Good evening all, please join me in welcoming another of our fabulous Lovettes team members – last night we had the very funny and honest Emily introduce herself (and talk about big pants and body image and wobbly bits). This evening, it’s the turn of Charlotte and her fiancé Rik, who are planning an Autumn barn wedding, with the creativity of Wes Anderson serving as their main inspiration. And, the wonderful McKinley Rodgers are due to take their photographs too. Handing over to you Charlotte! Welcome to Love My Dress 🙂
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Our story is not one of those love-at-first-sight, knowing they’re ‘the one’ from the word go type scenarios. It wasn’t even love at second, third, fourth or come to mention it, one-hundredth sight.
Now, this may seem an incredibly unromantic way to begin my first post, but it gets better, so thanks for sticking with me.
Rik and I met at senior school where we grew up in Brighton, at some undefined point between the ages of 12 and 15. We were in the same year but didn’t really have any classes together until year 10, and our contact was no more than a passing glance in the corridor until we worked together on a school play, Willy Russell’s ‘Our Day Out’. I was the lead and Rik did the lighting and sound production. A group of us from the play hung around together on and off, and I got in more trouble during those few months than I had gotten in throughout the rest of my high school career.
Highlights included ‘borrowing’ a box of wine from the teachers’ lounge and skipping school to go and see ‘Save the Last Dance’ and eat donuts on the Palace (Brighton) Pier. Rik has always stuck to his guns that he wasn’t to blame for these shenanigans, but he was one hundred percent the ringleader of that little gang of drama misfits.
That’s the thing about Rik, he’s always been the guy people want to be around, the fun, charismatic one who you know will make a good time even better.
When school ended we went onto separate colleges and universities but our paths crossed again as a direct effect of the saddest day of my life.
Losing my best friend Rebecca in a car crash at aged 19 was the most heartbreaking thing I’ve ever gone through, and during the six months that followed, my life changed completely. I moved back to Brighton from London to be close to my family and friends who knew what I was going through and a lot of whom were also suffering after our loss.
But light does come out of darkness, and for want of a better word, I was ‘adopted’ by one of her groups of friends, who I only knew in passing before the accident, but who felt my pain and made a huge effort to take me under their wing.
Rik was one of those friends, and over the next year, we grew closer until realising at the end of summer 2007 that we couldn’t actually face going back to our respective universities without making it official and becoming a couple.
We’ve been together now for over 7 years, and have been through graduations, a whole host of awful jobs, some pretty good jobs, some hard times and hundreds of great times, many of which we’ve shared in our little West London flat where we’ve lived for over six years.
Rik proposed last July, in our local park Kensington Gardens, in front of our families and invited some of our best friends to join us to celebrate afterwards. It was originally meant to be my birthday picnic, something we’ve done for the last few years, which is how Rik managed to raise no suspicion from me whatsoever. It was only afterwards that I realised why both him and my mum were so insistent when I nearly rescheduled as it looked like it might rain!
We’ve now only got a little over 5 months until the big day, and planning it is the most fun thing I’ve ever done. For us, the only stressful part was deciding what country to get married in (it was a toss-up between the UK and Las Vegas -a place I spent a great deal of my childhood- for the first month or so) and it’s been plain sailing ever since. Our venue is the breathtaking Tithe Barn in Petersfield and is a total blank canvas so we can put our stamp on it.
We don’t have a specific theme or colour scheme, but will be taking inspiration from things that we love, mainly books and films, and have an autumnal palette of colours that we’re loosely sticking to. An old friend of mine will be driving me and my dad to the wedding in his red 1976 VW beatle, and we’ve been gathering together a range of eclectic props and giving my poor dad who trained as a carpenter a whole host of projects to build. I’m hoping that everything will come together and it won’t look too much like a big mish-mash of crazy!
I’m also really excited about all the events on the lead up to the wedding, and all of our London friends getting to know our Brighton friends and family on the stag and hen weekends. We’ll have Tony Bowen and his band Kingtastic playing, who we booked after hearing Tony sing at our local every Thursday night, and hope that the dance floor will be bursting at the seams with everyone we love dancing together in one huge group.
