Sunshine on a Rainy Day ∼ A Wedding in Mauritius…

It seemed fitting today, having listened to the weather forecast last night and woke up to torrential rain this morning, to post something as bright and sunny as I could today!

Step in London and
Destination Wedding Photographers, Segerius-Bruce.  You might have seen the beautiful Art-Deco inspired wedding last weekend, that was photographed by Segerius-Bruce – today, I have something rather more tropical to share with you; a destination wedding from all the way over in sunny Mauritius.

This is the wedding of Dom and Jen which took place on 30 October 2009, with an intimate civil ceremony for 34 guests, followed by a reception at the Hilton Hotel Mauritius; "Dom
and I were dead set on having a beach wedding. On the night of his
proposal we were chatting to friends about how fab it would be to get
married on Mauritius Island! And we just stuck to our guns and made it
happen."

As for the look; "I love a very
vintage, elegant looks. That is why I chose a David Fielden French lace
dress because it has such an exquisite feminine vintage look to it. I
followed this theme through with my marcasite jewellery (which I am now
building up quite a nice collection of)."

And as for that beautiful French Lace Dress, there's a little story behind that one! …. 

Love My Dress Wedding Blog – Photography
Copyright (c) 2010, Segerius Bruce Photography

"There is quite a saga connected with the dress of my dreams! And Teokath was fabulous in making the impossible possible. I originally saw the dress back in 2008 when I first started trying dresses on. After trying on many different designers and styles I decided that I really wanted an all lace / vintage style dress. When I saw the David Fielden dress, I was blown away (not only by the dress – but by the price tag)!  So, endeavouring not to become to ‘Bridezilla’ I pushed the dress to the back of my mind and set out to find a dress in a price range that would not give my fiancé immediate aneurysm!

The search continued till December 2008 when my mom and mom in law (to be) came to visit from South Africa. Tanya, my sister in law (to be) / bridesmaid decided to make an appointment at the Pronovias sample sale in Mayfair as she thought it was be fun to have the Moms see me try on some dresses! It was a good day until I made the fatal mistake of getting caught up in a crazy moment of impulse buying! I zapped one of the sample dresses on my credit card. Well needless to say joyous champagne fuelled celebrations ensued in a quaint little pub down the road. When all the while I was secretly reeling from the whirlwind purchase!…

"I mulled over my hasty decision for the rest of the month of December (actually trying to talk myself into the fact the this was the dress I loved)! But to no avail. By the time January arrived I was bursting at the seams to tell someone that I had made a mistake, a big mistake! I decided to make one last appointment at Teokath to try and push the David Fielden dress from my mind once and for all! So… off Tanya and I went to Teokath to try on the dress! Once the dress was on I had a little sob because I knew that this was the dress! I asked the owner of Teokath, Maria, if I can buy the dress and she told me that it was from the 2007 range and was not being made any more! So I then enquired if I could purchase the sample but it had already been sold to another bride! Eeeeek!

Maria was very understanding and told me she was going to phone David Fielden to find out if he had any of the French Lace left that he had used to make the dress. Brilliant! In the mean time I ran straight home and onto the David
Fielden website to email each and every one of his stockists around the world to see if any of them had a sample dress! The response was incredible. I was contacted by stockists in Canada, France, Italy and USA! But I should not have fretted because I soon got a call from Maria to say that she had spoken to David who miraculously had enough French Lace left to make up one last dress!!!"

"I wore two very special pieces of jewellery. Keeping up with
my love of antique and vintage pieces I decided to travel to Tetbury and
Bath with one of my bridesmaids, Caroline, to look in the antique
markets and shops. We found the most gorgeous set of drop rose marcasite
earrings (circa 1920) from a little antique shop in Bath. And of course
because nothing is simple, the antiques dealer noticed that one of the
marcasite stones was missing and he refused to sell the earrings to me
asking me to deal directly with the seller who sold through Ruby Lane in
Bristol. 

