Christmas is one of my most favourite times of the year, is there a more romantic time to get married?
Michelle and Ian clearly love the season too as they tied the knot on the 14th December 2013. They wanted to create a cosy and relaxed wedding with touches of lace.
They had a candle and fairy light lit reception, with a chic emerald green colour scheme. There were mince pies, mulled wine and mistletoe. Not to mention pretty bridesmaids in green, Michelle in lace and lush cream blooms.
Thanks so much to Lola Rose Photography for sharing her gorgeous images today.
The Proposal… A cold, wet and windy day back in November 2012 Ian & I were sharing a mini break in St Ives, Cornwall. Ian got down on one knee ( or should I say… wobbled without putting his knee on the wet sand!) to pop the question. I could not have been more surprised as I had planned the mini break to celebrate his 30th birthday; it was on his birthday I said YES! It turned out he had been carrying the ring around for days waiting for the right moment.
The Vision for the Day… We wanted the day to reflect our personalities. Ian is very relaxed and I did not want the day to be too formal. We wanted people to relax and enjoy themselves. I love cute vintage things and absolutely love lace. We wanted to create a warm and cosy place to celebrate in a winter wonderland.
The Planning Process… We planned the wedding in 8 months. I spent time hunting charity shops and searching the web for cute and unique things. My friends and family were all involved in the planning, with lots of craft days held at our house, with a supply of tea & cake! It was great to involve people friends in the preparation for the day and it certainly eased the pressure.
The Venue… We were not keen on getting married in our home area, as we wanted to give people the opportunity to make a weekend of it.
We fell in love with Fittleworth from our first visit. It is a gorgeous little village in West Sussex, with a beautiful Church, St Marys The Virgin. Reverend Wynn and the congregation made us so welcome and over the 8 months of preparing we got to know everyone and they were so helpful in making our day special. They also managed to decorate the biggest Christmas tree I have ever seen.
Just down the road we discovered the lovely Fitzleroi Barn. It’s rustic charm and blank canvas to decorate and make our own, was just perfect. Julia and Mark were really helpful and helped to make our day special. The barn is right next to their beautiful home and this helped to create a really homely atmosphere. We wanted to have the freedom to create our own day without making us use specific suppliers.
The Dress + Accessories… I hunted high and low for the dress. Indecisive as ever! But kept coming back to try on this gorgeous Amanda Wyatt dress. I wanted a high neck dress and absolutely loved the lace. The girls in store then suggested a tried a cathedral length veil and I fell in love again. I decided on Palermo by Joyce Jackson. I think this gave the wow factor I was hoping for. I then tried on numerous pairs of ivory shoes but wasn’t happy with any of them. I then found these gorgeous forest green shoes and knew then would fit perfectly with our day.
Both mine and my gorgeous bridesmaid’s hair and makeup was done by Jenny. She was recommended by a friend as a specialist in wedding beauty. I am so glad I choose Jenny as she really put me at ease and I totally trusted her to create the natural look I was wanting.
Groom’s Attire… The suits were hired for the occasion from a small chain of formalwear shops call Dappers. Ian’s shirt was TM Lewin and the tie, handkerchief, and cuff links were all Ebay bargains! All the grooms men were kitted out in bright green novelty elf socks.
The Readings + Music… We had two beautiful readings. Our dear friend Michelle Noyle read Corinthians 13:4-13, followed by our lovely friend Claire Cooper reading ‘Why Marriage’ by Mari Nichols-Haining. Both readings meant a lot to us and really added to our wedding ceremony.
We were always agreed on the entrance music after a childhood of watching father of bride! – Canon In D Major (Johann Pachelbel) We walked back down the aisle to Mendelssohn’s Wedding March – we couldn’t resist it!
Beautiful Bridesmaids… My gorgeous bridesmaids were wearing matching J’adore Bridal dresses, in forest green chiffon. They all looked stunning and I was so lucky to have them with me on my big day. Their love and support with the wedding preparations was incredible. Even Claire who is based on China managed to assist with the preparations through the wonders of Skype.
