack was a dress that ticked all the boxes – sleeves, lace, no sparkle, my size and it was half price. I tried it on (by myself, no mum or bridesmaids and I was in joggers) and fell in love. It was a Benjamin Roberts design with a satin strapless fishtail dress and a lace dress with sleeves that went over the top. It had a really long train (weddingy to the max) and was really like the dress my mum wore on her wedding day. Everyone else in the shop had a gang with them to share in the moment, I was by myself. Cue panicked phone calls to Tristan, my mum, maid of honour who all told me to buy it so I did and dress shopping was done.

Simple Sparkle

I always thought I would wear a veil but when I tried it with my dress it took away from the beauty of the train and it was all a bit much. Instead I hired Jenny Packham’s Acacia II to add a bit of vintage sparkle. I wore a pair of simple drop earrings and my engagement ring. I also borrowed a feather bolero from a friend for around my shoulders.

Two Dress, Two Pairs Of Shoes

Two dresses meant two pairs of shoes! I knew I’d be in the mud for pictures so bought a cheap pair of Wallis shoes for £30 in the sale for the day. They were a rose gold with a low comfortable heel. For the evening I bought a pair of nude Alexander McQueen slingbacks (Ebay again) with a gold skull (complete with diamond eyes) on the front.

Thicker, Shinier And Better Behaved

I toyed with the idea of having my hair up for about two seconds but realised I wouldn’t feel like me. I always wear it down when I want to feel nice so wanted it to be like my hair but if it was thicker, shiner and always did what I wanted. I used the same hair and make-up artist, Becks and Sarah as my best friend had when she got married as I really liked them and they were tried and trusted. Becks gave me big curls with a shampoo and set with a few clip in extensions to make it nice and thick and Sarah made me look like a super glossy and shiny version of myself. They were both lovely people to have around and really made me feel at ease.

I remember feeling so calm while we were all getting ready that I felt like I was watching myself. It was only when I started walking down the aisle and I saw Tristan that the emotion took over and I basically cried pretty much the whole way through the service. Sarah’s make up did not move though and for that alone it was worth every penny!

David Austin Roses And Gypsophila

Being a winter wedding I wanted it to feel warm and cosy so fires and candles were a massive priority. Originally a family friend (who is a florist) was going to do the flowers for us but she found out she was expecting twins and the due date was scarily close to the wedding. So we recruited a florist to do a few complicated bits for us and with Claire’s expert help did the rest ourselves.

At Forde Abbey we had a beautiful display of gold candlesticks (all from Ebay) with white David Austin roses and gyp woven amongst them. We borrowed zinc buckets from Claire and she ordered a load of gyp for us to fill them.

At The Lord Poulett Arms we didn’t have traditional table centres but jam jars with gyp places on tables and services all around the pub.

My bouquet was David Austin roses, eucalyptus, freesias and other white flowers and the bridesmaids all had a big puff of gyp. The buttonholes were a white rose with pheasant feather and a sprig of eucalyptus.

Dapper Chaps

Tristan was very emphatic he didn’t want to wear tails and as the wedding was a pretty relaxed affair this felt like the right choice. Instead he wore a three piece Navy suit from Reiss with a white shirt and a knitted blue bow tie. We asked the boys to wear a grey suit and provide them with knitted ties, white pocket squares and spotty socks to pull it all together. They all looked very dapper!

Waterworks

When we started planning the wedding I had a vision of Tristan in a tweed suit and we even went to try one on. Unfortunately it just didn’t look right and he wasn’t comfortable so we opted for a three piece navy number from Reiss with a fitted white shirt and a knitted bow tie. He looked so happy and handsome waiting at the end of the aisle and I think that’s what pushed me over the edge and made the waterworks start!

Originally we wanted a humanist ceremony but when we found out that it would mean we’d need to get legally married before we had second thoughts. Instead we wrote the whole ceremony ourselves weaving in personal memories, the reasons why we love each other and promises and vows for the future. The ceremony was so intimate and pretty much everyone cried at some point. You could really feel the love and warmth in the room and I will remember it forever.

We had a brass band play as we thought the sound was more wintery and a bit different than strings. I walked in to some classical music but we decided to mix it up a bit and planned to walk out to Crazy in Love. Just as the music started I turned and saw my dad stand up and start playing the trumpet – Love Actually style! He had played the trumpet as a child and I found out after that he’d been practicing for months and had even been to rehearse on the sly with the band. He then sauntered up the aisle took a seat with the band and played till the end. It was a truly tear inducing moment and everyone absolutely loved it. I was going to dance with my dad after the first dance to something a bit calmer but we quickly changed it to Crazy in Love and did Beyoncé dancing together, my dad had one hand around me and another on the trumpet for the dah dah dah bits. I can’t wait to see this in the video!

Treasure The Pictures Forever

This was one of the easiest decisions we made. Pen and Cam had photographed my friends Claire and Nick and Tristan and I were blown away by the pictures. They put us at ease and all our guests loved them. We will treasure the pictures forever.

Chocolate Cake

My mum’s cakes would have Mary Berry quaking in her boots so I asked her to make us a darkly decadent chocolate cake which was absolutely yummy and Tristan and I enjoyed a slice in the taxi back to the hotel. We loved it so much she made us a mini version for when we got back from honeymoon.

Let Loose On The Decks

Being on a small budget we had to make concessions and we decided we’d forego a band but tried to build fun into the day in other ways. While we were at the Abbey finishing our pictures our guests travelled to the pub where they were greeted with mulled cider and winter pimms and sat down for a pub quiz with a general knowledge round, a Christmas round and a Mr and Mrs Broomfield round. The winning table won a bottle of fizz.

After the first dance two of my friends took to the decks for a warm up set that got everyone on the floor. They aren’t professional DJs and they don’t actually spin (you can do a lot with iTunes mixer!) but they dance, sing and are generally hilarious. I gave them both pheasant feather head dresses and let them loose. After this we had a local wedding DJ who played a mix of old favourites and some new stuff and the dance floor was full all night.

All I Want For Christmas Is You

We wanted a Christmas wedding not a winter wedding so the Christmas influence was small. However, the first dance was the exception. We didn’t want to do anything romantic as we knew we’d get embarrassed so decided to go for full on cheese. All I want for Christmas (not the Bieber version) is my favourite Christmas song and it seemed totally appropriate. We meant to at least plan the first ten seconds but never got round to it but we had a total ball and laughed the whole way though. Pen even told us it was the best first dance they had even seen (Pen were you lying?!)

Homemade Favours

In another nod to the season we made CDs of our favourite Christmas songs for guests to listen to on the way home (using a RMW template, thank you Adam!) And Tristan’s mum painstakingly baked us some deer ginger biscuits.

Roasting Open Fires

Fire and candle light was the décor mainstay of the wedding. Candles and roaring fires were everywhere from the huge open fire at Forde Abbey to the warming embers around the pub. We used blue Ikea lanterns in the pub, tea lights and silver jars filled with gyp to bring it all together.

We chose old family pictures of our parents and grandparents to display in the pub and made triangle shaped frames which we popped a battery operated tea light inside so they glowed, it was a subtle nod to those who will always be special to us but are sadly no longer with us.

Cosy, Warm And Fun

Our ethos for the wedding was cosy, warm and fun and we tried to make sure everything reflected this. Instead of a formal table plan or guest book we had a washing line around the bar with Polaroid’s of all our guests, find your face, find your table! Instead of a guest book we commissioned a lovely lady on Etsy to make us a Mr and Mrs Broomfield crochet that guests signed around.

We made little welcome cards for the hotels we knew our guests were staying at letting them know what time the fun bus would pick them up and how much we were looking forward to celebrating with them.

We bought some vintage hankies from Ebay and had these with the programs so guests could take one ready for it to get a bit emotional, I only wish I’d picked one up as my mum and I shared the same hankie all the way through the service. We also made up little gift bags for our bridal party with personal gifts and cards to let them know how much we appreciated them and thank them for all their support. I think sharing these with my bridesmaids and parents the night before the wedding will be one of my lasting memories.

Reflect On The Day

I am so pleased I got two dresses. Controversial as it may be I really appreciated the time to go and have a 15 minute refresh and take a moment to reflect on the day. My mum and bridesmaids all came with me (my mum had a costume change too) and it was a lovely moment to reflect on the day.

Similarly Tristan and I snuck upstairs for ten minutes to chat through our favourite bits so far. Brides to be, make sure you do this! It was really lovely to take a deep breath together before the dancing started.

