Kat & Graham

We've got an absolutely stunning outdoor wedding for you this afternoon, set in the beautiful grounds of Errol Park in Scotland and captured by Rock My Wedding faves Tub of Jelly in their dreamy, sultry style. My absolute favourite portrait has to be the one of our gorgeous Bride in her exquisite Tuberose Jenny Packham embellished gown, holding her delicate pink bouquet in the picturesque gardens surrounded by fallen blossom. Such a magical moment. Infact I adore all the subtle pink hints. The spray roses in Kat's hair, the handpicked wild flowers at the converted barn reception and those beaut. Mango bridesmaid dresses. With so many more beautiful details and inspiring ideas to marvel at; come see....

The Dress

Kat The Bride: I never saw myself in a traditional wedding dress with a veil, after looking on blogs and Pinterest I kept finding myself looking at the same style of dress which always happened to be a Jenny Packham, which I never dreamed of getting. I tried a few other styles but I just didn't suit them. On the first day of trying on dresses I was lucky enough to try on the Tuberose dress I fell in love with it and bought that day. My amazing bridesmaids bought me a lovely bracelet from Oliver Bonas as my 'something new' which went perfectly with the dress. As there was so much detail in the dress is was the only jewellery I needed. I struggled to find shoes that I liked that didn't cost the earth, but after months of searching found a pair of No1 Jenny Packham shoes from Debenhams. I loved the detail on them and how well they went with the dress.

The Grooms Attire

Graham always had a clear idea of the style of suit he wanted to wear on the day, a modern, slim fitting 3 piece suit with some subtle detail to the fabric. As soon as we went into Reiss, he saw the right one straight away. The trousers needed slightly taken in but everything else fitted perfectly off the hanger. The tie came from ASOS, was a real bargain and fitted perfectly with the pastel colour scheme. For his shoes he bought a pair of deep burgundy brogues from Topman that finished off his suit perfectly.

The Venue

We live in Edinburgh and tried to find a venue that suited the style of wedding that we wanted in the city but really struggled to get what we wanted for the budget we had. We decided to look further afield where we found Errol Park. We were in awe of Errol Park when we first saw it, we visited on a cold and rainy winter day but the grounds still looked absolutely beautiful. I always dreamed of getting married outside but never thought it would be an option in Scotland, luckily we had a very warm day for our wedding and were able to have our ceremony and drink reception outside in the garden. We also loved the converted stables, which we were allowed to decorate in any way we wanted to really put our own personality into the venue. This and the contrast between the grandness of the grounds and the house with the rustic charm of the converted stables is what really sold it for us.

Colour Scheme/Decor

We didn't really follow a colour scheme, I am not good at matching and quite like a bit of variety. I didn't want anything too bright so went for pastels with the bridesmaids dresses, ties and flowers. We brought some colour to the tables with our favours which were jars of home made jam and with the table settings which were made with different colours of patterned paper. We wanted lots and lots of lights, almost too many, so hired festoon lights for the day. These along with the fairy lights already at the venue, provided a canopy of lights in the stables which gave quite a large venue a more intimate feeling. For our table names we chose places that we loved and created a Polaroid style photo for each table which matched the same photo on the seating chart. We tried to sit guests at tables with a location that meant something to them as well as us. My dad drew us a fingerprint tree which was beside the guest book, we loved the idea of having something that we could hang in our house to remind of us our day and all the people who made it so special.

Florist

Linzi from Jack Fleuriste was amazing, from seeing what she had done before I had no doubt that our flowers would be perfect and was proven right when the bouquets arrived on the morning of the wedding. I have never seen peonies that big before! They were exactly what I had wanted. Having a ceremony outside in a beautiful garden didn't require too much decoration, but we had some jars of flowers on the end of every second pew which were subtle enough not to take away from the surroundings. When I walked into the reception venue before the guests I just smiled, Linzi had arranged everything perfectly which made the venue look so beautiful. We wanted a variety of flowers that looked like they had just been picked and placed in a jar (which is obviously easier said than done!). I loved the idea of having jars of various sizes dotted around the place with different flowers in each. It looked relaxed and informal, exactly what we had wanted.

The Wedding Party Fashion

For the bridesmaids we unsuccessfully tried lots of dresses in store and really struggled to find one dress to suit three people. I saw a dress I loved on Mango online but just couldn't get it as it kept going out of stock before I could get to checkout! After days of trying eventually they came back into stock and I could get them and luckily the bridesmaids also liked the dress. I loved the shape and style of them and thought that my bridesmaids looked incredible. Anj, my chief bridesmaid, was amazing and did all the alterations for us so that the dresses fit perfectly. The groomsmen were in 2 piece navy suits from Charles Tyrwhitt with the same ASOS tie as Graham was wearing. The suits went very well with Graham's suit but allowed Graham to stand out as the groom.

Ceremony

We had a humanist ceremony as neither of us are religious. This allowed us to have a really personal service with Neil, our humanist, sharing the story of how we met and how we got engaged. He spent a lot of time with us, listening and generally getting to know us. We feel this really helped set the relaxed, informal and fun atmosphere we were looking for on the day. Two of my close friends did the readings which were Love is Temporary Madness from Captain Corelli's Mandolin and I Carry Your Heart with Me by E.E Cummings. We did think we were being quite original with these but after reading a few blogs realised that they are quite popular readings! It didn't matter to us as we thought that they described exactly how we feel about each other. We also decided to write our own vows which allowed us to make our own promises to each other which we will take with us as we live our lives together.

Entertainment

During the drinks reception we had a Motown and soul playlist playing as people mingled on the lawn. For the evening entertainment we originally wanted a band we found playing in a hotel in Glasgow and fell in love with to play. Unfortunately, they split up before we could book them. As a surprise Graham had arranged for Bronagh, the lead singer from the band, to sing our first dance for us. It was the most amazing surprise. We found an excellent DJ, called Jim Moore to provide the evening entertainment, he kept the dance floor busy!

Food

My stepsister Emily made our cake and it looked and tasted amazing. She made a cake of two layers, one lemon and one victoria sponge. We used a local company called Gourlay to do the catering. We wanted to create a relaxed and informal atmosphere at dinner so opted for a grazing platter of cold and cured meats with local bread to start with and then a plated hog roast with summer vegetables for main. For dessert we had a white chocolate and raspberry cheesecake.

Photographer & Videographer

Our photographer was Tub of Jelly, the style of photography was exactly what we wanted. When we were researching photographers we spent hours on the Tub of Jelly website looking at all of the blog posts and knew that we had to have them for our day. Betty and David were amazing on the day. As a couple who are terrified by the thought of getting our photo taken they made us feel so relaxed and comfortable. Betty understood exactly what we wanted and since seeing the photographs we couldn't be happier with the decision we made. They were able to capture so many moments without us noticing in the most beautiful way.

Advice

Wedding planning is really fun but it is easy to get overwhelmed by all of the little things you have to do. I found that by writing separate to do lists for each part of the wedding can really help to keep you on track and let's you know that perhaps you don't have as much to do as you thought you did. Doing things yourself is quite time consuming but really is worth it on the day. Pinterest and wedding blogs like Rock My Wedding are such fantastic resources when looking for ideas. Even if you don't want to copy an idea from someone else you can find inspiration in something somebody has done before and develop it into something that would suit your day.