So if you caught {Part 1} of today’s wedding earlier today I am pretty sure you will have been mesmerised by the gorgeously decadent midnight blue flowers and bridesmaids dresses, the brides stunning lace dress and bolero jacket, not to mention the Groom Lee’s dapper military uniform.
There is so much to inspire you fro this wedding and I’m so excited to show you this image of Amy and Lee’s trip into Narnia, an absolutely stunning area of the venue Samlesbury Hall dresses with trees and fairy lights to create a magical fantasy land.
Amy tells us more about her perfect day…..
“On a work trip to London I found some commemorative postcards, from the royal wedding, in paperchase and thought that they would go well with our colour scheme and the military feel so I bought them all and our stationary designer (Catherine Alton) was happy to use them to back our table numbers.
After the ceremony our guests moved into the parlour for the reception, we didn’t have flowers in this room instead the venue had put up a Christmas tree and covered the window ledges with church candles. To add to the wintry/Christmas feel my nana took clippings of holly and ivy from her garden gave them to Angela (Samlesbury Hall wedding coordinator) who placed them around the parlour room between the candles, the clipping and the candles all went really well with our choice of flowers and the time of year and didn’t cost a thing!!
I wasn’t really bothered about having favours but my mum loves to make things and is very creative and so she offered to make the favour boxes. I’m so glad she did as they were beautiful and matched perfectly with our stationary. She bought the boxes, ribbon and diamante buckles off the internet and patiently handmade each and everyone. When I saw them finished I couldn’t believe how perfectly they matched everything and I was so glad she had taken the time to make them.
My mum and I loved planning the wedding together, I had a clear idea of what I wanted and my mum has an eye for details so together we made a great team. I honestly enjoyed every aspect of planning my wedding but most of all I loved going to wedding fairs, in particular the vintage wedding fair in Harrogate. I got loads of ideas from seeing the stalls set up; people that are in the wedding business are so creative I took my inspiration from their ideas.
Having the Guard of honour was really special, not many of our guests had ever been to a military wedding and it is very impressive. As I walked into the ceremony room theirs were the first faces I saw smiling back at me which made me smile. After we were married and we were walking down the isle they did a salute and we walked underneath their swords, the photos were fantastic and it was a really proud moment for each of them.
My Dad’s speech was unexpected and hilarious; although he is a very confident person I didn’t expect him to sing his speech! He sang his speech to the tune of kay sera sera and luckily everyone joined in at the chorus. Lee and I laughed the whole way through and it was all our guests talked about for the rest of the night. He had managed to set the scene for the rest of the evening as everyone was laughing and joking together late into the night.
Looking back now I think the two things that impressed me the most on the day were our Flowers and our photographer, Charlotte Boothman at LottieDesigns. The flowers used were absolutely perfect for the style of our wedding and the way the ceremony/reception hall was decorated was even better than I had imagined. Jane and the team at Flowerdesign are so creative and the decorations and bouquets were beautiful, they even snuck a little bit of mistletoe in my bouquet as a surprise.
There was so much to see and take in on the day; I didn’t want to miss a thing. But we with 102 guests there were a lot of people to speak to and thank so it was difficult to take the time to take it all in. I needn’t have worried as lottie captured every precious moment through her photos, all the detail of the venue, flowers and dresses to every smile and tear on our faces. As we look back through the hundreds of photos she took we can remember the day exactly, her photos are like a story book from getting ready with my mum and bridesmaids in the morning, dancing around with a glass of champagne in my pj’s to some very tipsy looking faces on the dance floor at the end.
My advice to other couples would be to try to incorporate as much of your personalities into your wedding as you can, Lee served in the Army for 10 years and we wanted this to be part of our day, our wedding was his last day in uniform and it was the perfect end to his army career.
Also think about the entertainment, we wanted to keep it light hearted as our families and friends love to have a laugh and sing and dance. So from the pianist to the DJ and the ghost stories to the speeches, there was plenty going on for all ages and the party flowed from day to night without any awkward quiet periods.
Utilise your friends talents, my friend is a hair dresser, Emma-Louise owner of Head Turners – Blackburn, Lancashire, she knew the type of look I was wanting for myself and my bridesmaids and she designed the hairstyles for our special day. One of my bridesmaids, Paula Turner – Lush Nails Blackburn Lancashire, is a nail artist and she did my nails, toes, eyebrows and lashes and sourced a make-up artist for myself and my bridesmaids. Very useful wedding gifts!
Music has always been important to me and Lee, we have been to many different gigs and festivals together so when we were looking for a DJ we wanted to be able to discuss the types of music we like and have some input in the play list. When we found Dancefloor couture we knew they were the right company for our wedding. We sat down with one of their representatives and he talked us through our wedding account, we had the ability to login online and list our favourite songs and artists, and more importantly highlight the music we don’t like, to make sure the music that means something to us and our friends and family is included on the play list. The system worked well as the dance floor was full from the moment the DJ started till the very end.