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Bride’s Dress – Jenny Packham and Benjamin Roberts
Head Piece – Jenny Packham
Shoes – Wallis and Alexander McQueen
Hair – Thairapy
Make up – Sarah B Make Up
Groom’s Suit – Reiss
Brass Band – Phoenix Brass
Venue – Forde Abbey
Reception – Lord Poulett Arms
Photography – Mckinley Rodgers

See – don’t despair that the nights are drawing in!!

Christmas is AWESOME.

Especially when you are let loose with a pheasant feather head dress and a trumpet.

Lots of love,
Fern x

Where the River Thames meets the Cotswolds. That’s how The Trout Inn describes it’s location. As you can imagine, it’s pretty idyllic. Which is exactly why today’s gorgeous couple chose it as their wedding venue.

They hired an amazing vintage marquee, set it up between the pub and the river and jitterbugged the night away. Throw in family, friends and homemade cake and you’re on to a winner.

The images were captured by the lovely Cotton Candy Photography ladies – make sure you click through to the gallery and have a look at some of their shots using vintage and toy cameras. Very dreamy indeed.

Rustic Countryside Charm

Natasha The Bride: The wedding ceremony and reception were at The Trout Inn at Tadpole Bridge in Buckland Marsh, Oxfordshire. After getting engaged in May 2012 in London we travelled to Oxfordshire to spend the weekend at a romantic retreat, The Dovecote, in Oxfordshire. We stumbled upon The Trout Inn at Tadpole Bridge after an epic walk in Oxfordshire countryside and immediately were taken aback by its idyllic location by the Thames and its rustic countryside charm. After having a couple of drinks in the sun, we decided to stay for dinner and ended leaving when it got dark. Little did we know that exactly a year to the date of our first visit (I still have the receipt!) to The Trout Inn we would be getting married there.

We chose this venue because it embodied everything that we were looking for – tranquil location, laidback atmosphere, delicious food and drink. Plus we love to spend an evening in a good pub! We could also decorate the venue as we wanted thus make the occasion more personal.

We hired a vintage military marquee from LPM Bohemia to be used for speeches and dancing. We used the pub’s picnic benches inside the marquee for guests to take a seat during speeches and to rest after a good dance session!

Reflecting The Location

I did not start with a particular theme or look in mind – rather, everything fell into place once the venue was decided so we got more of an idea of what would be fitting for the location and general ‘feel’ of the place. My hairstyle had to be appropriate for the dress (or two, rather) and was beautifully done by my hair stylist.

Make-up – I did my own make-up as I think you know your own face better than others. I had, however, been for a Bridal Make-up Lesson with MAC. The make-up artist created a look that accentuated my eyes whilst keeping the lip colour nude. I practised recreating this look a couple of times before the wedding day. I am glad I chose MAC as the products were fantastic and lasted well throughout the day.

I made sure I had a Gelish manicure and pedicure in pale pink – it lasts for weeks and we were jetting off on our honeymoon the day after the wedding. You don’t want chipped nail varnish ruining your honeymoon look!

Simple Yet Elegant

My wedding dress is an original 1970s Vintage dress which I got from the Vintage Wedding Dress Company (now Charlie Brear). I also had a vintage original headpiece bought at the same shop as my dress. When I saw my future dress at a Bridal event I immediately knew that this was The One – it fitted perfectly with our countryside wedding theme, it was simple yet elegant. The Dress Number Two that I wore for our Jitterbug first dance was by Malene Birger from Net-a-Porter.

I had two pairs of shoes: the Rosette-Embellished Satin Sandals for the ceremony and the reception; the Charlotte Olympia Kitty satin flats for dancing. The sandals were from Net-a-Porter by Giuseppe Zanotti. The Kitty flats are also a tribute to our two cats, Lilly and Anya. They obviously could not be taken with us to the wedding (although I would have loved to) but I was reminded of them every time I looked down at my feet!

Multi Coloured And Floral

I had one Head Bridesmaid and three Bridesmaids; Philip had two Best Men and two Groomsmen. We didn’t want anything ‘bridesmaidy’ so the girls were free to choose what they would be happy wearing as long as there was some unity by colour or style. The Head Bridesmaid wore a dress by Ted Baker but the Bridesmaids had their dresses were from Reiss. All the girls, however, wore the same pair of shoes by LK Bennett as the flower pattern and the multitude of colours suited the countryside theme and were in contrast with the pale mint dresses.

The Groomsmen’s ties were a great find as they complemented the Bridesmaids’ shoes and the Groom’s tie. They were from The Savile Row Company and the Groom’s tie was by Paul Smith.

Countryside Fair

The theme was Countryside Fair which we tried to reflect through decorative items like vintage paper pompoms, hessian table cloths, giant balloons, mason jars and porcelain jugs. The colour scheme came about spontaneously – white/pale mint. Essentially, we just picked out the colours and items we liked, such as the wedding car, bridesmaids’ dresses and groomsmen’s ties. To complete the theme we asked one of the venue staff to serve ice cream in a summer straw hat; cloudy lemonade in vintage milk bottles was provided to the guests during the reception as well as giant Jenga and quoits.

The Smell Of Herbs

The flowers were roses, baby breath and some green foliage (to keep with white/green scheme). These were provided Wild About florist. For the table centrepieces I planted rosemary, sage and thyme into wooden planters which were then draped in hessian and lace.

The Most Important Part

We felt that a ceremony should symbolise our wish to be together which is the most important part. The length, however, was less important so we wanted it short to keep the attention of the audience and to fit with the overall concept of the wedding: light-hearted and party oriented. We therefore had simple vows with no readings. We loved the way the rain stopped and sun came out briefly during our vows.

High Energy

The wedding dance was a track from a similar dance: Lucy Does the Jitterbug. We had a couple of lessons with a very patient dance teacher Stuart McGee from the Lyndy Hop and Swing Dance Club. It was fun to dance and our guests enjoyed the high energy and originality. We had a very good DJ who asked us to compile various lists of songs. He blended them into a very good party mix keeping people on the dance floor throughout.

From Russia With Love

The menu was provided by the venue and both chicken and vegetarian options were very tasty according to comments we received from our guests. Both chocolate/cherry and fruit cakes were created by Phil’s mother – Vera. The wedding was due to finish after 1am so we had a hog to provide our guests with much needed energy for the dancing.

As a thank you to our family, we gave picture frames with our names and wedding date engraved. With a nod to our Russian background our best men, ushers and bridesmaids received a glass jug and cup set in the form of a Russian doll while other guests received measuring cups in the form of Russian dolls.

Pale Pink, Green And Hessian

The stationery was very important as it set the tone for the wedding. We printed invitations, order of service and thank you cards in pale pink and green through a boutique San Francisco design studio Hello! Lucky. I bound the order of service sheets with hessian string – again, keeping with the rustic countryside theme.

I made the seating plan myself with handmade cards and rubber alphabet stamps. The table numbers were simply numbered with vintage rubber number stamps.

Go With The Flow

Although the task of organising a wedding may seem daunting, it is also ultimately enjoyable to see all your hard work eventually pay off. Don’t stress too much about everything going perfectly on the day – just go with the flow and enjoy the most memorable day in your life.

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Venue – The Trout Inn
Bride’s Gown – The Vintage Wedding Dress Co. and Malene Birger at Net-A-Porter
Bride’s Shoes – Charlotte Olympia and Giuseppe Zanotti at Net-A-Porter
Bridesmaid’s Dresses – Ted Baker and Reiss
Shoes – LK Bennett
Florist – Wild About
Car Hire – Cotswold 500
Stationery – Hello! Lucky
Photography – Cotton Candy Photography

I’m a sucker for herbs as centrepieces – the smell must be delicious.

Natasha’s hair looks gorgeous too. Yet another head piece I need in my life!

Hope you’re all loving the tweed suit and flat cap too! Phil looks like a true gent.

Lots of love,
Fern x

Back garden weddings are my favourite. They always look so cosy, warm and welcoming. This one is especially fabulous as there’s a Tipi and the family dog gets to join in the festivities.

Katie’s parents house was always her dream wedding venue and she has been best friends with Groom Andy since they were at nursery! Their familiarity and together-ness shines through in all of the images.

Their families and friends look like a really lovely, happy group of people and I bet that some of them knew very early on that Katie and Andy would one day end up Man and Wife.

Home Sweet Home

Katie The Bride: Ever since I was a little girl I have always wanted to have my wedding in my parent’s garden. My dad converted the barn into our home around 20 years ago and it’s been the central point of our family ever since. So when Andy proposed to me on a skiing holiday I knew instantly we had the venue sorted!

I found the tipi tents online before we even got engaged (as you do!) and absolutely loved how different they are to any other marquees. Andy wasn’t so keen to start with until we went to an open day with Tipis4hire and he was sold too! The team at Tipis4hire were brilliant and really competitively priced.

