Good morning wedding blog lovers 😉 This one is for all you craft creative brides who like to throw your self in to the design pool when it comes to planning your wedding day. How many of you have gone as far as designing your actual wedding dress? That's what bride Hayley here did for her wedding to Ryan on 24th August last year at Hertford Castle, Hertfordshire. She also styled all the flowers herself and pulled in her talented Mum to bake a cake. A true DIY family affair!
I love the dropped waist detail of Hayley's dress and all those pretty pearls and delicate vintage lace – it reminds me of something a bride in the 1920's would have worn – very elegant indeed. I also love how Hayley has pulled in a variety influences from across various eras – that 60's inspired beehive hairstyle looks fabulous!
"I designed my wedding dress myself, this was something I wanted to
do from the outset and a lovely lady called Elise made it for me. I like
to make design and make things occasionally, and I love vintage lace…"
Love My Dress Wedding Blog – Photography Copyright (c) 2013, Caroline Hancox
"Ryan and I were friends for a few years and rest is history!
We are both into traditional English things, so we wanted to keep the
wedding very much about us and what we like. Our reception was an
English tea party. We wanted an intimate day, celebrating with our
nearest and dearest.
We had a picnic here in the pretty castle grounds a few years
before we even thought of getting married and remembered this when we
started to plan our day…"
"My birdcage veil and hair accessories were from Vintage Styler. My parents bought me a beautiful vintage pearl necklace from an
antique shop and we could find the right earrings that I wanted to match
it so my mum very cleverly made me some that were perfect."
"I did all the flowers myself, I wanted them to look like they had just been picked up from a pretty garden."
"During the wedding ceremony, Ryan's grandmother Pearl read a lovely poem that she wrote for us, which put a tear in everyones eyes!"
This is what I want to be like in 50 years time. Love lasts forever…
"For our tea party I made all of the bunting and table cloths. we hired all of the amazing crockery from Pretty Vintage.
My Mum Sharon made our beautiful yummy cake (she used to
be a cake maker) She is very talented and has all the patience in the
world. She made every flower and details by hand. she is a superstar!"
"Our photogarpher was Caroline Hancox,
who is the best photographer in the world we knew as soon as we met her
she would be perfect and she was.she understood our vision for the day,
our photos are amazing, caroline made us two and everyone feel
completely at ease and comfortable and got on well with all of our
guest, everyone loved her. Caroline has an amazing eye for detail and
captures moments perfectly."
"Our friend Ben sang and played acoustic guitar, making a beautiful evening of dancing and lots of laughs.
We both love music and found it so hard to make a decision for
this, but we thought 'baby I love you' by the ramones was a great song
to have a little dance to."
Words of Wedded Wisdom…
"Enjoy every moment as the day flies by too quickly!
And for us, the very best part of the day was celebrating with our closest family and friends."
What a lovely way to have started my morning! I hope it perks you up too.
I'd love to hear from brides who have been as brave as Hayley and designed their own wedding dress. And what about a tea party in a castle? Anyone up for that?
With much love,
Annabel
Photographer – Caroline Hancox
Venue – Hertford Castle, Hertfordshire
Wedding Dress – Designed by the bride, made by a local seamstress
Veil/Headpiece – Vintage Styler
Grooms – Blue Tonic suit
Bridesmaids – Ted Baker
Flowers – The bride
Cake – Mother of the bride
Entertainment – Acoustic guitar, played by a friend
Hair Stylist – Hair by chim at Kenny Arnold hairdressing stevenage
Tea party crockery hire – Pretty Vintage
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.
