Love My Dress Wedding Blog

Two Weddings In One Day - A Colourful and Multicultural Celebration!

Do I have a beautiful wedding to share with you this morning!  Neema and Sam tied the knot - twice - on 14th July 2012 at the stunning Sezincote House (the original Brighton Pavillion), at Moreton-in-Marsh in Gloucestershire.  Their multi-cultural day which involved a traditional Indian wedding ceremony followed by an English wedding ceremony was planned and styled to perfection by the very talented Kim of The PInk Pumpkin.  I am smitten with these images by John Day Photography, they are bright, colourful and fun, and they capture so many smiles and are bursting with love.

"Having known I wanted to marry Sam for ages, this was only confirmed to me when he whisked me away to stay in a romantic 15th century villa overlooking Florence and proposed in a candlelit alter-like stone outside, temple gazing at the city lit up at night - by rap!

Yes, you heard me right! It was the perfect proposal!"

Love My Dress Wedding Blog - Photography Copyright (c) 2013, John Day Photography

"We were advised that to have a wedding at Sezincote (which entails organising power supplies, water supplies and a lot of lighting!), and with the number of guests (250 after 6 months of culling a long long list!), we would need to enlist the help of a wedding planner to help carry out the day. We went for Kim from The Pink Pumpkin.

Kim was brilliant from start to finish, as inspiration, a sounding board, a friend and especially with coming up with contingency plans for the unpredicted “un-summery” weather we had last July!"

"I don’t believe in having a particular theme for weddings - I just went with individual things I liked e.g. candles, lights, bright colours, laser cut (the best thing ever known to the stationery world!), fizz and good food! We did try to be inclusive and sensitive to both cultures and families that we were bringing together and I hope we just about succeeded."

"It’s not easy to find the perfect venue for a 'multi-cultural' wedding!  We went from considering getting married abroad in India, to looking at lots of standard venues across London but we couldn’t help feeling like these were the sorts of venues which churned out weddings every day and didn’t really seem to suit us.

In the end, Sam somehow found the utterly amazing Sezincote House - I still remember going to see it with my family. We got lost, the sat nav took us to the back gate and we were thoroughly late for our appointment.  But suddenly, we turned a corner and nestled amidst the rolling Cotswold hills was this amazing Indian house, with stone elephants in the gardens, Indian god and goddess statues by a lake, and the majestic Indian dome on the main house.

We knew immediately that this was where we were going to get married."

"Sezincote House is so breathtaking that we didn’t want to go overboard on decorating the marquee or the conservatory where the weddings happened. The conservatory is filled with ramshackle plants growing up the walls and had a slightly quirky feel so we didn’t want to dress it up too much- we went for a wrought iron mandap (the stage which marks where the Indian wedding happens) and simple white chairs throughout. It is flooded with light so had a super natural feel which was exactly what we wanted.

 For the marquee, we didn’t really have a fixed colour scheme but managed to source some saree fabric from India and have it made into hot pink, turquoise and gold tablecloths. We had some pink and white lanterns hung from the marquee ceiling which looked brilliant at night! We also went for a marquee with clear sides so that at night you could see the house lit up in all its glory! We had little individualised menus for each guest and we hand wrote their names on top, and Sam and our sisters made the seating plan 24 hours before the wedding!  So candles and colour it was!! And with that lovely summer evening glow, the marquee was beautifully simple!"

"Funnily enough, I was never one those girls who has dreamt about her wedding dress since the age of three! We decided to have two weddings in one day so I was lucky (!) enough to have a costume and hair change with 30 minutes for both! For the Indian wedding, my parents actually found my saree and Sam’s outfit in India. Having sent me lots of pictures of gaudy outfits, they wore me down into agreeing to let them pick.  When I opened the package, I was ready to hate it but amazingly, they did really well. I loved the delicate net and the off-white colour of the saree - not too bling!"

