Kristy & David

Choosing orange as the accent colour for your big day is a bold move - but it has seriously paid off at Kristy and David's rustic, love filled barn wedding. The gorgeous tone adds pop of colour to the more muted, natural surroundings and also works beautifully with the soft golden light in the barn. Not to mention the gorgeous bridesmaids who are looking utterly ravishing in a 70s-esque orange floral print. Kristy writes really honestly about planning a wedding, so make sure you take the time to read her words of advice. The atmospheric images are by From The Smiths Photography. The couple portraits are just so dreamy I couldn't chose which ones to include, so I've just added them all :) Enjoy!

Our Wedding Weekend

Kristy The Bride: Dave and I shared the same vision for our wedding and that was to have all of our friends and family together for a big, fun, laidback shindig. It didn't take many viewings before we stumbled upon and booked Northside Farm. It fit the bill perfectly! The venue gave us freedom to make our own decisions, so we could plan a personal wedding rather than the prescriptive, ticky box affairs that were offered by others. The barn itself was stunning with lots of natural light, original features and weather permitting, an uninterrupted sunrise and sunset over the rolling fields of Northumberland. It came with a campsite and 10 glamping pods making it affordable and fun for our friends travelling from all over the world. This totally added to the festival vibe we were after, and what's more, we got the whole place for the entire weekend. Although a wedding weekender takes a lot of extra planning, it was so worth it and can't recommend it highly enough. Our friends and family were incredible and we couldn't have done it without their help. We had a pre wedding campsite booze up on the Friday night, the actual wedding took place on the Saturday where we partied till the sun came up, followed by a BBQ and games on the Sunday. The weekend finished around a campfire with our nearest and dearest. Bliss!

The Ceremony

I'll admit, while planning the wedding the content of the ceremony got put on the backburner when in all reality, this should be the priority. We were very lucky that our registrars were accommodating with our last minute changes and the ceremony ended up being just perfect. We wrote our own very personal vows, which I would encourage everyone to do. The music was also a major factor. I walked down the aisle to I Giorni by Ludovico Einaudi as it was a very special piece of music to both of us and wow (!), we will forever get tingles when we hear it. We were blessed with my amazingly talented bridesmate (I didn't like the idea of maids), Saskia Brynne singing while we signed the register. The readings were also very personal based on favourite books of ours. These personal touches had our guests laughing and crying as the whole ceremony reflected our personalities. We wouldn't have changed a single thing.

The Bride

Like most, I had whimsical dreams of wedding dress shopping but reality didn't quite live up to it. In fact, I found the whole process pretty stressful and uncomfortable. There's so much pressure on finding ‘THE dress’ and I was clueless. After a lot of searching and practically giving up, my Mam booked an appointment at The Wedding Dress Company, Corbridge. Sarah there encouraged me to try on a dress which, on paper, was so far from what I thought I wanted - it was strapless!!! As soon as I put it on I instantly felt lighter. This was it. It was all about the unique lace. I wore a Stella York dress. My advice, be open minded and remember, it’s just a dress. One thing I was sure on was that I wanted was an unusual headpiece. I came across Jannie Baltzer and could have picked anyone of her stunning handmade creations. I went for the Josefine. Beautiful! Through the day I wore shoes by Jenny Peckham. They were the first I tried on. A vintage style and so comfortable - tick, tick! Dave bought me a pair of gold Superga trainers for the night, and thankfully, because as expected, the dancing carried on into the early hours.

The Beauty

The amazingly talented and lovely, Mary Weatherley did my makeup along with the bridesmate’s and Mam. She did exactly what I asked - as natural as possible. My amazing friend, Erin did our hair, with some last minute help from Mary (lifesaver!). An absolute delight to have lovely people around during morning preparations.

The Groom

David The Groom: I am much more of a joggers and hoodie type guy than dressing up to the nines so I wasn't quite sure where/what to look for when I started. I wanted something a bit different but at the same time was very conscious that a tweed waistcoat and bow tie may make me end up looking like a hipster waiter from a fancy bar. I eventually came across a local store called Master Debonair and it had a quirky and reasonably priced selection of suits. Despite some being a little too Connor McGregor for my taste, I managed to find one that was just perfect, a brown 3 piece. I went with a white shirt, blue M&S tie and dark brown brogues. Finishing off the look, my Dad dug out my Great-Grandad's rose gold pocket watch. Master Debonair also provided us with awesome blue suits and waistcoats for the Dads, super sharp. To save some cash we just asked the groomsmen to wear their own blue suit and black shoes and we provided them with braces and orange ties to match the bridesmates.