A Colourful Lip

I knew I wanted to wear my hair in an up-do so I wouldn’t have to worry about it on the day. I bought my hair comb at the Save the Date wedding fair. My hair isn’t very long and it’s quite fine so my auntie Sue (who is a hairdresser) recommended a Balmain hair piece. This was amazing and I still use it now when creating my own up-dos.

I wanted my hair loose with a messy look and Leah from Head Candy in Market Harborough totally nailed it. She’s so lovely to work with and also did all the bridesmaids hair and my mum’s! I tend to go for a bright lip colour and keep my eyes neutral when doing my own makeup so thought I’d stick to what I like. Mandy Adams is fab and did an awesome job of all our makeup. It lasted well into the night despite lots of hugging, kissing and a little crying!

Exactly As Imagined

I knew I wanted some lace in my dress and I was completely adamant I didn’t want strapless. I have to say I never had an ‘it’s the one’ moment but when I decided on my gorgeous Benjamin Roberts gown it’s exactly the dress I imagined wearing on my w-day. I wasn’t so keen on the neckline of the dress so I had the sleeves pinched in to expose more of my shoulders. I added an embellished sash that I bought on Etsy.

Sparkly Princess Gorgeousness

My something old was my Mum’s veil that she wore when marrying my Dad and this was really special to me as I’m so close to both my parents. Top tip: After 30 years in the loft the veil was rather yellow, so my Mum hand washed it in Glo white net curtain whitener, and TA-DA, it was as good as new!

Ooh the shoes…I wanted some I could wear again to remind me of our special day so I went for the ultimate in sparkly princess gorgeousness… Jimmy Choos! I kept my jewellery simple with some small vintage chandelier earrings from the Save the Date wedding fair and a sapphire ring my Grandma Sheila gave to me for my 21st birthday, this was also my ‘something blue’.

Andy bought me a beautiful delicate Astley Clarke bracelet as a wedding gift and I surprised him with the Tag Heuer watch he’s dreamed about for as long as I can remember.

Well Dressed Wedding Party

I had seven bridesmaids in total – my sisters, Andy’s sisters and our three cousins. I stumbled across the older girls dresses in Topshop, they’re from the boutique range Coco’s Fortune and knew they’d look amazing on all my girls.

My little girls were really hard to dress as they were 12 and 11 at the time, too young for ladies dresses but too big for flower girl dresses. In the end we went for a dress from Monsoon teamed with glittery gold pumps.

Andy had two best men and they all wore the same three piece navy suit from Jeff Banks. Andy loves his shoes so went for some lovely tan brogues from Grenson. Their spotty ties were from Reiss.

Six Foot K & A

We wanted an outdoorsy, rustic and fun feel to our day. The tipis needed to be bursting with pretty decorations so we used lots of fairy lights, bunting, paper pom poms, wicker hearts, paper lanterns and tons of gorgeous flowers and foliage. I had seen on RMW some fantastic giant light up letters so my Dad decided he could make these and 2 days later, voila – we had a 6 ft K & A in the garage!

Colour And Texture

The beautiful flowers were exactly as I’d imagined and arranged by the wonderful Carolann at CK Flowers. I wanted lots of colour and texture so for the bouquets she used pink peonies, herbs such as rosemary and lavender, orange roses and blue thistles.

We also had two large arrangements in milk churns and two smaller arrangements for the top table. Then my lovely Grandma organised our table arrangements in wooden heart lanterns. We then raided my parent’s garden for tons of ivy and foliage that we used all over – throughout the tipis, around pillars and to make an arch at the altar of the church.

Marrying My Best Friend

Andy and I have been friends since we were at nursery so it was really special for us to get married at our local parish church where we were both christened. My sister Charlotte read a poem by Louise Cuddon called ‘I’ll be there for you’. She kept this as a surprise until the day, it was so personal to us both and she read it so beautifully. I was worried I would cry throughout the ceremony but I was just so excited to marry my best friend all my nerves melted away.

You Belong With Me

Andy’s sister Kate is a phenomenal singer and asked to sing at our wedding breakfast. She chose Ed Sheeran ‘Kiss Me’ and it was absolutely amazing. It was really important to us that we had a live band that would get everyone dancing. We came across TI Funk in Nottingham and knew they’d be perfect! They’re a great blend of soul, funk and RnB with two incredible lead singers. We chose our first dance so long ago nothing else could compete… We had Ho Hey by The Lumineers and it will forever be one of our favourite songs.

Lovingly Homemade

My parent’s friends and exceptional caterers, Nick and Mandy Healy from Nick’s at Home, produced our delicious menu. We had canapés then a selection of homemade breads, oils, hummus and smoked salmon for starter, succulent supreme of chicken for main and a trio of desserts to finish. For the evening we had pork cobs with all the trimmings and lots of homemade cakes loving made by friends and family. For our favours my mum was amazing and made plum jam, raspberry vodka and sloe gin for the ladies. Then for the gents we bought hipflasks and filled then with whisky.

Talented Friends And Family

When it came to stationery we were extremely lucky to have such a talented bunch of friends and family. Our lovely friend Ian of Twin Tipped Designs offered to design all our wedding stationery. He is fab and all the invitations, menus etc looked brilliant. My Grandad is a great artist and sketched the church for the front of our order of service and our family friend Paul Duval printed everything for us.

A Wedding In A Field

If you are planning to organise a wedding in a field or garden then you need tons of support! We were so lucky to have amazing parents, family and friends to help us out because there is so much more to think about and arrange; the list is endless!

Andy and I tried to make sure we had some time together as the whole day is a whirlwind of kisses, thank yous, laughs, tears and much more! I know every bride says this but it’s over in a flash so savour EVERY moment!

Breath-taking Photography

Emma Case and her husband Pete are simply the best! They are such lovely, genuine and wonderful people and their photography is breathtaking, everything we could have wished for!

We also enlisted Carmen of Carmen Weddings as our wedding organiser and I truly don’t know what we would have done without her! She worked her socks off and ensured that on the day we could relax without worrying about lighting candles, moving tables and the thousand other things that needed doing.

It was Lolly’s wedding on RMW that made me realise we HAD to have a videographer and we decided on Minty Slippers who captured our day beautifully. I can honestly say all our suppliers were absolutely awesome and amazing to work with.

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Bride’s Gown – Benjamin Roberts
Sash – Etsy
Shoes – Jimmy Choo
Bridesmaid’s Gowns – Coco’s Fortune at Topshop and Monsoon
Hair – Leah from Head Candy in Market Harborough
Groom and Groomsmen – Jeff Banks
Tipi Hire – Tipis4Hire
Jewellery – Lou Lou Jewellery
Band – TI Funk
Florist – CK Flowers
Stationery – Twin Tipped Designs
Videography – Minty Slippers
Wedding Planner – Carmen of Carmen Weddings
Photography – Emma Case Photography

Isn’t Katie’s hair and make up gorgeous? Very fresh and fun looking.

And who needs a prop hire company when you’ve got Katie’s Dad??

Lots of love,
Fern x

We do love a Groom in shorts, and lovely Dan is no exception. Add to the mix the gorgeous Zoe in her unusual Tatyana Merenyuk gown, heaps of delicious wild flowers, some watercolour Bridesmaids dresses AND Groomsmen in bowties and braces and you’ve pretty much got wedding perfection.

Zoe and Dan also managed to bag the most epic wedding entertainment I’ve heard for a while – but I’ll let Zoe surprise you with that one.

If the knees leave you in the mood for a little more men-in-shorts action and you missed these Bermudan beauts, make sure you check them out.

That Feeling

We got married at The Secret Garden Restaurant, Mersham-Le-Hatch near Ashford in Kent. We knew they had a good reputation for food, and when we went to see them we loved the walled garden with a gazebo in the middle of rows of vegetables. We also liked the fact we could have the ceremony and reception all in one place (the reception was in a marquee in the garden).

We knew it was the right kind of setting for us – naturally beautiful, outdoors, ever so slightly quirky… Even though we visited for the first time in winter when the trees were bare we both somehow were able to envision ourselves and our wedding there. That was what swung it I suppose, that feeling.

Midsummer Night’s Dream

We were going for an outdoorsy, informal feel so I wanted to keep my look quite natural. For my hair I got inspiration from Pinterest, I knew I was going to do it myself and just accessorised with little fake flowers bought on the high street.

I had a trial with a make-up artist but the ‘flawless base’ and dramatic eye make-up just didn’t go with our ‘garden party’ style. I did it myself in the end with my normal make-up kit plus some corner lashes and a primer which I don’t normally use. My mum described my look as ‘very midsummer night’s dream’!