I wasn’t keen on favours at first, they seemed very costly and I couldn’t think of anything special to give our guests as a memento. Military tradition (or so I’m told) is to make a toast with a glass of port, so our first idea was to give each guest a miniature bottle of port. This would have been very costly and so we finally decided to give charity pin badges as our favours. The men were given help for hero pins and the ladies were given breast cancer awareness pins. I liked the idea that by giving our guest a gift we were also donating to charity and so we chose the two charities closest to our hearts.
Thank-you so much to the ever wonderful Lottie Designs for sending me these stunning images and a huge congratulations to Amy and Lee, I wish you many years of happiness together, thank-you for sharing your love story with us today.
Michelle xx
ALL THE DETAILS
- Photographer – Lottie Designs, Lancashire
- Venue – Samlesbury Hall in Preston, Lancashire.
- Bridal Dress – Forever Yours from The Bridal Room in Castleford, the dress was originally a strapless dress; the alterations were made by Tie the Knot in Blackburn, Lancashire. The lace bolero jacket I wore was also by Forever Yours, it originally had long bell sleeves which I had altered into short cap sleeves by Wendy at Tie the Knot.
- Bridal Shoes – Rainbow Couture from Dan Kerr bridal shop in Blackburn, Lancashire. I also bought some wedding wellies from weddingtonboots.com, in case it was bad weather.
- Bridal Jewellery – Earrings Cath Kidston, Bracelet Monsoon. Headband by Swarovski from PJ Harley’s in Preston, Lancashire and the pearl and diamante pins in the back of my hair were from Tie the Knot bridal shop in Blackburn, Lancashire.
- Grooms Uniform – Lee rented his number one’s military dress from Hamilton’s textiles Taylor’s – Camberley, Surrey.
- Bridesmaid outfits – Dresses were by Dessy in midnight blue from Orchid Design in Clitheroe, Lancashire. Their metallic grey and diamante sandals were by Debut at Debenhams and their silver and pearl earrings were from Avon.
- Stationery – The wedding stationery was by Catherine Alton at Sapphire Stationery, she designed our seating plan, invitations, menu’s, name plates and wedding card post box, the frame used for the seating plan was taken from a mirror I bought from The Range. The favour boxes were designed and created by my mum with materials she sourced from the internet and our guest book was a gift from my nana which she had made by www.notonthehighstreet.com. The table numbers were backed on union jack heart postcards which I found in Paperchase.
- Floral designer – Our flowers were by Flower Design in Blackpool, Jane and the team used many different flowers, herbs and foliage in our arrangements which gave off a beautiful sent of lavender, eucalyptus, thyme and rosemary. This was then complimented by the smell of pine needles from the Christmas Trees in both entrance halls which were supplied by Samlesbury Hall. Flower Design used hurricane lamps, candelabras, mirrors and a number of unique cut crystal ornaments and glasses to dress the ceremony and reception rooms to give the whole wedding an authentic vintage feel. We also rented the steel lanterns from them which framed the doors of the main entrance. They also came to Lee’s rescue with ribbons for his car, as a mini enthusiast Lee wanted to incorporate our Mini Cooper as a wedding car. He dressed the car with ribbons and one of his Honour Guard drove him to the venue ready for pictures outside, unfortunately the ribbons flew off on the drive over but Flower Design team were at hand with every colour of ribbon available to dress the car in our wedding colours.
- Venue stylist/wedding planner – I didn’t have a wedding planner, but Samlesbury Hall does have a wedding coordinator, who was really helpful. She recommended a number of useful suppliers and was able to accommodated all of our wedding day requests along with a few special touches of her own; Angela dressed the ceremony room in fairy lights which perfectly added to the wintry feel of the day, she also lined the outside walk way with tea lights in jam jars to guide the evening guests to the entrance. Our Chair covers and sashes were by Carol Temby at In-style venues. As the weather was so bad, we were also give access to have photo’s taken in Narnia. The room was dressed for children by Samlesbury for Christmas. Magical!
- Entertainment/music – Our DJ for the evening party was from Dancefloor Couture in Preston, Lancashire. During the day we had a pianist, Simon McClure, who played beautifully throughout the ceremony and wedding breakfast.
- We also had a Master of Ceremonies, Howard Rudge, who coordinated the flow of the day to ensure every last detail was in order and everything went to plan. Prior to the wedding breakfast he also gave our guests an insight into the history of Samlesbury Hall and the people who had visited over its 800 years, after the wedding breakfast he took a number of guests into the parlour to tell them about the ghosts of Samlesbury Hall which was a huge hit with the children.
- Menu – Samlesbury Hall have their own chefs who prepared our menu. We chose three types of canapés for the reception; chicken satay skewers, mini Moroccan kebabs and sun blushed tomatoes on a crisp base with pesto drizzle, the reception drink was winter pimms which is served warm. For the wedding breakfast we had tomato, basil and split pea soup to start, tender loin of beef with red wine jus and fondant potatoes for the main and sticky toffee pudding with ice-cream, raspberries and butterscotch sauce for dessert with sparking wine for the toast. The evening buffet was a selection of bacon and sausage sandwiches, chunky chip cones along with our wedding cake served as dessert.
- Cake – Our wedding cake was designed and created by Emily-Jane Moore from Preston, Lancashire. The cake was a mixture of chocolate fudge cake and lemon drizzle cake.
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