Planning a winter wedding in the UK, you wouldn't usually think of hosting the evening outdoors. But Emily and Pete planned on hosting a cosy evening beneath the stars at their wedding back in January. With hot chocolate, warm blankets and a camp fire, their guests were entertained with live music. So cosy.

Now. Let's talk about this fashion forward couple, who donned the best wedding attire. Emily found her stunning vintage gown in Oxfam for just £30, which she teamed with suede lace up boots. Pete meanwhile was suited and booted in ASOS, with a tweed and quirky bow tie combo.

Such a happy day.

Thanks so much to the amazing Murray Clarke for sharing these wonderful images today.

THE PROPOSAL | Pete and I took a week-long trip to the Lake District with four of our closest friends in September. One of the days we all took a hike to Scafell Pike, the highest mountain in England. It was incredibly beautiful and Pete and I hung back to enjoy all the waterfalls and viewing points. At one of the particularly stunning waterfalls, we sat together and talked about the journey our relationship had taken. Just when I got bored and was ready to move on, Pete said he wanted a photo of me next to the waterfall, and when I turned around he was on his knee. He said lots of wonderful things, most of which I can't remember, but I do remember he started with, "I'm not sure what to say now". When he asked me to marry him I said, "Sure why not". His startled face let me know he didn't remember that this was a throwback to what I said when he originally asked me out!

THE VISION | Pete and I knew that bringing together my family from Australia and his from England would be such a special and rare opportunity. So the most important thing for us was to make as much time as possible to spend with the people we cared about. With this in mind, we planned a camp style weekend away for all our friends/family, hoping to create a really relaxed and fun atmosphere. In terms of theming, we both love Wes Anderson and took lots of inspiration from his film Moonrise Kingdom, trying to go for an overall vintage/scout camp feel. Planning a wedding for the middle of winter, I pictured lots of people standing around a campfire, snuggled up in blankets and toasting marshmallows.

THE PLANNING PROCESS | Having spent time studying and working in events, I really enjoyed the planning process and didn't find it anywhere near as stressful as I expected! We only really had about 5 months to pull it together though, so everything had to be done quite quickly. Early on we decided to focus on three key things as most important to us; a good band, delicious food and a relaxed venue/atmosphere. Everything else we said we would chose not to stress about.

BUDGET | We worked with about £7,000 total for the wedding weekend. The venue was the biggest outlay of the budget at £2,500 - but seeing it was the only suitable venue and was priced for a whole weekend, we couldn't say no! With the limited budget, we had to call in lots of favours, and did a lot of things ourselves. We also chose to all the catering ourselves, with the help of some incredible family, which saved a lot of money.

THE VENUE | I spent weeks looking for any sort of campsite/scout camp/outdoor activity centre that could cater to our needs, but all of them were too expensive or didn't normally do weddings. Finally, we found Oakwood Youth Centre - who hadn't hosted a wedding before, but had everything we needed. It was such a fantastic venue with cozy dorm rooms for the guests, a big fire pit and plenty of beautiful outdoor spaces.

THE DRESS & ACCESSORIES | I found my dress in an Oxfam Bridal store in Leatherhead after searching a few other charity stores. It was off to the side and not ready for sale, but it caught my eye and I fell in love with it straight away. The dress was over 100 years old; it had beautifully intricate lace and was so simple and feminine. I bought it for a steal, only £30! I definitely recommend for brides to check out speciality charity bridal stores if you're looking for something unique. In terms of accessories, I bought suede boots from ASOS to match the Edwardian style of the dress and wore an ivory/gold necklace my mum gave to me.

GROOM'S ATTIRE | Everything for the groom was bought online through ASOS (we're addicted). We wanted a vintage look to match the style of the dress. So he wore brown chinos, a grey acid wash shirt, a brown tweed vest and jacket to match and a gold tipped, navy bow tie to top it all off.