Unique And Unconventional

My dress was by New York designer Tatyana Merenyuk and I found it in Frou Frou Bridal Boutique, Tunbridge Wells, Kent. It’s a small store and the owners are two lovely, young, down to earth ladies who really seem to care. I thought I might struggle to find what I wanted – something unconventional but not ‘trendy’, not too heavy or structured.

None of the dresses in the main collection were quite right but then they dug out this one-off sample that was different to anything I’d seen anywhere. When I saw my sister’s face I could tell it was the one.

Delicate Gold

In terms of shoes and jewellery again I didn’t feel the need to go for expensive or glitzy additions, partly it’s just not style and partly the dress was so lovely by itself it hardly needed accessorising at all.

My parents wanted to contribute to the outfit so they gave me a delicate gold bracelet which was the only jewellery I wore. Shoes I ordered a few pairs online and in the end went with a super-comfy pair from Zalando (think they were by Vagabond).

Fun And Comfortable

I’ve never been a fan of matchy-matchy clothes or colour schemes so we had long talks about how to get round this but still have a cohesive bridal party that looked a bit special and stood out from other guests. Luckily Dan feels the same way and we found some cool ideas on Pinterest for informal groomsmen’s outfits. They all wore beige trousers, brown braces and white shirts with gorgeous handmade bow ties and pocket squares from Bow & Tie London.

Bridesmaid’s dresses ended up being a floral Traffic People number I’d ordered from ASOS – again I’m not a fan of the conventional style for bridesmaids so just went with something summery and floaty to match our theme. My sister’s loved the fact they were comfortable too!

Vintage And Rustic

There was no real colour scheme – in the end there was quite a bit of blue I suppose, but I made sure nothing was too ‘matching’! The theme was ‘garden party’ and we had bits and pieces of vintagey and rustic looking decorations – some supplied by the venue and some we found or made ourselves.

My mum made us a post-box in the shape of an Oast House (because we live in one) and groomsman Neil handmade giant photo-frames to hang from a tree.

Wild Mixed Flowers

All the flowers were done by the talented Fiona Chapman of Anenome Blue. Her lovely shop is on the same site as the venue and they have a partnership whereby table centre flowers are included in some of the packages so it made sense to have her do the other bits too.

Fiona did an amazing job of bringing my vague idea of ‘wild, mixed flowers’ to life and we ended up with gorgeous natural looking, multi-coloured, hand-tied bouquets for me and my two bridesmaids. We also had the gazebo decorated, button holes with cornflowers and herbs for the boys and a colourful mix similar to the bouquets for the table centres.

I Wanna Grow Old With You

Ours was a civil ceremony so we added two readings to make it more personal and to make it last a bit longer! One was ‘How Falling in Love is like Owning a Dog’ by Taylor Mali which Dan’s sister read, and one of my best friends Laura read ‘I Love You’ by Larry S. Chengges.

We also had a member of the evening band do an acoustic rendition of ‘I Wanna Grow Old With You’ from the film The Wedding Singer as I walked down the aisle – I love that song.

Surprise Entertainment

In between the ceremony and meal we had a surprise for guests in the form of two teenage magicians who I knew through friends – they mingled with guests in the garden performing card tricks and were truly impressive – everybody was stunned by the pint-sized talent!

Stripped Back Beyonce

We had an amazing band with us all day called The Brightside Band. I can’t recommend them enough – they learnt new songs for us, lent their equipment to the surprise act we had coming on after them, and doubled up as a gorgeous ‘chill out’ jazz trio in between the ceremony and meal which everybody loved.

They did a stripped back version of Beyoncé’s ‘Halo’ for our first dance which I absolutely loved – it was awesome to have one of my favourite songs sung live.

Restaurant Quality

Our delicious food was done by the venue since they are a restaurant (one of our reasons for choosing them!) we knew it would be good, and had great comments from our guests. Guests had a choice of three starters, four mains and three desserts which we had selected from an even larger list so we were happy we could tailor it to our tastes.

Cakes were three sponges (carrot cake, chocolate orange and lemon drizzle) and a tray of brownies, made by a lady called Debra who has a stall at a local farmer’s market.

Football Crazy

To be honest stationery wasn’t that important to us, we got brown cardboard invites, thank you cards and tags for our message tree from Paperchase that went with our rustic / country style décor. We made invites, wrote place cards etc ourselves as we weren’t worried about them being fancy or perfect – not our style!

The table plan and names were themed around Dan’s other Love – the footballer Dean Saunders. We had eleven tables so it worked really well – tables were represented by footy shirts and stuck on to a foosball table background!

Wonderful Suppliers

I want to say a big THANK YOU to our venue for accommodating all our wishes and also our lovely photographer Rebecca Douglas, who has been so wonderful throughout we really can’t recommend her enough.

There Are No Rules

It’s been said many times, but I can’t stress enough how important it is to be true to your own style, personalities and tastes – go with gut feelings when making choices and don’t let other people or what ‘should’ be done sway you. There are no ‘rules’ apart from the legal bit in the ceremony – you really can do it your way.

I almost forgot, I haven’t revealed who our surprise act was – the biggest talking point amongst guests for days! Dan, through a university friend, managed to book the Artful Dodger for a set after the band! They smashed it – the dance floor went crazy – all our friends were loving the 90’s garage tunes, reminding us of some of our first nights out as teenagers with such classics as ‘Re-Rewind’ and ‘With A Little Bit Of Luck’. It was surreal and SO much fun!

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Bride’s Dress – Tatyana Merenyuk at Frou Frou Bride
Bridesmaid’s Dresses – Traffic People at ASOS
Groomsmen’s Bowties – Bow and Tie London
Florist – Anemone Blue
Band – The Brightside Band
Cake – Debra’s Cake And Bake
Stationery – Paperchase
Venue – The Secret Garden
Photography – Rebecca Douglas

Isn’t it lovely?

And how awesome that ACTUAL Artful Dodger DJed!

Yay for ‘no rules!’ Rebellious weddings are always the best.

Lots of love,
Fern x

There is SO MUCH GORGEOUSNESS in today’s wedding my head almost exploded putting it together.

The gold accents throughout the marquee, the wild flowers, the cuter-than-cute flower girl and page boys, Hannah’s earrings and hair slides, the Vintage Land Rover covered in roses…I could go on and on.

The wedding party look very Kate-Moss-and-Jamie-Hince-Wedding inspired and the images of everyone basking in the setting sun are literally idyllic. Get ready for some serious inspiration!

Enjoying the views

My parents live on a farm in Hertfordshire, so there was never any doubt where we would hold our reception. We never wanted a particularly traditional wedding, more a relaxed summer garden party so the farm really was the most perfect location for this. My parents are lucky enough to have quite a large garden to hold a marquee, with enough space for people to stand around sipping champers and enjoy the views.

Natural And Relaxed

I don’t tend to wear a lot of make up and always wear my hair up and out of the way but I wanted a casual and relaxed hair style so I opted to wear it down. I’ve been going to the same hair dresser for about eight years, where we’d constantly discuss each others love lives so I always knew I’d ask the lovely Dino to do my hair on the day.

He was so calming and I was thrilled with my natural tousled look. My make up was done by the amazing make up artist Emma who is a friend of one of my best mates. She did a fantastic job in making me look half decent and without the caked effect!

An Easy Dress Hunt

I’m a womenswear buyer for a UK retailer so I always though finding a dress would be quite stressful. In actual fact it was a breeze! I lined up three appointments in London about eight months before the wedding and took both Mums, my Sister and Sister in law with me to help me make a decision.

At my second appointment I fell in love with Jenny Packham Eden dress in platinum, it was exactly what I’d dreamed of wearing – unconventional and with a bit of bling. I’ve never felt more amazing in a dress before and I’m sure I’ll be able to wear it again one day.

The Only Chance To Wear A Veil

I only decided on the shoes I was going to wear as I was putting on the dress. For me, shoes weren’t hugely important – no one even sees them! I ended up wearing a pair I’d worn as a bridesmaid for my friends wedding, I’d only worn them once before and they were a perfect match to the dress. I bought some pretty hair clips from Anthropologie and borrowed some gorgeous earrings from my sister which she’d wore on her wedding day. I wore a veil too because I knew it would be my only chance!

Bespoke Dresses

My job takes me to India regularly and it was on a trip there to see one of my suppliers that I saw a beautiful dress that I knew would be perfect for my three grown up bridesmaids to wear. They very kindly said they would make the dresses for me, so I changed the colour and embroidery so the dresses were off white with a tarnished gold hand embroidery. They only arrived a week before the wedding, luckily they were fab and only needed a few tweaks.

