Hi Guys! Well, firstly, I must apologise for lack of blog post yesterday. I worked on one for you, but as I have learned in the past 24 hours, our hotel wifi is not really very reliable! And well, we wanted to get out and about today after a few totally hectic days and explore New York City! In case you weren’t aware, I’m over here to exhibit at Bridal Market later this week 🙂 The city is just incredible and there is an amazing buzz about the place right now as President Barack Obama is in town giving a speech tonight. I am LOVING the atmosphere!! 😉
Anyway, more on my trip very soon, for now, I wanted to share this lovely Lake District wedding with you, photographed by the simply charming Sarah Lafford of Assassynation Photography.
Vicky and Jim tied the knot on 12 March 2011 at Blencow Hall – a beautiful old twelve bedroomed country house in the Lake District near the village of Greystoke. And I have to say, this wedding is PROOF no other that it really does NOT matter if it rains on your wedding day….
Vicky wore an Amanda Wyatt wedding dress, that she purchased from The Dressing Rooms in Halesowen..
“I’d originally gone to that particular shop for more of a 50s style dress by Charlotte Balbier but when I got there, they didn’t have the one I was after so they suggested this one called Olga, by Amanda Wyatt, who is, coincidentally, Charlotte Balbier’s mother – gotta keep it in the family, hehe! It felt so right the minute I put it on – plus, my Mum cried and she’s SO not like that so I knew I was onto a winner!
I liked the fact it looked pretty vintage-esque with the lace, the beads and the scalloped hemline.”
Love My Dress Wedding Blog – Photography Copyright (c) 2011, Assassynation
“Penny, the younger bridesmaid- dress was from Sequins & Pearls. Nancy, my best woman – dress was from Vintage Style Clothing. From experience, I think it’s really difficult to find a bridesmaid dress that suits every age and shape so I really embraced the idea of different dresses. A couple of their accessories matched and I think that was just enough to make them stand out.”
“We rented Blencow Hall for a long weekend – a 12-bedroomed country house/castle in the Lake District, near the village of Greystoke. We had stayed there last March for a week with my family and just fell in love with the area so decided to go back!
We got married at Greystoke Castle, about a mile away. We actually booked it without ever having visited it… We took a leap of faith but it really worked for us. When we finally did visit the castle (last November) it was just perfect! We chose to get married in the Drawing Room – a really relaxed room with sofas for the guests and tonnes of natural light.
After the ceremony we had an afternoon bash on a steamer boat on Lake Ullswater, followed by a party back at Blencow Hall. We dreamed up our perfect day and, aside for a little inclement weather (haha!) it was just what we’d hoped for.”
“The coach was from Cumbria Classic Coaches. We’d originally booked Florence, a sage-green and cream coach – we took our colour scheme from that – but the day before the wedding they called me to say that Florence had failed the MOT!!! I was a bit miffed to begin but our blue coach was just as lovely and, more importantly, had a valid MOT, hahaha!
Our wedding car was from Churchill Wedding Cars and was a Ford Popular. We just thought it perfectly fitted our vintage theme and we loved it!”
“We had a brass band to play at the ceremony – Lakeland Brass. We came out to The Throne Room/Star Wars theme which was great fun! It starts off a little like the traditional exit music so people totally weren’t expecting it!
They also played on the boat – that was a bit of a disaster as it was cold and rain. There was a canopy though and they very bravely played on for as long as possible!”
“We’d been fruitlessly searching for a Jim’s suit for a while – we’d bought a couple and ended up taking them back because they just didn’t look quite right. In the end, I bought Jim’s suit without him even being in the shop! We’d been searching high and low for a slim fit brown wool suit but had really struggled to find anything that looked good and fitted well.
I went shopping after work one night and came across this Ben Sherman suit that ticked all the boxes and thought ‘that’s the one!’. Got home that night and when Jim tried it on it was the perfect fit.
He looked very tasty in it and I thought to myself ‘yes, I’ll take him, thank you’!!”
“We’d originally planned a very different wedding… We had booked a converted barn in Norfolk with 80 guests invited for the day plus another 40 for the evening do. We’d booked a fantastic band, the food was chosen, the car was sorted, photographer was booked etc etc but we just weren’t excited about it. Any time anyone mentioned the wedding we’d just roll our eyes and change the subject but one Sunday afternoon last summer, we went to the pub and got a little tipsy.