"I am not a shoes kinda a gal! If I could, I would live in Havianas all year round. I had a passing flirtation with some glittery Jimmy Choos but came to my senses and got a bargain pair of Dorothy Perkins mink-coloured low-ish strappy heels- I could walk in them all day and will be able to wear them again too ☺"

"I have to say I can’t remember how we found Suzie from Karma Kars Cotswolds, but I am super glad that we did! I thought the idea of spending lots of money on a posh car to 'get us from A to B' seemed like a waste of money and I stopped thinking about wedding cars until I stumbled across Suzie’s Ambassador car. With the kitschiest decor inside and a garland of flowers across the front car, it was the perfect car for our Indian-English day."

"People loved seeing the car, and Suzie was such a helping hand on the day, from running down to get me some lunch, finding me some champagne to steady my nerves, shepherding our guests to and from the venue, to taking us on our own little photo shoot after the ceremony! I remember being told to treasure the few minutes you get away from the crowd, and having a glass of bubbly with my new hubbie whilst trying not to fall into a pond as John got us to precariously balance on a mini-bridge will definitely be one of my treasured memories!"

"Sam also wore an Indian outfit for the Indian wedding. Having thought the headpiece was OTT, we both ended up thinking it was the best bit of his outfit! For the civil wedding, he had a bespoke suit made by Henry Herbert tailors and picked a lovely tie from Liberty(the best men had matching ties!) and maroon shoes from Paul Smith.

He looked great in both but I think he personally preferred the regal Indian look!"

"The best part of the day was without a doubt, having walked up the aisle with this mad energy in the air, the sun streaming through the conservatory glass windows, sitting down next to Sam who still had his eyes shut, and then suddenly looking at each other. Instead of feeling nervous, we just smiled at each other and couldn’t stop smiling. I felt incredibly excited and lucky that we would be spending the rest of our lives together." 

 

"For my wedding dress, I traipsed around the shops never having that magical moment. I had lusted after the Justin Alexander tea dress (design 8685), but realised it didn’t really fit with the day we were planning! It was only when I went to try this on that I was distracted by another wedding dress on a mannequin - the Justin Alexander signature range. It was almost an antiquey gold, with embroidery and lace, and I fell in love with it!

Best of all, my mum loved it too and it was a pretty close match with the saree ☺ I managed to get a friend to get the dress for me in New York as it was way cheaper there, and then my kind dad lugged it around America on a business trip before bringing it back home!"

"I have never known my hydrangeas from by gypsophila. So when it came to flowers, I left this in the capable hands of Sue from The Bay Tree at Campden with the only instruction being KEEP IT BRIGHT! She chose some beautiful arrangements for the tables with pink hydrangeas, blue delphinium, and white stock and even supplied little jam jars and tea lights for the tables! Sue also supplied fresh flower garlands for the Indian wedding and baskets of rose petals for our flower girls to throw."

"I didn’t have formal bridesmaids (finding it too hard to pick and co-ordinate eight girls). Instead, my sister and Sam’s sister were both super involved with the ceremonies. I also had lots of help from my best friends from one of them making the most amazing wedding cake (with crystallised chillies no less!), to organising the hen and multiple shopping trips. I got really cute bracelets with each of their initials on them from Etsy to thank them for their support and help in making our wedding visions come true."

"A random Google search found John Day, our photographer. I loved the fun, natural photos on his website as well as the mad shot of himself and liked that he didn’t seem to take himself too seriously! Without even looking at any other photographers or meeting John I went ahead and booked him. It was the best decision we could have made- both Sam and I are quite camera-shy- John put us totally at ease, and we will treasure the photographs for years to come!" 

Giant Pink Balloons For a Relaxed And Elegant Scottish Castle Wedding

Good morning wonderful. Well, the big week is here - I step on to a train at 10.38am this morning on the way to London to start a week of book promotion and exhibiting.  And I can't wait to see so many people this week and celebrate the good stuff!

One of the people I'm most looking forward to meeting is Cara - one half of the talented duo behind Lillian and Leonard (the other half being her husband, Nye) - an incredibly talented photographer who relocated to London last year. 

I adore Lillian and Leonard's photography - there is something so emotional and touching about it - the beautiful soft light and colors. And I adore the way Cara and Nye have captured Nathan and Angelica on their wedding day on 13 October last year, at Rowallan Castle, Kilmaurs. Scotland...