Boys In Blue

The flower girls wore white cotton broderie dresses and the page boys bright blue chinos, stripy shirts and converse style trainers, all from Gap and John Lewis. Despite not wanting a too traditional wedding, James, his best men and ushers all wore morning suits which I loved and James bought the ties himself. An avid fan of the Wimbledon football team he wanted a blue and yellow combo which was fine by me.

Gold Accents

I didn’t have a particular colour scheme but if i had to pin point it then I guess it was neutral and gold with accents of all colors! The theme was rural, rustic and fuss free.

Informal And Pretty Flowers

My gorgeous Aunt has always been interested in flowers and flower arranging so it was only natural that I would call on her for help! I found a few images of what I wanted and she helped me to create that natural, ‘just picked’ look I was after. The table arrangements were colorful, informal and pretty in simple Kilner jars.

She did various other arrangements with the help of my Mum, other Aunt and Mother in law – a large pedestal in the church and a gorgeous one in an old metal milk churn. The bouquets were done through a recommendation, the very lovely Ellie. She came to meet with me to go through my ideas and I was so thrilled with what she did for us. They smelt just as good as they looked!

Family History

Many generations of my family have been married at one particular church near home so it really was the only place we had in mind. Everyone says the most nerve racking bit is walking down the aisle but I really loved it, seeing all my family and friends with my father by my side and most importantly James waiting for me at the front. We had two readings read by close friends and family and pretty lively hymns to get everyone in the mood.

Sun Shining Down

We’d had such a cold and miserable summer so far this year and I was so amazed and happy that the sun shone and it was warm, everyone could stand outside and enjoy the views and our homemade coconut shy! I always wanted an interesting and different marquee and was very excited to find The Raj Tent Club on-line which had traditional pole, Indian inspired tents with pretty linings.

We chose a duck egg blue lining with tiny gold stars and in the dance floor and bar area the lining was navy blue with gold stars which gave you this nightclub feel. James and I love Snow Patrol and chose their more up beat and well known track ‘Just Say Yes’ for our first dance. This got everyone in the mood for a boogie and the dance floor remained packed until the bitter end. We chose a DJ because there’s more choice of the different types of music you can have. Our friend Richard did an amazing job of the music and lighting, everyone commented on the brilliant playlist.

Steak And Chips

We always wanted simple food done really well. My parents are farmers as our most of their friends so steak & chips was a natural choice. Our caterer was a lovely local lady called Sarah who created the most amazing menu for us. A large selection of yummy canapés, tender and delicious medium-rare fillet steak served with chunky chips and a green salad. This followed with treacle tart and whiskey cream.

My mum had made raspberry gin for all the tables and this was perfect to wash it all down and get you in the mood for a dance! It probably made the hangovers even worse the next day though!! Our table names were large Kilner jars full of old school type sweets which also helped when people got a bit peckish later.

Homemade Décor

My sister in law is a saint for saying she would design our invites and order of service, she’s a graphic designer and did an amazing job. The invites were unconventional and fitted with the theme perfectly. We used large slate hearts to write the table plan on. These were made by a friend of ours. Each table was named after a sweet and to find your table you had to find the Kilner jar of sweets. I bought wooden stamps in India and stamped brown luggage labels with birds and elephants. My amazing friend Henny has lovely handwriting and she wrote them for me.

The luggage labels were wrapped round the napkins with brown string and we popped a sprig of rosemary and lavender on them. We didn’t do favors as such but we hired a photo booth through Say Fromage which allows you to print your photos, either in singles or fours. This went down really well and whenever we see our friends we notice the pics stuck on their fridges or propped up on their fireplaces. The company also sends you the photos on a USB stick so you can arrange a collage.

Embrace The Spread Sheets

I have to say that we found planning the wedding pretty stress free. You need to sort out all the big and most important things first – venue, photographer, caterer and dress. If you’re particularly keen on a specific caterer or photographer then check what dates they are free before you confirm your date – that way you won’t be disappointed if you can’t get them. Planning a wedding goes in peaks and troughs, one minute you’re really busy trying to confirm things, the next you’re not really doing much until a few months before the wedding – that’s completely normal.

Set up a spread sheet to track your spending against your budget. I’m really not into spreadsheets but it’s a must if you want to keep your spending under control and your stress levels low. Shop around and negotiate early on because nearer the time you won’t have the time or the will to do it. Delegate as much as you can, everyone will be happy to help and if the going gets tough try not to argue with those closest to you – this is the happiest, best day of your life and everyone’s there to make it perfect for you both.

Capturing The Most Precious Day

Last but by no means least, a huge, huge thank you to the amazingly talented Annamarie. Anna was recommended to us by my friend at work who had used her for her wedding a few years ago. My friends photos were exquisite – they both looked so happy and loved-up plus the colour of the photos was amazing. You really want to like your photographer and get on well with them as you will spend a lot of time with them and they will be capturing the most precious day of your life.

Anna was kind, considerate, caring and genuinely happy to share in our day. We did an engagement shoot with her first – which was a great way to get to know Anna and try to relax in front of the camera. Thinking about it, it would have been so weird for her to just turn up on the day, take some photos and not know anything about each other. Other special mentions go to my family, James family, the Bridesmaids, Best Men and Ushers – we couldn’t have done it without you!!!

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Dress and Veil – Jenny Packham
Hair Clips – Anthropologie
Make-up artist – Emma White Turle
Bouquets, Button holes and Flower girls Headdress – Ellie Goode
Flower Girls Dresses – John Lewis and Baby Gap
Catering – Sarah Williams
Marquee Hire – Raj Tent Club
DJ / Lighting – Richard Bowden
Photo Booth – Say Fromage
Videographer – Ral Gilmour at Sugar and Rose
Photographer – Annamarie Stepney

See what I mean about Kate Moss-esque?

I love Bridesmaids in white and those gold embroidered gowns are particularly lovely.

Brilliant planning advice from Hannah as well – spread sheets are definitely where it’s at.

Lots of love,
Fern x

If you’ve signed up for the awesome publication that is the Rock My Wedding newsletter* then you’ll already have seen a sneaky peek of the epicness of this morning’s wedding. We couldn’t hold back any longer, after all we’re practically half way through this month (I know! Already!) so this morning we decided to share this fairytale of a wedding with you.

Trust me ladies, if you’re of the bohemian, ethereal, hippy fairytale persuasion then this one is for you. There’s also a splash of Moroccan adventure and festival fever in the mix as well. Anyone that reads the blog regularly will know that I’m a sucker for exquisite florals and this beauty of a wedding is no exception; I adore Sarah’s bouquet and the table centrepieces slot perfectly into the overall vibe of the laid-back decor.

But it’s Sarah’s sartorial choices that have blown my mind. Her dress, veil and headpiece are quite possibly my favourite to ever appear on the blog and given the plethora of pretty that appears on these pages daily that really is a bold statement to make.

Honestly go see for yourselves…

Standlow Farm

Sarah The Bride:From the very beginning of our planning we knew we wanted a venue we could hire for a long weekend that could accommodate all our immediate family and close friends so the fun could last as long as possible. We also wanted it to be in the Peak District, even though we both live in Manchester we spend a lot of time in the peaks and it’s somewhere that’s close to our hearts. This resulted in what felt like the longest venue hunt in the history of wedding planning.

Just as we felt like giving up we found Standlow Farm near Ashbourne. It couldn’t have been more perfect, 5 beautiful cottages, a farm house, a games room and a huge paddock to put up venue hunt number two – the amazing Tepees!! It also meant we could invite all our guests back the next day for a BBQ.

The Tepees were supplied by the even more amazing Papakata. As soon as we saw them on one of their open days we knew that nothing else could even come close. The Papakata team have got to be the best company I have ever had the pleasure to work with. They are so passionate about what they do and just want to share the love, they made everything really easy and there was always an excited and enthusiastic helper at the end of the phone whenever we needed it.

Au Natural

I did my hair myself on the day, I have quite long hair and I knew that wanted to wear it down as it really suited the feel of the wedding so I really didn’t need anything doing to it. I had my make-up applied by Kevin’s sister Grainne; she is a qualified make-up artist which was very handy.

It was really important to me on the day that I looked like me; I don’t wear lots of makeup normally and I had a few trials that didn’t go well but Grainne understood exactly what I wanted (without a trial) and I felt amazing. I had my nails done at Selfridges a few days before, French manicure isn’t very me so I just went for very pale pink gel nails to avoid the chipping that normally happens within minutes of nail varnish coming anywhere near me!

Grainne also did all the bridesmaids’ hair, I wanted them to have something quite unstructured and she came up with idea of using plaits which looked brilliant and really suited the look I was trying to create. This was probably the easiest part of the planning, I trusted in her skills and just let her do what she thought would look good and the results were stunning.