Since everyone says the day itself goes by in a flash, I plan to fully enjoy every moment of planning over the next 5 months, and totally self indulge in reading every bridal magazine I can get my hands on and sky plussing every episode of Say Yes to the Dress.
After all, you only do it once.
Love Charlotte x
A little background on Charlotte and Rik
As this is Charlotte’s first post for Love My Dress, we thought it would be nice to share some of her original Lovettes application with you all – to help you get to know her a little better. We’ll be doing the same for all our new Lovettes when it comes to sharing their first posts.
Charlotte Knott is marrying her fiancé Rik on 18th September 2015
Location: The Tithe Barn in Ditcham, near Petersfield
Photographer: McKinley Rodgers
Find Laura via: her blog + Instagram
How they met:
Rik and I met at school when we were 15, but didn’t become close friends until we were 19, when we both endured a personal tragedy – I lost my oldest and dearest friend Rebecca in a car accident. We had grown up like sisters, born on the same day, and I couldn’t picture how my life could go on without her. Heartbroken, I made the decision to leave my university share house and move back home to Brighton where I had the comfort and support of my family and childhood friends. Rik was also affected greatly by this, as his two best friends were both extremely close to Rebecca and were suffering terribly after her passing.
Over the next year or so, the group of friends that had been so close to Rebecca during the few years that I’d been away at uni (some that I knew, others that I didn’t before the accident) welcomed me into their circle as if I’d always been a close friend. Rik became my closest friend out of the group, with his incredible sense of humour lifting me at the darkest time of my life.
Just over a year and a half later, we were the last ones to realize we had fallen for each other, and said those 3 words to each before we even decided that we were officially dating.
7 years on, Rik proposed in Kensington Gardens, in front of all our family and a few close friends, under the guise of it being a birthday picnic for me. I didn’t suspect anything and was unbelievably shocked and thrilled, and after quite a few tears, of course said ‘yes’.
It was an amazing moment, to be able to share our excitement and celebrate with all of our nearest and dearest as soon as it happened.
About their wedding:
Our wedding is at the Tithe Barn in Ditcham, near Petersfield, on the border of Sussex and Hampshire. We both grew up in Brighton, and when we were first together Rik was at uni in Portsmouth so we spent a lot of time between the two places, which is why it’s special to us.
When we started looking for venues, we weren’t looking for a particular type of place and were open minded to anything from a marquee, barn or even old castle ruins, but as soon as we stepped in the Tithe Barn and saw the high beams and rolling hills of the South Downs surrounding it, we just thought ‘wow’. The best part about it is that it is a blank canvas that we can make our own. We both love Wes Anderson films so are using them as a source of inspiration, and also love making things, so are looking forward to getting stuck into lots of DIY projects on the run up to the day, with a little bit of help from my discount at Liberty where I work as their Press Officer 🙂
Autumn is my favourite season, with it’s warm, golden evening light, and in mid September, hopefully it will still be warm enough for our guests to enjoy the beautiful land around the barn.
The main thing for us is to throw the best party of our lives and celebrate with all of our closest friends and family, and for it not to feel too formal or polished.
What does marriage mean?
I feel incredibly lucky that the saddest time in my life set me on a path that would lead to the happiest time in my life. This is what marriage means to me – that together you can weather the hardest moments life throws at you, as well as being able to treasure the laughs, love and adventure along the way.
Favourite Hollywood Icon?
Emma Stone, because she’s fun and she doesn’t take herself too seriously. You know she’d be the first on the dance floor and not afraid to throw some funky shapes!
(Plus, The Help is one of my all time favourite films)
Favourite Love My Dress wedding:
My favourite Love My Dress wedding by a country mile is Clara and Jason’s*** Along with being big fans of Jason’s work (did you just see he won BAFTA for Best Actor?!), I also had a serious case of deja-vu when pouring through the photos as I used to seriously covet Clara’s jewellery when she had a stall at Spitalfields Market, round the corner from my first London flat, as a very poor student 10 years ago!
Their story had me sobbing, as I’m sure it did for I’m sure everyone who read it. It is also very close to home for me in that life’s tragedies make those perfect days even more special and meaningful.
Plus, Clara looked like the most effortlessly beautiful bride, and their personalities shone through within every aspect of their day.