The Flowers… My sister put me in touch with Russell New at Blomster Designs. He listened to the ideas I had for the day and suggested a gorgeous combination of flowers. He even mocked up a table for me so that I could see the final result. The tables were set with numerous small vases and votives scattered between them. A combination of cream and ivory flowers, with dark green follage were used to set the tone of the day. We also had blue fir up the stair spindles, with fairy lights around heart wreaths, really helping to create a cosy wintery feel. On the day the barn looked wonderful, all I had hoped for and more.
My bouquet was simple yet effective – a domed hand tied posy using a mix of romantic pepita spray roses, avalanche roses, vendella roses and some double dream lisianthus, all tied with ivory ribbon and a cute pearl brooch. The bridesmaids had wrist corsages set on pearl bracelets, with romantic pepita spray roses. The groom and groomsmen had avalanche rose buttonholes with a few berries, to give a wintery look.
The Cake… The cake was lovingly made by a close family friend. It not only looked gorgeous, but tasted incredible. Three tiers of traditional fruit cake.
Your Photographer… Kelly at Lola rose photography was brilliant. We were recommended her by another photographer and loved her work. We met up before hand and instantly clicked and knew we had found our photographer. Kelly caught the emotion of the day, as well as picking up on all the little details. We would definitely recommend her.
The Details + Decor…. The day was full of handmade, personal touches. The main décor included lots of fairy lights to create a warm cosy feel. There were lots of heart wreaths twinkling. The biggest heart was handmade from garden twigs and was hung behind the top table with of course more fairy lights. It also created a perfect backdrop for our guests to take pictures. The subtle lighting of the fairy lights around the barn created a beautiful atmosphere for a cold winters day before Christmas.
All our wedding stationery was personally designed and produced by our friend Hayley Nichols. She did an amazing job with the invitations and all the signs helped to theme the day perfectly. We had a thank you message on the reverse of the menu cards on each table, as well as a sweepstake card for guests to guess the length of the speeches!
We hung a large gold frame with mistletoe hanging from the top. We set up a camera for people to take snaps and used a sign to encourage our guests to kiss under the mistletoe. It was a great success with lots of hilarious photos as a result!
Instead of a guest book we hung our guest’s names up on a length of ribbon and asked them to write a short message on a postcard. We have some lovely messages which will be added to our wedding scrapbook.
We also had a dresser with numerous antique gold frames, which displayed our parents and grandparents wedding photos. This was our way of making sure those that could not be there were still in our thoughts on the day.
The food was supplied by Champion Caterers. Nicola was really flexible and produced some amazing food. She made the most gorgeous smelling mulled wine which welcomed our guests to the drinks reception. The dessert was a selection of handmade cakes served as a buffet. We asked our guests to bake a cake or two and these were all displayed together on a large round table. This worked brilliantly and again got our guests involved, as well as being different from the norm. Fortunately we had lots of cakes as people helped themselves and went back throughout the night.
The Honeymoon…. Getting married just before Christmas meant that we decided to have a mini moon straight after in Rome. It was an amazing week with perfect weather and we even managed to relax and saw the Pope! After Christmas we were lucky enough to go to the Maldives. It was as perfect as it looks in the brochures – Paradise!
Memorable Moments… It really was the best day ever and we both smiled for the whole day. Our wedding car was Ian’s rickety old Nissan Micra which was brilliantly decorated for the occasion by our friends Nick and Anna. All went well until it did not start – but after a lot of cheering and black smoke it got going. So funny!
Advice for Other Couples… Enjoy every second – it zooms by!
Credit Where Credit is Due…
Photographer | Kelly Green
Stationery Designer | Hayley Dodds
THE dress shop | Love me do brides
Bridesmaid dresses |Online store - Fairytale dresses Ltd
The flowers | Blomster Designs
Hair & Make up | Jenny Spelling – jenniferannspelling@hotmail.com
Caterers | Champion Caterers
Suit Hire | Dappers
Just gorgeous. And the decorated wedding car was so much fun… Love it!
Thanks so so much to Michelle and Ian for sharing their wedding story with us here at WWW XOXO Lou