"Nathan proposed after one and a half years of dating and took me for a lovely picnic and hike on St Patricks day 2012 to ask me to marry him.  We got married seven months later!"

Love My Dress Wedding Blog - Photography Copyright (c) 2013, Lillian and Leonard

"We wanted a relaxed and informal day with lots of our friends and family.  It was important to us that we were both comfortable and that the day reflected our relaxed lifestyle! We wanted it to be light and fun - so we chose colours white, pink and grey to keep the colour scheme playful.

That's also why we chose giant balloons to decorate our marquee and the sweetie table, and test tube favours."

"My dress was from Sincerity Bridal.  I wanted a Grecian style dress that was floaty and comfortable to wear.  I knew before I started looking that I  really wanted the dress to be very simple and understated.

I didn't wear any jewellery although I did wear a grey sash around my waist from Etsy."

"Both of us loved having a reason to get everyone we love together.  Family traveled from England, Italy and even New Zealand to join us for the day - our friends that couldn't make it managed to watch the ceremony on Skype which was amazing."

The couple ordered huge balloons from Etsy.com...

"We wanted the flowers to be beautiful, natural and not too posed. We went for white roses for all the bridal party and the grams had light pink roses for their corsages."

"I viewed his parent's house in August 2010 and met Nathan's parents first! My family didn't buy the house but I  had a nice chat with his parents! I didn't think anything else about it until I bumped into his parents again a few months later at a local church and they quickly introduced me to Nathan!

We loved Rowallan Castle and grounds - it had just started doing weddings - so we were so lucky to find it!"

Penguin Books and Jesus Piero - Navy and Blue Fill a Castle Full of Colour

Good afternoon my friends - brides, before you get stuck in to this post, have you seen our latest competition on the blog this morning? You can win a full wedding photography package you know!

This afternoon's real wedding comes to you from Cardiff based wedding photographer and our long-term sponsor, Jake Morley.  Jake was the chosen photographer to shoot Ruth and Steffan's wedding, which took place on 3rd November last year, at Craig Y Nos Castle.

Ruth's chic and elegant dress was a Jesus Piero design - a purchase from the Alyson Jayne bridal boutique in Cardiff...

"I loved the simple elegance of my Jesus Piero dress and the classic Audrey Hepburn-esque style. I don’t do sparkles or lace – I wanted something sharply cut and very stylish – this was only the 2nd dress I tried on and I loved it immediately."

Love My Dress Wedding Blog - Photography Copyright (c) 2013, Jake Morley

"We wanted a non-religious humanist ceremony. I was inspired by autumn and autumnal colours - I really wanted a different wedding to the normal summer wedding. I fancied sparklers, log fires, cosy, candle lit setting. The navy and orange colour scheme came out of the colour of autumnal leaves and the burnt orange bouquet I wanted.

Our Florist was The Bee Orchid Claire was absolutely fab, she was a fellow Brummie and so friendly throughout the whole process. I decided to go with a burnt orange colour palette and wanted to feature succulents really prominently as they are something my Gran and my mum have always grown at home. The succulents used were grown by mum."

"My veil was from an amazing lady Ashley behind With Love from Bobbin – the headpieces and veils are all handmade and she made my shoe bows too – we met by accident at a vintage shop in Cardiff, Vintage Zizou  http://www.vintagezizou.co.uk/ who provided both of my white vintage fur coats for the day!"

"Our venue, Craig Y Nos Castle,was an amazing venue set in the Welsh Valleys. It was once the home of Opera Singer Adelina Patti and has a reputation for being haunted. The venue was beautiful, quirky, atmospheric and very 'us' we also loved the preserved Opera Theatre where we had the ceremony." 

"We met when I moved back to Cardiff after graduating from Cardiff University for my first job. Steffan's best friend had moved out of a shared house of four boys to go and live in Manchester and I was the replacement.

We met after I had been living there a couple of weeks. I instantly liked him but it took us nearly 6 months to finally get it together! He proposed after seven years by taking me on holiday to Kalkan in Turkey and it was the world's worst kept secret. It nearly ended in a row though as he had disobeyed strict instructions NOT to buy me a ring - I wanted to choose my own! We got lost looking for a 'special beach' with Steffan getting more and more anxious - in the end he blurted it all out next to a wheelie bin! Romantic!

