Katie & Thomas
Photography
Katie the Bride: We had the amazing Lee Robbins take the photography for our big day. I actually found Lee whilst gathering inspiration via Rock my wedding, I also had a colleague who had Lee for her wedding and so knew he came highly recommended! Lee was everything we wanted, relaxed and inconspicuous, resulting in ‘in the moment’ photography, capturing the very treasured moments throughout the day. My absolute favourite was the shot he captured our flower girls seeing me in my dress for the very first time! We have had so many favourites back from Lee that I think we may have to put them all in rotation around our house!
Videography
A lot of my married friends had told me that having a videographer is a must for any big day. I also quite liked the idea of feeling famous for the day too and so it was an absolute no brainer to invest in this keepsake!
We had both Lee and Dawn from Shutterbox films with us for the full day of the wedding. We decide on two videographers to ensure we captured both myself and Tom, separately, in the build-up to the church, and this duo didn’t disappoint! The footage they captured was magic, especially with the use of 3 super 8 films woven in with digital, it really portrayed the 70’s aesthetic we were aiming to achieve. We chose 6 of our favourite songs to be used in the audio of the film which made it so much more than just an edit film of highlights, I get goosebumps every time I watch it!
Brides Gown
I was on the lookout for a traditional dress with a ’70s, boho twist. I visited a few dress shops that I had been recommended and they were far too conventional and didn’t suit me. I then visited the amazing ‘Morgan Davies’ in EC1V, London, which have a vast range of styles and designers and found Jesus Peiro. I tried on around 5 of their dresses but knew I had found the one when I tried on the very last in my pile! My dress was usually made with the lace around the bust, neck and arms in pink, along with a full petticoat for under the skirt, but I had this made in all white and didn’t wear the full petticoat to make it more relaxed and sheer.
Jewellery
I’m not one for big pieces of jewellery and knew I wanted to wear a big headpiece as my main accessory statement so my jewellery was very simple. I wore a gold chain with my initials, that one of my bridesmaids had bought me the morning of the wedding, along with a gold signet that Tom had made at the same place our wedding bands were made in Hatton Garden, Max Gardens.
Shoes
My shoes were from Miu Miu similar here with encrusted crystals and pearls on the heel. I knew I wanted something fun and actually comfortable - these platforms were perfect!
Veil/Headpiece
My veil was from Morgan Davies, and was plain white with 3 tiers. I then had an oversized real flower headpiece that was made up by the guys at Farm Flowers at the Farmhouse using our cream wedding flowers with ferns and greenery. I swapped into this when the guests were being kept busy with drinks at the reception after church.
Florist
All of our flowers were provided by Farm flowers: Soho Farm House
Venue
Soho Farmhouse, Oxfordshire. We had the Barwell Barn and Haybarn for the wedding day celebrations as well as the farmhouse for the weekend bbq party along with the yurts for guests to stay in.
Decor/styling
The events team at the farmhouse were amazingly helpful at supporting our vision for the deco and set up for the big day. I also had a friend overseeing art direction for the set- up the day before making sure it was exactly as we wanted! We wanted the wedding to ooze colour and fun and what better way to achieve this than with balloons! Tom and I went balloon crazy and bought huge orb balloons in a variety of colours to use in bunches all around the venue. We had a photo booth made up of lots of white balloons and streamers, using the farm's heritage style furniture to define the area. The kids also made use of the balloons throughout the day too! Flowers and greenery were used to wrap and creep around rustic candelabras on circular tables with wagon cartwheels covered in ferns and greenery hung from the ceiling of the barns
Cake Maker
A new independent café had opened near where we lived and a friend recommended we try it out for lunch. We got talking to the owner who then offered to make our cake for us! We had the lovely Lia from Mae and Harvey in Bethnal Green make our beautiful 4 tired, multi-flavoured naked cake. Tom and I both have a sweet tooth and so both wanted our favourites. We landed on chocolate, lemon, carrot and Victoria sponge all layered on top of each other, decorated with edible flowers and fruit.
<h4CatererThis was looked after by the farmhouse head chef. We invited 4 of our friends to help create our ideal menu, it didn’t disappoint!
Bridesmaids Dresses
Two of my bridesmaids live in New York and so I knew I needed something that I could send easily for them to try. After a few misses, I actually found their navy blue, wrap around, bell-sleeved maxi dresses from Asos! (asos.com). Our pretty flower girl dresses were from Monsoon
Groom/Groomsmen
Tom wanted something relaxed but fun for him and his groomsmen. The guys wore their own navy suits (a couple ended up in brown!) and Tom bought them all shirts which had their personal initials embroidered on.
I actually ended up going with Tom to help him decide on his suit and we couldn’t decide between two completely different styles…. so he ended up with both and had a suit change half way through the day! He started in a traditional navy 3 piece and then changed into a grass green, double-breasted 2 piece suit for dinner and dancing! I couldn’t believe he had wangled an outfit change and I hadn’t! Both of Tom’s suits were from Beggars Run in Shoreditch, London.
Wedding Planner
I was lucky enough to have the very talented head of events at the farm look after the logistics of the day for us. Not only did we have her support on the day but she was on hand the whole way through the planning. She went above and beyond to make sure the day was seamless and ensure we were looked after for the whole weekend.
Stationery
Tom and I designed our wedding invites and save the dates as we had quite a particular style in mind. We got our paper from GFSmith and kept it clean and simple with hand-picked typography.
All of our menus, the order of service, wedding signs and favours were created by our amazingly talented friend Ashley, who owns Pale Press London. We had chalkboard signs, velum covered order of services and tambourines that had her signature hand calligraphy on for our personalised favours! The tambourines were a hit when Tom and I entered the evening dinner to ‘Return of the Mac, we got through the whole song before sitting down to eat!
Entertainment
Music was an important thing for us and so we didn’t go for a wedding band but stuck to having a DJ from 3 pm in the afternoon. We had ‘The Wedding Smashers’, mainly because one of our friends is the DJ and we knew that she would 100% get our music taste. They were brilliant at making sure that we had all of the tunes that we wanted to be played throughout the daytime drinks, dinner and the evening party. With such a diverse taste and audience to please, we made sure we played everything from 60’s rock and roll to a 90’s garage session in the evening. Our tip here would be to get all of your guests to give 3 of their favourite floor fillers as part of their RSVP.
Transport
Luckily my uncle has his own fleet of wedding cars and he was kind enough to revamp his white Morris Minor for our big day! We decorated it with a bunch of balloons and prayed for good weather! Luckily the sun stayed shining so we could have the roof down for the trip to and from the church, the flowers girls loved it! Our guests all travelled on an old fashioned double decker green bus from Nostalgia travel.
