Following on from part 1 of Emily and Mark’s wedding this morning, I have their fun party wedding reception to share with you. They chose the The Three Tuns pub with a beautiful marquee for the backdrop of their wedding day.

Emily and Mark crafted so many of the pretty touches, from the bunting, to the fabric table plan and decorated wedding cake.

Emily looked so very beautiful in a polka dot creation by Oh My Honey, which she teamed with a pink petticoat from Petticoats A Plenty and veil from Lily Bella. Mark chose a grey tweed suit from Next which he wore with quirky scrabble cuff links to fit with the details in their décor. Oh so gorgeous.

Thanks so much to Emma Lucy for the wonderful photographs today.

 

 

The Flowers… Sunflowers! It’s a bit of an in-joke from a family holiday years ago, but I love them, they’re so cheerful. My bouquet also had gerbera to get some pink in, and rosemary, tied with leopard-print ribbon – I think I knew that Mel from The Flower Smith was the one for me when she got excited about having leopard print in there too . The bridesmaids had sunflower wrist corsages on pink ribbon, with a posy of gerbera for the flower girl. Mark took a firm stance on not wanting sunflower buttonholes for fear of looking ‘clowny’, so chose craspedia instead, with some rosemary too. They looked brilliant, we had so many comments about how unusual they were. In the marquee we chose big enamel jugs of sunflowers for the tables – really simple but the colour looked amazing against the white marquee and pastel tablecloths.

 

 

The Cake… From good old M&S with a little staff discount thanks to the lovely Sharon, one of the bridemaid’s mums. We ordered just plain ivory sponge, which was totally delicious, and I made and added the sugar paste bunting and polka dot ribbon. I also made the lobster topper (it’s a Friends reference!) – it’s made of Fimo, so hopefully we can keep it forever – some of the children were quite disappointed they couldn’t eat it though!

 

 

The Details + Decor… The ceremony room really didn’t need anything else, it was so lovely with its high windows and wood panelling. A special mention must go to our beautiful car, which was loaned to us by my step-uncle from his collection – transport wasn’t really a priority for us, but he and my dad arranged for us to travel to the reception in his stunning 1930s Buick which looked beautiful.

For the marquee, a whole 200m of bunting was made by me – a real labour of love! It looked amazing, I was rather proud of me and my little sewing machine, which was a very welcome gift from my bridesmaid Leah. Each table had a different fabric tablecloth which matched some of the bunting, and I used a swatch from each on the table plan too, which was a plain canvas from Hobbycraft covered in brown paper. I’ve since had the tablecloth fabrics made into a patchwork quilt (a bit beyond my own sewing skills sadly) which is a gorgeous memory of the day. We also had table numbers which were made by my mum’s clever partner Martyn (who was also one of our witnesses), that I then painted in bright colours. I handmade the name tags using brown paper luggage labels and Scrabble tiles which we bought on eBay – we (sadly) get pretty competitive over Scrabble and it was a fun touch to use the tiles here and there. I think a lot of people took them home which was nice! In the barn we had lots of tissue pompoms and letter bunting with Fleetwood Mac lyrics, that I printed from a downloadable online template. We had a vintage suitcase for cards which I lined with some posh wrapping paper – a bit of a cliché maybe but it looked fab and made carrying all the bits home much easier! Then just lots of jam jars with tea lights that I decorated with some fabric tape.

 

 

 

The Dress + Accessories… My beautiful dress was made for me by the very talented Louise at Oh My Honey, with the pink-edged petticoat from Petticoats A Plenty. I wore a headband from good old Accessorize with a birdcage veil from Lily Bella and my Nana’s pearl necklace. The little heart earrings were Accessorize too, I had a silver bangle engraved with some song lyrics that are special to us made by Posh Totty via notonthehighstreet, and Mark bought me a little silver watch to complete it all.

And the shoes! I think I bought about five pairs in my quest – I knew I wanted pink all along but went through a few options! I adored my Vivienne Westwood (via eBay!) pair, and then had personalised pink and leopard Converse for dancing later on. I did also have some gorgeous Joules wellies with me (pink too with big bows!) in case of rain, but the sun was kind – the last day of summer I think!

 

 

Finding the Dress… I know I’ve already written about this one in a previous post, but dress shopping for me was a bit of a rubbish experience – everything strapless and horribly sparkly and in ridiculously tiny sample sizes. Our photographer Emma recommended Louise and Oh My Honey, and I worked with Louise to alter one of her standard designs, adding the sleeves and v-neck, and some pockets! I loved my dress, I cried when I boxed it up to put it away!

 

 

Your Photographer… Emma Lucy – just brilliant! She’s a friend of a friend and had done their wedding which we’d attended a couple of years before, and with that and our fab engagement shoot we knew she’d do an amazing job. You barely noticed she was there yet she got some amazing shots. She also whisked us away for portraits to another location up the road – I wasn’t sure about leaving the party initially but it was lovely to have that little break from everyone just for a few minutes, and it resulted in some beautiful images full of dramatic skies and New Forest ponies.

 

 

The Honeymoon… A wonderful week in Morocco – five nights in Marrakech in a quirky little riad in the old city, followed by two nights of luxury at Richard Branson’s place in the Atlas Mountains. It was bliss.

 

 

Groom’s Attire… Almost as big a mission as finding the dress! Mark and his best man Ian ended up in lovely grey tweed suits from Next, with blue shirts from TM Lewin and ties from Marks and Spencer. They also had Scrabble tile cuff links made by an eBay store, to tie in with one of the décor themes.

 

 

Memorable Moments… I was so nervous the day before – kept randomly bursting into tears! – but was just so calm and happy on the day. I loved getting ready in the morning, but the ceremony was the real highlight of the day for me – it just seemed to mean so much. Though the atmosphere was lightened by a) me nearly tripping over on a misplaced bag on the way in, and b) our niece Amelia (who is only two) piping up when they asked for any reasons we couldn’t get married!

 

 

Advice for Other Couples… Have a plan – I was calm as I knew that everything possible had been taken care of! Try and spend a little bit of time just the two of you – our couple portraits were great for this.

 

 

Credit Where Credit is Due…

Venues – Bournemouth Town Hall and The Three Tuns

Dress – Oh My Honey and Petticoats A Plenty

Brides Accessories – Accessorize, Lily Bella, notonthehighstreet, Converse and eBay!

Groom’s Attire – Next, TM Lewin, Marks & Spencer

Bridesmaids’ Dresses – Debenhams

Photographer – Emma Lucy

Reception Stuff – Brock Ice and Disco Wed

Cake – Marks & Spencer

Flowers – The Flower Smith

 

Amazing! Thanks so much to Emily and Mark for sharing their beautiful wedding with us today. And a huge thank you to Emily for blogging all about her wedding planning journey on Whimsical Wonderland Weddings XOXO Lou