Seeing him all stressed and emotional and finding it difficult to get his words out made me love him even more - even if he did fluff it!"   

"DecoPomPoms are amazing, effective and cheap. Everything else was hand made even down to the orange confetti painstakingly cut using butterfly and heart paper stamps!"

"Our photographer was Jake Morley. Jake was great and all my guests observed how he was brilliant at being unobtrusive. We are really happy with the shots and he has captured some beautiful memories of the day. We would definitely recommend!"

Sassi Holford Lace for a Laid Back Rustic Style Farm Wedding

It is such a beautiful, beautiful morning over here in the North East of England.  Beautiful sunshine flooding the rooms just as it does the imagery on the page here today.  This is Charlie (the bride) and Nick, who tied the knot on 29th September in the local village church where Charlie grew up, followed by a reception at Charlie's parents farm.

I love the laid back, rustic nature of this wedding, and Charlie looked quite the picture in this beautiful lace gown by Sassi Holford - a purchase from the award winning Ellie Sanderson in Beaconsfield...

"It was very hard finding something I liked as much, until I had an appointment at Ellie Sanderson with my sister, Lucy.  All the dresses in this lovely shop are stunning and the staff, in particular Eira, were very amenable and patient as I wanted to try them all!  Sassi’s ‘Mia’ dress has a very classic cut and elegant structure, plus stunning guipure lace from head to toe and gorgeous button detailing all down the back.

It’s not the sort of style I’d usually wear and I guess a bit of a gamble to try something new on your wedding day but I loved it, and I wasn’t disappointed with the choice."

Love My Dress Wedding Blog - Photography Copyright (c) 2011, Dasha Caffrey

"I’ve always had a soft spot for the church we got married in, St. Mary Magdalene, as it’s quiet and tucked away and very pretty, but many years ago I visited it with a friend who came to stay from up North and she wrote in the visitor’s book ‘My friend Charlie Bowden is going to get married here someday…’  so that sealed it really – years before I’d even met Nick.  The reception was held around the corner on my parents’ farm (also where I grew up).  You may ask, did dear Nick have a say? Well, luckily for me he also likes where I’m from and was pretty happy to go with the Dorset option. Plus he got his way in other aspects of the day.

I can’t say we had a strong theme for our wedding, or even a colour theme really.  It was a bit of a mish-mash, but I quite like things like that.  I guess the overriding factor was ‘suitable for a day on the farm’.  That said, my parents poshed the place up A LOT so it wasn’t like we were tramping around the cow shed in our wellies.  In terms of decor, we had lots of candles and fairy lights! Bunches of white and pink gypsophila in washed-out cat-food tins. Bunting made by a friend. A disco ball as a centre-piece.  Hops hops and more hops. And lots of trees hired to us as a favour from the local garden centre, Groves."

"Words can’t sum up the amount of work my parents put in to transform an old breezeblock barn with asbestos roof into something befitting for their daughter’s big day.  They even re-landscaped part of their garden and knocked down a wall to create a nicer entrance to the barn. The piece de resistance was a pub (The Duck & Poulet) which Dad constructed adjacent to the barn complete with footrests, scampi fries, pickled eggs, pork scratchings, sailing paraphernalia and local ales and cider.  It was well-patronised on the night, the next day and it’s still there now.  (I think Dad just needed the excuse)."

"I kept it simple with some fresh flowers in my hair - spray roses and white gypsophila prepared by the florist,  Beaminster Flowers, and finished off by Mum.  I also wore a string of freshwater pearls I’ve had for many years and some small stud pearl earrings that I’d bought from family friend jewellers, Wessex Jewellers in Bridport, the day before."

"We met in a pub in North London that was Nick’s local and a first-time haunt for me.  Nick was at the bar with a friend and apparently my jumper caught his eye (nothing special I can tell you!).  When I was at the bar buying a drink for my pal, he said ‘that’s a nice jumper’ or something equally blinding.  Then as my friend and I got up to leave (much later, not because of said blinding compliment) he persuaded us to stay for a drink.  And the rest, as they say...

