Alice and Peter’s elegant vineyard wedding took place on 11th June 2022 at Tillingham Winery in the beautiful Sussex countryside.
This beautiful wedding was full of the prettiest seasonal blooms and the bride chose a sublime ruffled tulle gown and delicate veil, by Love My Dress favourite, Halfpenny London – before slipping into an evening combo that she could dance in, by Rixo Bridal and 16 Arlington.
Alice – I have loved preparing this beautiful feature. Thank you so much for your very kind words about Love My Dress.
Love and thanks too, to the super talented Maja Tsolo for sharing these gorgeous images.
A Halfpenny London Dress
My dress was from Halfpenny London – my experience at the boutique was excellent.
It’s a treasure trove full of dresses and separates to suit all tastes, I found the staff to be exceptionally helpful. I would highly recommend this boutique to any bride-to-be.
Shoes, Veil & Accessories
My veil was from Halfpenny London, it was a super soft silk waterfall veil.
I wore shoes from Monsoon and Sophia Webster.
My scent was Christian Dior Vanilla Diorama – it’s sweet but not too floral with a slightly woody undertone.
I chose to wear earrings from Lilly and Roo, they were simple pearl earrings with a long gold chain drop.
The Ceremony
Our ceremony was held at St.Mary’s church in Rye, this is were my family were christened and married.
My father walked me down the aisle, to the sound of Songbird by Fleetwood Mac (performed by the choir). We also had a Gospel Choir sing during our ceremony.
Rector Revd Paul White, provided us with a wonderful loving and warm ceremony with lots of laughter.
My ring was a custom design twisted gold band by the talented Eduardo from Rae Lifestyle in Rye.
Photography by Maja Tsolo
We chose Maja Tsolo, because she is excellent at capturing images that tell a story, she finds fantastic use of light in all of her images and her image aesthetics were exactly what we had been looking for.
She was fantastic, very friendly and put us all at ease as soon as we met on the day. I would highly recommend Maja to all couples, you won’t find a better photographer.
We had a drinks reception on the terrace, during which, Will Scott duo entertained. Our guests loved the music the duo provided.
Bridesmaids
My bridesmaid bought their own dresses in shades of pink. I made the bridesmaids earrings and they bought their own shoes.
My flower girl wore a light pink tulle from Children Salon to match my dress.
Our page boy wore a stone coloured linen suits with bow ties and loafers.
The Groom
Peter wore a dark blue three-piece suit from Edit Suits in London. With dark brown Oxfords from Crocket and Jones.
The groomsmen wore matching ties and pocket squares from a local Menswear shop in Rye (W J Bennett) and Pete wore a Jean Pierre pocket watch (bought from Farrar and Tanner).
We met in an Islington Bar whilst working in London, Peter then proposed on a mountain in France during our ski holiday whilst the sun was setting. We were engaged for 3 years before our wedding, it was postponed for 1 year because of covid restrictions.
We had variations of seasonal pink and white flowers in the bouquets, button holes, church flowers and flower crown for our flower girl, from local florist, Café Des Fleur.
At our reception venue, their floral stylist, Karen, created us some bespoke floral arrangements on the outside tables, stairs, dining tables and a large display in the restaurant, climbing up the wall and over a large window.
Reception
Our reception venue was at a beautiful Vineyard, 10 minutes drive outside Rye, over looking the countryside.
We both share a love of good food and wine, we chose our reception venue for this reason. The chef prepared a beautiful feasting menu using local suppliers, which was also particularly important when planning our wedding.
As our wedding was held at a vineyard, we decided that a cheese wheel wedding cake would be the perfect pairing. We visited the Cotswold Cheese Company for a tasting selected a five tier cheese cake with a big selection of crackers and chutneys.
I designed all our invites, order of the day, maps and table places. My Father made our table seating plan from copper pipe, plywood and chalkboard paint.
We both chose our favorite sweets and placed them on the tables for guests. Peter chose Chocolate Mice and Jazzes, Alice chose maltesers and chocolate covered rum soaked raisins.
Karen, the floral stylist at Tillingham created a wonderful atmostphere, the venue was scattered with tiny bud vases with beautiful flowers, the detail was wonderful, even down to the edible flowers in the homemade elderflower cordial.
A favourite moment was at the reception, before dinner, on the terrace overlooking the vineyard. The weather was beautifully warm, everyone had a wonderful time chatting, listening to the acoustic duo, watching the resident pigs in the fields whilst enjoying fabulous canapes and drinks.
I used Love My Dress and Brides for inspiration when planning. I loved looking at the real weddings on Love My Dress and finding suppliers from the wedding directory. I love the wedding directory! Alice
Evening & Dancing
My venues were quite different, going from Church to Vineyard, and so I decided to have an outfit that changed throughout the day. A more traditional look for the church, then removing the over skirt for the reception/dinner and then a party outfit for the evening, which was a combination of looks from Rixo Bridal and 16 Arlington.
In the evening, Truly Medley Deeply provided entertainment. Our first dance as to Sam Cooke’s ‘Bring it on Home’ – it’s from one of our favourite films and movie soundtracks, Guardians of the Galaxy. This Sam Cooke song is so beautiful, this was a very easy choice for us.
Words of Wedded Wisdom
We wish we had allowed ourselves more time to get ready in the morning, it was a bit of a rush!
We left two polaroid cameras for our guests to use and ended with some brilliant photos, a true record of how much fun was had.
We didn’t set a strict budget, but tried to spend more of things we saw most value in.
Explore our Directory
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.