The Wedding Party

These dresses were the part that took the most time finding. My criteria was colour, unusual, affordable but most importantly something that each of them loved. Although very lovely, I didn't want the sweet romantic colour palette. Orange and green are my favourite colours but gained a few unsure looks when I mentioned them. When I found the dress on ASOS. I fell in love with it immediately and luckily the girls did too. And so reasonably priced as well. They looked absolutely amazing on the day and photographed so well. Bridesmates chose their own shoes for comfort and style.

The Food

We both love our grub and really wanted to serve the kind of food we love to eat. Nothing pretentious and full of flavour. Although Northside gave us flexibility we decided to go with resident caterers, Jackson's. We sampled some of their food at an open event and loved it all. To match the informal feel we opted for sharing plates in a Lebanese/North African style and it went down a treat. As we had quite a large wedding, we had to be savvy with certain aspects. Friends and family made a wonderful array of traybakes for dessert, we opted for personalised giant pork pies from Wilson's Butchers to supplement canapes and topped it off with the most amazing 3 tier wedding cake made by my incredible cousin, Rachel (rachel.james_85@yahoo.co.uk). She always makes the most incredible cakes for family occasions and is in the early stages of starting her own cake making business, so we were delighted when she offered to make ours. Stunning and so, so delicious!!! For evening guests, Jackson's put on paella, which was also a hit the next day at the BBQ. We sourced a variety of beautiful cheeses through our friends at The Feathers Inn, Hedley-on-the-Hill to create our own tiered cheesecake. Needless to say nobody went hungry.



The Styling


So, there's no denying that flowers make everything look amazingly beautiful but they also come at a price. We were incredibly fortunate to have Jyll from Flora at The Feathers (info@thefeathers.net) as my bridesmate's Mother. She is so creative and turned the barn into a magical garden with trees and foliage from local woods, flowers from the local flower market and twinkly lights. It quite simply took our breath away! Jyll also decorated our tables with flowers, beer bottles Dave and I had sprayed, geometric candle holders and photo framed table names. I have to mention Dave's brother, Adam who designed and made our table names and table plan. Both were made out of wood, then laser cut with the names and images of mountains we've climbed. The table plan is now framed and hanging up in our home - a very cool keepsake. 



The Flowers


My bouquet was awesome! Honestly, if I could carry it for the rest of my life, I would! Nicola from Secret Garden Flowers, Heaton made all bouquets, buttonholes and corsages. She is amazing!!! The pops of colour with the crisp white and greens together with pheasant feathers...ah, I just adored them all. We also used the bouquets to decorate the top table to keep costs down. Plus, they looked beautiful.

The Photography

After much searching we came across From The Smiths Photography. Their portfolio was a style we'd been searching for, so we immediately got in touch and arranged a time to meet them. From the off Sarah-Jane and Simon were both so friendly we decided to book them there and then. The big selling point for me was that you get two!!! Sarah-Jane spent the morning with me, and Simon with Dave. Perfect! They made us both feel at complete ease in what is a quite a bizarre situation. In fact, one of our favourite parts of the day was escaping off to into the woods and fields to capture the couple shots. The photographs are stunning and tell a beautiful story of the day. We cannot thank them enough.

The 

Entertainment


'This is the most fun I have ever had on a dance floor' as put by one of our mates as he was raving to The Prodigy. The band C-Collective played tune after tune in a superb 2 sets. This ranged from Reggae and Ska right through to heavy hitting dance tunes. The dance floor never stopped and finished with Dave, the father of the bride achieving his lifelong dream of crowd surfing! Can't recommend these guys highly enough, and to top it off they are also some of the nicest, most accommodating guys you will meet.

The 

Videography


Daniel Patrick Vaughan from Digitalfire is a friend and is also mega talented, so this one was an easy choice. After seeing some of his work online, we were sold. Super professional and a top guy, he had lots of good ideas and suggestions but let us take control of everything. We know it is an additional cost on top of everything else but we are so pleased we went with Dan, as sitting down to watch it with a glass of wine after a tough day at work is priceless and something we can show our children one day.