THE READINGS & MUSIC | I walked in to a beautiful piece that Pete had composed for me when I first went back to Australia. We walked out to Stanger by Angus and Julia Stone. The first reading came from Hebrews 12:1-3, a favourite passage of ours, which talks of persevering in all things through the example Jesus has set for us. The second was Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 which holds a powerful message of two being better than one.

BEAUTIFUL BRIDESMAIDS | The bridesmaids were my sister and my best friend who were both in Australia while we were planning the wedding in England, so I basically had to let them find their own outfits. In the end they found these stunning full length, long sleeve, navy dresses with lace detail from Phase Eight that fitted perfectly with my dress and the guys navy theme.

THE FLOWERS | To match the vintage theme, I decided I would really like to have dried flowers, but only had a budget of about £80! So I decided to make the bouquets with my mum in the week before the wedding. We ordered all the dried flowers online through wholesalers and had a blast making them together. With neither of us having any experience flower arranging, we were pretty amazed at how well they turned out!

THE CAKE | A wonderful and very talented friend of ours offered to make the wedding cake as a gift. So we had a three-tiered 'naked' cake with three different flavours of sponge; almond, lemon and plain - each with a tasty buttercream and blackberry filling. It was so delicious, but Pete and I both wished we had more!

YOUR PHOTOGRAPHER | The photos were really important to me and I spent a long time researching for a photographer who could capture the day perfectly. We wanted someone who could take really natural, light and wide frame photos. Murray Clarke was such a find; he was so friendly, easy to work with and the photos were exactly what we were looking for. Plus he was willing to offer us a discount for being out of season - score!

THE DETAILS & DÉCOR | Running with the camp theme - we created a 'Camp Oakwood' logo for the wedding. The logo was used throughout the day; from the treasure hunt style invitations to the ceremony programmes and even on disposable cups we got printed for the drinks bar. The warm drinks bar had mulled wine, spiced apple juice and hot chocolate with all the trimmings! To build on the cosy feel - we had a large patio where we placed outdoor heaters, string lights and crates full of warm blankets for the guests to use. The campfire was a bit hit too!

We kept the décor quite simple otherwise and decorated the ceremony hall with branches, dried flowers and garlands of mixed feathers. We were so blessed by one of our friends who built an amazing archway for the ceremony out of silver birch. One of my favourite things was a photo booth we created with Moonrise Kingdom themed props; felt animal masks, racoon hats, Indian headdresses and binoculars. The guests took pictures in the props with a Polaroid camera and placed the Polaroid's in the guest book with a messages for us, so much fun!

THE HONEYMOON | We didn't have a lot of money left over for the hmoon - but on the advice of a few friends, we stayed in a cosy cottage close to the campsite for a few days straight after the wedding to catch our breath. Then we flew to Morocco for a week and stayed in a beautiful all-inclusive, 4-star resort for less than £400 each!

MEMORABLE MOMENTS | There were a few special times when Pete and I were able to sneak away and enjoy a moment together at the campfire, staring at the stars. And we loved seeing all our friends and family so relaxed, everyone was chatting to everyone. But one of the real highlights was seeing how much fun everyone had on the dancefloor! Our band, Mammoth Grooves, were incredible, and I don't think I saw anyone sitting down during either set.

ADVICE FOR OTHER COUPLES | For us, deciding early on what our three most important things were really helped focus the planning. It's super easy to get caught up in lots of detail - but try to remember what you really want the day to be about; whether that's a relaxed atmosphere, food, music etc. Also, like everyone says make sure you find time throughout the day to pull each other aside and just catch up/enjoy watching everyone.

CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE |

Photographer | Murray Clarke

Videographer | NV Media

Venue | Oakwood Youth Centre

Dress | Oxfam Bridal Store - Leatherhead

Design | Creative Little Dots

Band | Mammoth Grooves [email protected]

Wow. So very beautiful.

Emily and Pete thank you both so very much for sharing your story today xo Lou