Simple Silk Chiffon

I work as a personal shopper and love fashion so the dress was always going to be a really important part of the whole experience for me. However once I started the big dress hunt I realised that I don’t really like wedding dresses. I know to a lot of brides this sounds completely crazy but every dress I put on I felt silly in, I felt like I was playing dress up and nothing seemed to work.

Then I found a beautiful vintage dress purely by chance which I snapped up but it needed a lot of work to make it fit and look the way I wanted it to, sadly in the end it wasn’t meant to be. This as all you brides can imagine was pretty heart breaking, 5 months before the wedding I had to start my dress hunt all over again eeeek!!

I remembered being recommended Silk Brides in Lichfield by someone early on in the dress hunt process and went on their website, I couldn’t believe it but they had a sample sale on the next day and as fate would have it they had one slot left. My sister came with me; I went through all the rails and pulled only one dress out. A simple silk chiffon gown by David Fielden, I came out of the fitting room and my sister burst in to tears and said that I had to have it, I took one look in the mirror and I knew she was right.

The Statement Headpiece

My dress was really simple so I knew it could take a really statement headpiece. I wanted something that wrapped round my forehead that would work well with my hair down. I found exactly what I was looking for by Doloris Petunia on Etsy. Courtney Prince is the designer of the brand and she hand makes every piece of jewellery in Los Angeles then ships them to customers. When it arrived I actually squealed with excitement, it was more beautiful than the pictures and I think I loved it more than my dress.

I also had a veil made by Margret from Dream Veils in Manchester. I wanted a Juliet cap veil that my headpiece could sit over. Margret was amazing, she designed and made a veil to fit perfectly and I think she was more excited than me about the finished result.

My shoes were a limited edition pair by Ted Baker. I didn’t want traditional bridal shoes and had an idea of a gold sandal. I found a pair in Jimmy Choo that I loved but two wedding dresses later I think Kevin would have lost the plot if I came home with them. When I saw the snakeskin heel on mine I knew I wouldn’t be leaving the shop without them.

Champagne And Navy

We didn’t start with a colour theme for the wedding we just said that we wanted everything to be quite neutral. So when I took the bridesmaids dress shopping I didn’t have a clear idea of what colour the dresses should be. I also wanted the girls to choose their own dress, it was really important to me that the felt good in what they wore, as they are all very different if I put them all in matching dresses it would never work.

We ended up in Coast and after trying on a few dresses I could tell straight away which ones they loved and they were all a beautiful champagne colour which I was more than happy with. We bought them there and then and went for cocktails to celebrate.

A Wonderful Garden Party

We wanted a really relaxed feel to the day so Kevin told all the groomsmen to wear a suit they felt good in and not to worry about colour as we didn’t have a set theme. As it turned out they all turned up in navy suits purely by chance that matched Kevin’s perfectly it was as if we planned it.

Although we wanted all the formalities of a wedding such as speeches, first dance etc. it was really important to us that our wedding had a really relaxed feel. The farm and the teepees helped to achieve this and the fact that we didn’t have a rigid colour theme we just kept everything really simple and neutral. Our family and friends helped with the décor, my mum made 100 meters of bunting; yes you read correctly 100 meters! My bridesmaid Rachel made paper doily pom poms and covered the hay bales in fabric for people to sit on outside.

We also filled the tepees with large paper lanterns and giant round balloons filled with helium. There was lots of outside seating as well as the hay bales which meant that people could relax outside in the sun, some even put blankets down on the grass which made it feel like a wonderful garden party.

Thistles And Hydrangeas

All I knew about flowers was that I wanted lots of them and wanted it to look really natural in white, cream and pale pink. Jemma from Flowers by Jemma Holmes was fantastic. I took a few pictures with me of what I liked and she pulled out flowers that she thought I would love. She also at the last minute suggested some white hydrangeas for the tables and I’m so glad she did as they were my favourite.

My bouquet consisted of sweet avalanche roses, astilbe, stocks and spray rose and the bridesmaid’s had balls of gypsophila. Kevin’s buttonhole was a thistle as my mums side of the family are Scottish and the groomsmen each had a little bit of gyp tied with twine. Jemma made all of these and I ordered all of the table flowers from her but I did the arrangements myself with a little help from my amazing friends the day before the wedding. This turned out to be a mammoth task but I was so pleased with the end result and felt quite proud of myself.

The Favourite Part Of The Day

The ceremony had to be by far my favourite part of the day. I was grinning ear to ear all the way down the aisle and as I got about half way I saw Kevin waiting for me with his bottom lip quivering, desperately trying not to cry and my smile got even bigger. We married in St Johns RC church in Alton which is right next to Alton castle and a truly beautiful setting.

Kevin’s uncle is a Priest so he performed the ceremony and the first thing he did was get all the men to stand up and say hello to all the women, everyone got to have a hug and a little chat and made everyone feel really welcome and relaxed. It was a lovely way to start the ceremony and set the tone for the rest of the day.

Mrs G’s Dancey Dance

Kevin is very into his music so he was a bit wary of hiring a DJ. He used to be a bit of a local pub DJ in his younger days and still has all the equipment so he did a playlist for the night (he called it Mrs G’s dancey dance) and everyone commented the next day on how amazing the music was.

What was great was that they were tunes that we both loved or meant a lot to us so it made it really personal. The only downside was that I don’t think I finished a single conversation as half way through I ran away from everyone towards the dance floor screaming the words “I love this song!”

Our first dance was “Silver words” by Sixto Rodriguez, it’s a song that Kevin has always loved and the first time he played it to me I fell in love with the lyrics so it felt like the perfect choice.

Red Velvet

Neither of us are big fans of canapés however, we are both very big fans of cake! So we decided to have red velvet cupcakes with prosecco and elderflower cordial for all our guests when they arrived. My very talented sister and her friend offered to make them for us and my equally talented auntie made our three-tiered Victoria sponge wedding cake which basically equalled a seriously sweet cake-tastic delight!!

We wanted a formal sit down wedding breakfast but still wanted it to feel relaxed. Papakata introduced us to Lesley from Saunts, each course was a big dish that was put in the middle of each table with someone nominated to play mum and dish up. It made it really sociable and got everyone talking. So many guests commented on how amazing the food was, it was proper home cooked dishes that really suited the day.

My parents live in France and offered to bring all the wine for the tables back with them, we bought carafes for each table and the Saunts team just kept on filling them up throughout the meal. It felt like we had an endless supply of wine that just kept coming, there was so much we were even able to keep it coming the next day at the BBQ.

Take One Handmade Wedding Ring

One of the most important aspects of the wedding for us both was that we wanted it to be really personal and reflect us as a couple. This meant that we did a lot of stuff ourselves. We made all the invites and orders of service as well as any other stationery. To tie it all together, we used the same typography throughout; such as the vinyl we had made for the light box.

We also designed badges as favours for our guests. We attached these to luggage tags with guests’ names on which we pinned to a board then used this as the seating plan. We also designed stickers which the kids loved and stuck on just about everyone and everything.

The most time consuming yet, rewarding DIY thing I did was to make Kevin’s wedding ring. I made it from a silver American half dollar from the year his Dad was born. It took me what felt like a lifetime but now he gets to wear something that I’ve made for the rest of his lifetime, it sounds cheesy but I love it.
There was a lot of hard work involved and we had to prioritise what was most important but it was worth it when it all came together and it felt so personal to us.

The best advice I can give is to make your day as much about the two of you as possible. Try and plan it together, Kevin was much more involved in the whole process than most grooms probably are and it was much more rewarding knowing that the whole day really did reflect us both.

Many of our guests commented on how personal the service was this was because Kevin’s uncle was our priest and it meant a lot to us both that he could marry us, it also meant that there wasn’t a dry eye in the house especially Kevin’s!! (He cried a lot). The ceremony was by far my favourite part of the day, it’s the moment all the hard work and planning has been building up to and it’s an amazing feeling showing how much you love this one individual in front of everyone you care about. It’s so easy to get bogged down with the organisation of the reception but my advice is to put as much time and effort in to the ceremony, at the end of the day it’s the most important bit.

A Big Decision And The Best Decision

One of the biggest decisions to make is choosing your photographer. We had a clear idea of the style of photography we wanted and as soon as we saw Harriet from Weddings Vintage previous work it was as if what we had in our heads was staring us in the face. Our main priority was that we wanted images that captured moments and reflected the feel of the day rather than endless posed photographs that steal you away from your guests for hours on end. This is Harriet’s speciality and not only that she makes them beautifully original by editing them in a way that gives them a very timeless, vintage feel. She also had the ability to put two people who hate having their picture taken completely at ease.