Nick proposed to me 18 months later on a skiing trip in Italy on New Year’s day.  We were sat in deckchairs at the top of the mountain on the only sunny day we’d had on the holiday so far. The snow was sparkling as much as the beautiful rock he presented to me.  We were married just over 9 months later."

"I’d wanted a bit of colour on my feet and originally opted for some peach court shoes from Selfridges.  Beautiful shoes in themselves but what on earth was I thinking pairing them with a cream wedding dress?!!  They stood out like a sore thumb and completely detracted from the dress.  So I swapped them for a pair of LK Bennet Shilo patent leather court shoes in off-white, which were perfect – and soooo comfy."

"My veil was handmade by one talented lady called Helen Martin in Norfolk.  I can’t remember how I came across her website but I contacted her through it and she replied immediately outlining various options, with photo examples and a list of costs.  She even sourced a sample of the exact lace from my dress and sent it to me to be extra doubly sure of the match.  From start to finish Helen was incredibly helpful, patient, honest, and professional. And the veil was flipping gorgeous, I had loads of comments on it on the day. "

"Our Florists were Beaminster Flowers - a local supplier who had done the flowers for my best friend’s wedding the year before, which were beautiful.  So it was a no-brainer to use them for our wedding.  Both Leah and Helen are wonderful and achieved just the right balance between listening to what I wanted as well as bringing their own ideas and creativity to the bouquets.  I was after a simple bouquet for both the bridesmaids and me - just green and cream.  And ideally flowers that were in-season.  I could spend hours looking through the florist books dreaming up combinations but in the end we opted for simple cream spray roses with white gypsophila and green foliage including the herbs rosemary and sage.

My thinking was that the smell of the herbs would help calm my pre-wedding nerves on the day. In the event I completely forgot this clever idea of mine but nay matter, they looked beautiful.  My one weakness in the bouquet was Craspedia, a weed really that’s native to Australia and NZ  but they added a fun element and a pop of colour that looked great.  They also looked great in the men’s button holes.

I should also mention local lady in the village, Jessie Barratt who does the church flowers each week.  She and my mum worked tirelessly the day before the wedding on displays for the pedestals, the church pews, the candelabras and the windowsills and made the church look even prettier than it did before.  The result was stunning especially with the sunlight pouring through the stained glass windows. "

"The bridesmaids dresses came from Boden, I can’t remember the name of them but they were a simple above the knee v-neck dress with capped sleeves in cream.  They all looked blooming amazing so it was worth the gamble of ordering online which I’m always a bit wary of doing, especially as my cousin who lives in Paris didn’t try hers until the week before the wedding.

They all wore their own jewellery and it was all different but looked fab.  As a thank you gift I bought them matching bracelets from a shop in East London called Luna & Curious.  They stock a brilliant collection by largely British designers and after much deliberation (I wanted it all), I ordered 4 gold bracelets with a delicate heart charm by the designer Karin Andreasson. Karin, and Rhianna, one of the shop owners, were super helpful in creating a bespoke bracelet (based on Karin’s ‘Love Hearts Necklace) to suit what I was after, as well as my budget and I was so pleased when they arrived.  They were stunning."

"I’ve always had a soft spot for the church we got married in,  St. Mary Magdalene, as it’s quiet and tucked away and very pretty, but many years ago I visited it with a friend who came to stay from up North and she wrote in the visitor’s book ‘My friend Charlie Bowden is going to get married here someday…’  so that sealed it really – years before I’d even met Nick.  The reception was held around the corner on my parents’ farm (also where I grew up).

You may ask, did dear Nick have a say? Well, luckily for me he also likes where I’m from and was pretty happy to go with the Dorset option. Plus he got his way in other aspects of the day."

"Dasha Caffrey was our amazing photographer and comes highly recommended by us.  She really captured the relaxed, fun atmosphere on the day and we barely even noticed her being there (in a good way). Her service was professional but personable from the start, and the photos?!  Well, they speak for themselves don’t they? We’ve had so many lovely comments from our guests about them."