We agreed that this wasn’t the wedding for us and that we’d just fallen into organising a traditional wedding when all along we’d said we wanted something small and different. We contemplated running away and getting married abroad but then Jim suggested going back to the Lake District and having a small do there – we’d spent a week there last March and fell in love with the area so decided that would be the place for us. We took the plunge and cancelled wedding number one – and never looked back!”
“I’d bought these almost a year before – they were purple Irregular Choice shoes and didn’t go with anything else but I loved them the minute I saw them so was determined to wear them. Oh yes, plus blue wellies so I could tramp about in the mud!!”
“My mum made acres and acres of bunting… It took her SO long but she was very determined and her mammoth effort was completely worth it – it looked amazing, strung between all the lights.
We’d borrowed vintage crockery and filled the teacups with tealights and flowers. I’d collected wooden hearts, paper butterflies, strings of pearls, little birds and paper flower garlands which we used along with some vintage-inspired birdcages.
We filled little tin buckets and glass jars with sweets and had a couple of baskets for the pots of jam. My mum and grandmother did all the flowers for the tables – they were very simple and very pretty. It looked exactly how I’d hoped it would :-)”
“We decided to have cupcakes instead of a wedding cake because I just think they are so pretty! We had them made by Tirzah Sutton at Honey n Love Bakery in Cannock in the Midlands. Tirzah was great and made them to our colour scheme so they perfectly matched the bunting / bridesmaids / flowers and they tasted delicious!
The day before the wedding I started panicking that we didn’t have a cake to cut so legged it to the nearest supermarket and bought a pretty birthday cake with a pink flower on it – I got a hot knife and scraped the ‘Happy Birthday’ sign off and, hey presto, we had ourselves a wedding cake!! Despite the last minute panic, we ended up ignoring the cake completely and just getting tucked into the delicious cup cakes. Yum, yum, yum!”
“My mum made little pots of jam for everyone – apple jelly and raspberry jam – and we set up a little help-youself sweet shop so everyone went away with a little pot of jam and a bag of sweets…”
Words of Wedded Wisdom…
“Please don’t be afraid to be honest with yourself – if you’ve made a mistake in the planning then deal with it head on. The first wedding we planned was a huge mistake but we couldn’t be any happier having cancelled it! We’d have spent the rest of our lives regretting the whole thing instead of looking back with fondness.
My advice is just be sure the day is about you and reflects both your personalities – after all, you only get one shot at it so it has to feel right :-)”
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Brides dress – Amanda Wyatt
Brides shoes – Irregular Choice
Groom – Ben Sherman
Bridesmaids – Sequins & Pearls + Vintage Style Clothing
Cake – Tirzah Sutton at Honey n Love Bakery
Flowers – Coach House Flowers in Penrith
Venue – Blencow Hall
Photographer – Assassynation
Hair & Makeup – Ashley Malloy + Leonie Caniffe
♥ ♥ ♥
I LOVE this wedding for the fact the weather made absolutely NO difference to the fun and amazing day this couple had 🙂 Big congrats to you both VIcky and Jim 🙂
Thanks to my lovely friend Sarah Lafford of Assassynation Photography too for sharing these super photographs…
“Our photographer was Sassy at Assassynation – honestly, she was AMAZING! The photos are incredible and Sassy perfectly captured the day. I’m not usually very comfortable in front of a camera but Sassy made us feel so at ease and I think the photos really reflect the fun we had!
We really couldn’t have hoped for anything better, we are so, so over the moon with the results. Like I said to Sassy, we are in love with the photos – and with her :)”
You can see more from Assassynation Photography on Love My Dress here 🙂
Much love,
Annabel xXx
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Annabel View all Annabel's articles
Founder of Love My Dress. Passionate Podcaster and Editor. Annabel lives in rural North Yorkshire with her husband and business partner Philip, their two daughters and menagerie of furry hounds. She loves photography, meditation, walking, being outdoors and star gazing. She is fierce when it comes to championing talent within the wedding industry and when she's not working on Love My Dress, she supports her husband Philip in the running of the family's sustainable flower farm and floral design business, Moonwind Flowers. In 2013, she became a published author.