The best decision I made throughout the whole planning process was to hire Laura Tickle. Laura is a wedding planner and also an angel sent from wedding heaven to sort out all your wedding problems. We hired her for on the day co-ordination, she took over a couple of weeks before the wedding and confirmed everything with all our suppliers. She also organised the timing of the day and was on hand from the getting ready stage to the first dance to make sure everything ran smoothly. This meant that Kevin and I could completely relax and enjoy the day without the stress of worrying about the details. She truly was an angel and every wedding should have a Laura Tickle!

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Venue – Standlow Farm
Tents – Papa Kata
Boutique – Silk Brides
Dress – David Fielden
Headpiece – Doloris Petunia
Veil – Dream Veils
Make-up and Hair – grainneafifmakeup.com
Florist – Flowers By Jemma Holmes
Caterers Saunts
Photography – Weddings Vintage
Wedding Planner – Laura Tickle

So did you adore this sunsoaked adventure as much as I did. Thought you might….

And aren’t Sarah and Kevin’s portrait shots the absolute sweetest…I love the one where Kevin is tilting Sarah’s chin; it’s intimate and loving all at the same time.

Who else is thinking of having a totally epic headband like Sarah’s too? Next time I am!

All my love Lolly xxx

*if you want to sign up for the newsletter and haven’t done so already then sign up here.

Happy Friday everyone!!! If you’re not already smiling because the weekend is here, then Hannah’s bubbly write up of her fun-filled day will definitely put a smile on your face.

The grin inducing photography comes courtesy of Chris Barber.

Look out for the scooter riding baby, the very enthusiastic confetti-throwing Grandma and a to-die-for daisy and plait hair combination that manages to be chic rather than hippy (not always easy when using daisies!)

It’s A Knockout

Hannah The Bride: Hello future brides and grooms, lovers of all things pretty and wedding-tastic, and those obsessives (like me) that still lurk these beautiful polka dot pages despite already being on the ‘old married’ bench. I’m Hannah, and I married my best friend Rob on the 27th July 2013.

Rob and I met back in 2005, in a muddy field in Harrogate playing It’s A Knockout all in the name of team building. Well clearly large inflatables and sumo suits worked for us… from that day onwards we have been our own awesome little team, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

We got engaged way back in November 2011 in New York City, our favourite place in the world, and started making plans straight away. We both had a fairly clear vision of the sort of wedding day we wanted – relaxed/rural/colourful and ultimately FUN! Basically we figured if we were enjoying ourselves, everyone else would as well. I like to think we pulled it off.

Scooter Ride Friendly Gown

My dress shopping checklist – lace, not strapless, absolutely no bling, and will allow me to ride on the back of a scooter. That’s normal, right?! As it turns out, I tracked down the perfect candidate on RMW. Once I saw Sienna by Sassi Holford I was smitten, and the search stopped there.

I teamed it with a bespoke lace trimmed veil from Jennifer Bone, and some ivory lace shoes (from BHS of all places!) that I funked up a bit with some yellow ribbon. I wore white gold, diamond and pearl drop earrings and a string of pearls which Rob bought for me in Birmingham’s jewellery quarter.

Crazy For Daisies

I decided to keep my hair fairly simple, and my lovely hairdresser Emma did a side chignon with little braids and tiny silk daisies to make it feel a little less ‘done’. My bridesmaids had waterfall braids and more daisies (you can never have too many daisies…). Make up was by the very talented Chloe McCall (another RMW find!).

Yellow Details

My two best friends and my two new sisters in law were Team Bridesmaid. They wore beautiful grey chiffon dresses with bright yellow braided belts that were custom made for us by Jennifer Bone.

Rob looked absolutely smokin’ in a three piece suit from Reiss and a Junghans Max Bill Chronograph watch which I surprised him with on the day. His two best men, the ushers and the Dads wore navy lounge suits with grey striped ties and yellow pocket squares that my mum made in the same fabric as the girl’s belts.

Focusing On Marriage

Getting married in a church was something that was really important to us, so we made it official at Holy Trinity, just down the road from my parent’s house in Shropshire. Phil the vicar was great, and helped us to spend time focusing on our marriage rather than just our wedding. He also let us have free reign on choosing the music for the ceremony, which helped to make it feel really personal and special to us.

Rob chose the song I walked down the aisle to which was ‘Here, There and Everywhere’ by the Beatles. The chorus goes “I want her everywhere, and if she’s beside me I know I need never care. But to love her is to need her everywhere. Knowing that love is to share. Each one believing that love never dies. Watching her eyes and hoping I’m always there”. I still cry every time I hear it!

Flexible And Unique

Finding a venue for the reception proved to be a bit more difficult. We looked at a LOT of places, from barns to schools, but couldn’t seem to nail the one that was really ‘us’. Eventually we stumbled across the beautiful tipis from Elite Tents, and realised that we could have the flexible, unique venue we wanted, and have it at Rob’s family home as well.

It was one of those light bulb ‘why didn’t we think of that sooner’ moments. Rob’s Dad surprised us by planting a tree in the field to mark the day. If he keeps that tradition up by the time all of my brothers and sisters in law get married there’ll be a forest there…

Military Precision

Pretty early on we realised that the ‘DIY’ nature of our wedding meant that we needed to hire someone to co-ordinate on the day. Sian from Top Banana Weddings held everything together expertly and kept us on schedule with military precision.

We decided to forgo the traditional wedding cars and make our big entrance on Rob’s battered old Honda C90, with bridesmaids and ushers in convoy. It was a surprise to the majority of our guests and I’ll never forget the looks on their faces as we bounced across the muddy field in our finery.

No Fluff Needed

The tipis don’t require a lot of additional ‘fluff’, so we kept the look pretty simple with some grey and yellow bunting made my mum and myself, and beautiful wild flowers arranged in old glass bottles that my uncle dug up in the fields at my grandparent’s farm back in the 1960s, which we sat on slices of English Oak.

Signs were hand painted by me on bits of an old pallet that was destined for the fire, and we made loads of tin can lanterns to hang in the trees for the cost of only some car spray paint.

Flowers With Meaning

Our good friends Sarah and Fran are behind the company Big Little Things, and they took care of all the floristry and the cakes as well. Oh, and Fran had a baby seven days before the wedding, no big deal! The overall look was ‘wild, textural and colourful.’

We tried to embrace a little meaning behind our flower choices so we included corn and wheat to reflect my family’s farming background, cornflowers because Rob’s mum had them in her bouquet and Craspedia (native to NZ where I studied for a while) to add little pops of colour. The thistles and daisies were just because we love them!

Meat Feast

As Rob’s family own the local butchers the food was unsurprisingly a bit of a meat feast. Rob’s cousin supplied our caterers with cold cuts for the daytime buffet and an amazing hog roast for the evening.

We had a ‘naked cake’ (top tip – don’t Google that at work unless you want to have to explain yourself to the IT department) served with fresh berries and cream for dessert. I made some simple wooden cake toppers of us and our cat Kiwi for decoration.

Luke Brown entertained our guests and also played our first dance song (Al Green – Let’s Stay Together). He’s a local singer/songwriter, and it’s been really great hearing him play some of the songs from our wedding around town over the past few months.

Branded Stationery

Being an architect (and a big typography geek) I’m not too bad with various graphic design programmes so I did all the stationery myself, which was a bit of a labour of love. Rob reckons I find the most complicated way to do everything, and then make it a bit more complicated again just for fun!

I decided to approach the overall stationery ‘look’ as a bit of a branding exercise, so I created a logo and a custom silhouette design, chose a colour palette, 2-3 complimentary fonts and a couple of card types to print it on. Everything was then just a different combination generated from that list, which tied it all together without being too matchy-matchy. We saved quite a bit of money doing it all ourselves, but it took a LOT of time, so be warned!

Team Work

Don’t be scared to break with tradition if something doesn’t feel right for you. I was really keen to make a speech because the idea of sitting sweetly and letting the men do all the talking felt a bit outdated, and I wanted to tell everyone how amazing my new husband is!

Try to enjoy the planning process, it’s part of the wedding too. Other than my dress, Rob and I planned the whole wedding as a team. We have amazing memories of our day, but also a lot of happy memories of the time spent together coming up with ideas and laughing at the ridiculous amount of crafts we had embarked on.

Marriage Kicks A Weddings Butt

Spend your money wisely. Whether you have a £500 or £50,000 budget, prioritise what is important to you, and allocate your budget accordingly. For us, the most important things were having a kick-ass photographer (take a bow Mr Barber), and an awesome venue. Other stuff we did as cheaply as possible.

