Our Wedding: Three Years On

Written by: louise

Three years ago today Mr B and I tied the knot on a beautiful wine farm in South Africa, on a perfectly hot and sunny day. Little did I know then that day would change my life in more ways than I could ever have imagined - not only becoming a wife - but becoming a blogger, a stylist and part of this wonderfully crazy world of weddings and the incredible I've met because of it all. For those of you who don't know my story Mr B and I met almost 11 years ago, and after 8 years of travelling, house-buying and career-building he got down on one knee on the beautiful sandy beach at Camps Bay, and proposed! Almost exactly a year later we exchanged vows in the cutest old chapel just outside of Cape Town, and celebrated with an intimate group of family and friends in our most favourite place in the world.

Today, I'm taking a look back over our amazing day and sharing our story once more from a slightly different perspective. If you'd like to read my original wedding posts, you can find all of them here. Of course I've learnt so much more about weddings since then than I ever thought possible - discovering the best bridal boutiques and accessories designers, meeting some of the most creative florists, cake designers and stationers and of course the most stylish planners, stylists and coordinators there are. When I planned our wedding Pinterest didn't exist, and inspiration was stored in folders and files, printed and shared with family and suppliers, and there certainly wasn't quite as much choice. But after three years is there anything I would change?

Waking on that morning, and peeking through the curtains across the lake and mountains to the most beautiful blue skies, I knew our day was going to be blessed. After a family breakfast, the girls and I headed to the bridal suite to be greeted by hair & make up artist San Marie, who is still a great friend today. That's one of the biggest lessons I can pass on to you, find wedding suppliers you would like to be friends with, you trust and know understand your creative vision. You never know they might actually become friends, it's not uncommon! My look was slighting Bardot-inspired, I love that fresh, flawless makeup look with emphasis on the eyes, so San Marie used epic falsh lashes to add drama to my eyes! To over come my short(ish) hair she used extensions to add length before sweeping up into an elegant side bun, and tucked my veil and sparkly comb for the ceremony. Lesson number two, you've got to fake it to make it! In all honesty, my dress is probably the only thing I would change about our wedding - with just 5 months between choosing the date and the actual wedding day I didn't really leave enough time to find what I really wanted. Don't get me wrong I love my wedding dress, it just wasn't quite what I envisioned walking down the aisle in! My bridesmaids wore customised silvery-grey dresses with charcoal sashes, and the groomsmen wore grey suits with yellow ties - the first hint of our colour scheme!

Walking along the gravel path with my Dad to the chapel was such a special memory - treasure those moments with your Dad, it's one of the most lasting memories of my day. I also loved the getting ready part of the day with my mum and bridesmaids - we put on some tunes, pampered ourselves and practised walking the aisle {although my dad probably been there too as he proceeded to march down the aisle later!}. As our wedding was small we had just three bridesmaids and three groomsmen, with Mr B choosing his two brothers and youngest cousin, and me choosing my sister-in-law, my brother-in-law's girlfriend {who happens to now be my sister-in-law-to-be and our Real Life Bride!} and Mr B's adorable cousin.

Choose a marriage officiant, vicar, celebrant or registrar you love. Our officiant had a young, relaxed style which in turn relaxed us {even when the best man dropped the rings!} He incorporated beautiful, serious readings with a few jokes {at Mr B's expense!} making the ceremony fun and memorable. We chose Mr B's two Gran's to read at our ceremony - 1 Corinthians 13, and 'What is Love' by Coulson Macloed which was a lovely way to make them a part of the day.

Leaving the chapel to a flurry of confetti is easily one of my favourite memories. With The Beatles 'All You Need Is Love' blasting through the chapel doors, and our guests smiling and laughing as they congratulated and confetti-bombed us it was fun, and colourful and made for some brilliant photos! Aaah, our wedding photos. They still bring a smile to my face every time I see them - decorating the walls of our home, the screensaver on my phone {still!} and paging through our much-loved album, our photographer was absolutely the best investment we made for our wedding. We'd fallen in love with Christine Meintjes work long before we even got engaged, following her blog and facebook eagerly awaiting her next feature and little-by-little learning more about her style. Since our wedding, we've become great friends and she is still one of the ladies I most admire in the wedding industry - and a huge inspiration.

As the light began to fade, our guests moved from the gardens, where we served peach bellini's using locally grown peach juice and entertained our guests with a local Marimba band, to the terrace where a long table was set and ready for our guests to enjoy the sunset over the magnificent views of the lake and mountains. Our florist, Leipzig, created a vibrant, fresh and colourful array of flowers decorating the table from one end to the other. I loved the orange colour - a reminder of that big African sun - and they included so many local flowers from Protea to Strelizia which added to the uniquely South African style. The bouquets tied in with the colours - combining calla lilies, banksia and brunia with local fynbos making our bouquets so different and fun! This was the year before Pantone announced Tangerine Tango as their colour of the year - so it was nice to know I was a bit ahead of the trend

As our wedding was an intimate celebration - with just 45 guests - we were able to be seated on one banquet table in family-style. Mr B and I sat centred, surrounded by loved ones and it was so lovely to see everyone enjoying themselves, laughing and exchanging stories across the table as they ate delicious African-inspired food and enjoyed the wonderful views with fairy lights and candles twinkling all around.

If there's one thing I've learned in the last three years, it's that it doesn't matter if what you chose then wouldn't be what you would chose now. The venue, the flowers and décor are all a wonderfully pretty and romantic backdrop to your day and I wholeheartedly believe that you should go all-out to prettify your day as much as you desire. But at that time, standing next to your new husband, surrounded by family and friends and an awful lot of love, it really is just all a backdrop.

Happy Anniversary, Mr B. xo

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Photography: Christine Meintjes. Meet our suppliers here

Categories: our wedding · Tags: anniversary, christine meintjes, orange, our wedding, south africa