After about two weeks of liaising with the seller via email I
finally received a gorgeous vintage earring case with my earrings!
Worth the wait. And to thank Caroline for all her patience during the
week long shopping excursion I bought her a beautiful marcasite bow
broach. This was later to become my something borrowed which was
fastened to my garter (which was my mom’s garter that she wore on her
wedding day – vintage all the way ).

The second piece of jewellery I
wore was a gift from my friend Emily. It was a marcasite and fresh pearl
starfish bracelet. The marcasite starfish was originally a vintage
broach turned into the bracelet by Magpie Vintage Jewellery."

Coral Pink…

"The
bridesmaids all wore matching boob-tube/ babydoll style sundresses.  The
dresses material was coral and ivory with a fan/seashell design. This
tied in with our beach colour scheme of coral and turquoise, ivory and
brown.

I
bought each of my bridesmaids a lovely banana leaf covered photo frame
with a picture of us on our Mauritius wedding holiday. I also bought
them some coral underwear and bracelets in the wedding colours. The
paroles are also a little keep sake for my special girls."

 

Waiting in Limbo…

"The waiting in limbo to be told that it’s time to walk
down
the aisle was unreal. Nerves of excitement and tension filled the
dressing room and then I walked outside to meet my dad who was to walk
me down the aisle. Lucky for me he had a joke that he has been saving
for years for this very occasion to tell me as we walked! I laughed and
giggled the whole way to my waiting hubby…"

"The handsome groom
wore brown leather flip-flop thongs, ivory trousers and an ivory shirt
with a white flower design. He looked tanned, cool and casual as he
waited for me to arrive! I nearly sprinted down the aisle!"

Hehe! 🙂

Pretty Parasols…

I love the way Jen has accessorised her wedding photographs with a beautiful Parasol! You can learn more about wedding parasols in this Love My Dress Feature…

Seashell's and Sand…

"Each table was different, I had a pearl table, coral table, seashell table and starfish table. Each table had a large hurricane vase in the centre filled with Mauritian sand and a ivory pillar candle.  We then tied the actual ‘table name’ object to long beach worn sticks that were buried in the sand in the hurricane vases. So the seashell table had a big seashell as the table centre, the Hilton Hotel dive instructors dived the coral reef just off the beach and brought us the most magnificent piece of coral to tie onto the coral table etc.  We also have lots of floating candles and shells scattered on the table.

I also bought turquoise, ivory and brown chiffon and asked that the venue build me a wooden alter that Dom and I could stand under. We draped the chiffon over the alter." 
I loved the overall look of the wedding and did not know what it was going to look like until I walked into the reception venue with my husband. Our on the beach wedding was rained out! I was sitting in the hairdressers watching torrential mini cyclone rain out of the window! Heartbreaking! In the mean time my bridesmaids were running around like headless chickens moving the venue indoors! And what a fantastic job they did!"

"Each table was different, I had a pearl table, coral table, seashell
table and starfish table. Each table had a large hurricane vase in the
centre filled with Mauritian sand and a ivory pillar candle.  We then
tied the actual ‘table name’ object to long beach worn sticks that were
buried in the sand in the hurricane vases. So the seashell table had a
big seashell as the table centre, the Hilton Hotel dive instructors
dived the coral reef just off the beach and brought us the most
magnificent piece of coral to tie onto the coral table etc.  We also
have lots of floating candles and shells scattered on the table…"

"Dom and I are both die hard Quentin Tarantino fans.
Our
favourite movie of all times is Pulp Fiction and Dom is also the
spitting image of a young Greece Lightening Danny Zuko. So it was no
surprise to friends and family when we opened up the dance floor to  'You Never Can
Tell' (Teenage Wedding)’ by Chuck Berry. I just have to add the my
gorgeous hubby is a killer dancer (my own personal John Travolta!)…"

In Limbo…

Clearly, awaiting her walk down the aisle was not the only time Jen seemed to spend 'in limbo'….! 🙂

 

What a gorgeous wedding, full of wonderful memories of what was evidently a truly amazing day.

Thank you so much to Chanelle Segerius-Bruce, for once again sharing her exquisite photography with Love My Dress.

Now please, Mr Sunshine, come back and grace us with your presence! 🙂

Much love,

Annabel
xXx

♥