Remember why you’re doing it! Weddings are amazing, but marriage kicks a weddings butt any day.

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Dress – Sassi Holford
Veil & Bridesmaid’s Dresses – Bespoke by Jennifer Bone at My Little Wedding Shop
Groom’s Suit – Reiss
Hair – The White Room
Make Up – Chloe McCall
Tipis – Elite Tents
Bell Tent – Country Bell
Planner – Top Banana Weddings
Food – Roslin Catering
Drink – Tipples
Flowers – Big Little Things
Cakes – Big Little Things
Music – Luke Brown
Meat and Hog Roast – Beamans Butchers Bridgnorth – richardbeaman@live.com
Stationery, Signage, Cake Toppers, Venue decoration – DIY
Photography – Chris Barber Photography

The branding looks great – it just shows what you can achieve if you put your mind to it!

And a great mantra for all of those lovely people who sneak back here once they’ve hung up their bridal gowns – marriage kicks a weddings butt. Wise words Hannah.

Have a nice weekend!

Lots of love,
Fern x

All of the blooms in today’s wedding were grown by Jo’s Mum. I know. How talented is she??

It’s literally a plethora of floral gorgeousness in rustic terracotta pots. The mini displays on the pew ends are particularly lovely!

Jo’s elegant Pronovias gown fits her like a glove and her simple accessories are really striking.

Images come from Hannah-May, if you get a second, have a little read of her my story section on her website – it made me chuckle.

Rustic Wood And Brickwork

Jo The Bride: We wanted a barn – that was our main wish! We love exposed brickwork and rustic wood (both feature in our house!) and we wanted a venue to reflect our taste…The Ferry House Inn was perfect- a 16th Century Country Pub complete with a beautiful barn and incredible views across the Swale Estuary. It was the one and only venue that we viewed!

To top it off we made it a whole weekend of wedding celebrations with 35 of us staying in the nearby luxury Mocketts Farm Cottages which were absolutely gorgeous!

Just Me

The beauty was simple really – I just wanted to look like me. No fancy up-do, no extravagant make-up. Just me. Booking my hair and make-up artist was easy- in fact it was one of the first things I did! I had been a bridesmaid for my brother two years previously and Emma Smisson did my hair and make-up then and she was amazing! She uses airbrush foundation and I cannot recommend it enough- my make-up stayed flawless all day!

Damn Those Spaniards

Ah the dress…I’m not ashamed to say that quite some time before we got engaged (I knew he was the one!) I had already fallen in love with Pronovias bridal gowns – damn those Spaniards can design beautiful dresses!

My dress, called ‘Balta’ was purchased from Teokath Bridal Boutique in Canterbury. I knew I wanted a vintage inspired lace dress that was simple in fit and intricate in detail and as soon as I put my dress on I knew she was the one!

Accessory Heaven

This was one of my favourite things to organise! I wanted something elegant and classic for my hairpiece and after spending endless hours doing research I approached the incredible Jo of Jo Barnes Vintage who sourced, designed and made my beautiful bespoke vintage headpiece.

I opted for a vintage cuff which was designed and made by the extremely talented Victoria of Victoria Millésime Design London and it matched the belt on my dress perfectly!

Baby Bridesmaids

Having a lot of friends I decided that rather than have a huge bridal party, I would have no bridesmaids at all and just two very beautiful flower girls; my niece, Lilly-Mai, and my goddaughter Phoebe. Both were around 15 months old at the time of the wedding, and Phoebe had only just started walking a few weeks before but they both managed to fly down the aisle!

We wanted something cute and modern for their outfits so opted for stripey ‘sundae’ dresses from Monsoon.

As for the boys, we decided to buy their suits from Next rather than hire them, and we went for a classic combination of navy blue and white- adding the polka dots to Ryan’s tie and hankie to set him apart from the others!

A Natural Blend

When it came to picking a colour scheme all we knew is that we didn’t want one! We wanted our day to be a beautiful natural blend of lots of different colours, rather than tying it to a particular theme. We wanted the overall effect to be relaxed, country and vintage and I think this is apparent in our décor which consisted of (a lot of!) home-made bunting, apple crates, bales of hay, vintage jugs and pots and hand crafted wooden signs.

Mum’s Are The Best

I am so proud to say that every single button hole (one for every guest!), pew end, jug, vase, pot and jam jar of flowers were grown from seed, and lovingly designed and arranged by my incredibly talented Mum. Gardening has not only been a career for my Mum but also an absolute passion of hers- when Ryan proposed and she offered to grow and put together the flowers for us we jumped at the chance because we knew that they would be beyond beautiful- and they were- I think the pictures speak for themselves!

We particularly loved the simple pew ends which were rustic jam jars filled with pink gypsophila and sweet peas and the wooden stepladder display showcasing vintage pots filled with flowers such as verbena, heartsease and lobelia.

Short And Sweet

Our ceremony was short and sweet- that was our aim! No readings or songs, just a simple ceremony during which I cried (quite a lot!), and Ryan broke the ice by hilariously being unable to say ‘lawful impediment’- instead- what came out (three times!) was ‘awful impediment’- I do hope he wasn’t trying to tell me something!

Live Acoustic Guitar

During the ceremony and drinks reception we had a live acoustic guitarist and singer- Andy was an absolute hit with everyone and he created the perfect atmosphere for our guests to enjoy their Corona and Pimms!

Our first dance song was to ‘Chasing Cars’ by Snow Patrol, one of our favourite songs which has the most beautiful and fitting words. Following that we had a DJ – a friend who does all our family weddings- and I can honestly say he filled the dance floor all night!

Hearty Pub Food

When we started planning the wedding Ryan had only two requests (the rest was down to me!)- he wanted a hog roast in the evening and he wanted corona for the reception drink! We also opted for yummy canapés during the drinks reception including chicken satay, mini yorkshire puddings with beef and horseradish and homemade chipolata sausages. The menu consisted of hearty pub food including duck salad, lamb shank, mushroom wellington, banoffee pie and chocolate brownie cheesecake, all served with copious amounts of wine! We had so many comments about how incredible the food was!

The cake was one of my favourite parts of the wedding- I am not a big fan of traditional wedding cakes but I loooove victoria sponge with jam, fresh cream and strawberries (who doesn’t!) and so we opted for three tiers of exactly that, made and expertly put together by Raie of Raie’s Cakes.

To compliment this, as favours we made our own jam and decorated the jars with pretty floral fabric and luggage tags.

Hands On With The Stationery

Stationery was hugely important to us- I think the invites set the tone and give the first indication of the style of the wedding and so we wanted to get it right! Buying stationery was never an option for us- we wanted to be quite hands on and so we designed and made everything from the invites and luggage tag place names, to the table names and menus.

We centred all the stationery around a rustic theme using brown card, luggage tags and brightly coloured bunting (and I should add that every single paper flag was cut out by hand by either Ryan or myself which took hours!)

We Did It

If I had any advice to give to future brides and grooms it would be- do it your way- don’t be hung up on tradition-make your wedding reflect your own personality!

Also, make sure you steal a moment or two on the day with just you and your new hubby. We were lucky enough to be staying overnight at the venue so before our evening guests arrived Ryan and I popped upstairs to freshen up- as soon as we were through that door I flung my arms around him, looked into his eyes with a huge smile on my face and simply said ‘we did it’ and then we had a little dance all by ourselves. That for me was one of the most special moments of the day.

Recommended To The World

Hannah-May – our photographer. To say that this young woman is sensational at her profession would be an understatement- she captured our day in the most breath taking and beautiful way and no words of thank you would ever be enough to show our gratitude for the amazing memories she has given us through her photos. We would not hesitate to recommend her to the entire world!

We must also mention Kerrie, the wedding coordinator at our venue, who was absolutely incredible from day one- my emails (and there were a lot of them!) were always answered within a few hours, nothing was ever too much trouble and we generally couldn’t have asked for any more from her- an absolute godsend for us so ladies, if you want to plan your wedding in an organised, efficient and effortless manner- Kerrie and The Ferry House Inn are for you!

Click here & view all images from this wedding

Bride’s Gown – Pronovias at Teokath Bridal Boutique
Head Piece – Jo Barnes Vintage
Cuff – Victoria Millésime Design London
Hair and Make up – Emma Smisson
Flower Girls – Monsoon
Groom & Groomsmen – Next
Florist – Jo’s Amazing Mum
Music – Amu Acoustic & Perfect Choice Entertainment
Cake – Raie’s Cakes
Venue – The Ferry House Inn
Photography – Hannah-May

Aren’t the flowers amazing?

And how adorable are the little flower girls?

Lots of love,
Fern x