Lizzie & Tom

The setting for this incredibly gorgeous country wedding is non other than our fabulous front page sponsors and List members Launcells Barton, and oh my it is going to take your breath away. Every moment and detail captured by McGivern Photography is incredible. You can feel the love bouncing off the page, especially during the magical sunset portraits. With fabulous DIY projects adding to the elegant rustic vibe, including the amazing wooden sign put together by the bride & groom, and sentimental gestures of tribal shawls from the Brides Mum to pay tribute to the brides heritage. After you've finished swooning over this inspiring day and you realise you love Launcells Barton as much as we do, you'll be pleased to know they have an open day at the end of January. Why not pop along, we promise you won't regret it. Now lets take a look...

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The Venue

Lizzie the Bride: There were several ups and downs planning our wedding, we initially planned to get married in Tarifa, Spain - somewhere we have been to a few times and loved where Tom can Kitesurf and I go running. However, planning a wedding there was so different to holidaying there and when we returned we didn't get the right vibe. But we eventually found a venue/Villa we were really happy with. However, after returning to Australia they pulled out as cancelled doing weddings altogether. We took it as a sign to change plans and country completely. We then decided we wanted to get married in Aus!...We love it here!! And friends and family were so keen to come too, but then my some salient family members couldn’t come so we started planning in the UK, third time lucky! So we were getting a bit over wedding planning third time round, getting quite stressed about it all! I was also panicking a bit as it was getting late in terms of venue booking for when we wanted it. We really wanted to stick to a coastal wedding with our love for Aus in mind, so I scoured the internet for UK coastal wedding venues, more specifically in Cornwall nearer to where Toms family and my family are based. We found a few potential venues including Launcells Barton which I instantly loved. The only issue was it was still in the process of renovations, which had only just begun. It was a risk as when I saw it there was so much work to be done still. But I saw the potential as it literally offered everything: gorgeous big manor house to stay with friends or family; a rustic barn to host the reception; near the coast for a coastal vibe and activities; and a church right next door for the ceremony. Although a little nervous as we felt like there was a big black cloud over our heads with our wedding planning track record, and a bit worried renovations may not finish in time, we knew how hard they were working and everything turned out perfectly, more than perfect, completely better than any expectations. ☺

Colour Scheme/Décor

Elegant Boheme. My love for things rustic, homemade and colourful, juxtaposed to things simple, classy and chic. I love it! I think my dress helps set the tone - it's effortlessly elegant. Light and relaxed but still elegant and classy. I love the contrast with my bohemian colourful bridal bouquet.

Florist

Our florist was Bleujen Florists in Bud who created blooms with eucalyptus greens, dark grees, peachy, dusky purples, and blush pink created in seasonal bohemian flowers including my favourite – dusky pinky/purple proteas. An Aussie influence. We used the same flowers in loose stems in jam jars, Beer and wine bottles for the centre pieces, on wooden flats. My bridesmaids helped arrange, and sprinkled with small dried rose buds. I loved the rustic colourful finish.

Stationery

All stationery was homemade by myself with Toms help, using craft paper throughout. For invites, orders of service, favour labels and table names.
 Toms twin sisters helped make our name places from pebbles from the beach wrapped with twine and written with silver pen.

Decor & Details

Our table names were beaches we had been to together. The table name board was made from a map which we framed with craft paper and string pointing to the different beaches Tom and his dad took charge of wooden features and built a large sign post pointing to the tables, other smaller signs, our initials as large props, and table centre piece bases. We framed a little map of South America and pegged activities we wanted to do on our honeymoon onto string over it. We asked people to donate money towards our honeymoon as our wedding gift and to peg an activity of their choice to their card so we could say that was from them. This was Toms idea!

The Wedding Party Fashion

The bridesmaid wore dusky pale pink full length gowns with gold neck detail from Mango Outlet at bargain price of £25! And was also a flattering style for everyone. I also bought everyone a pyjama playsuits from Marks and Spencer as a thank-you gift. The girls also had mixed colour clutch bags from Katie Loxton.
 Tear drop fire opal earrings from Beadin' Nora on notonthehighstreet.

Ceremony

My bridesmaids Kal played the piano beautifully during our ceremony - Clair de lune by Claude Debussey as I walked down the isle; Yann Tiersen - Comptine d`un autre ete from Amelie as we signed the register with my little 2 year old nephew Rowan as page boy who walked down the isle perfectly. Sister in Law and friend sally were flower ‘girls. Sister in law Chloe made all the confetti packages. My brother Paul read a bible reading and Toms Sister Marie read – He’s not perfect by Bob Marly. Both read beatufully. Our other brother and sister Si and Lindsay witnessed the signing of the register. Our friend Jen also sang my favourite song amazingly after the registration -first day of my life by bright eyes.

Entertainment

V.I.B.E. were a funk and soul band in who we danced to in the evening from Bands for hire. Our first dance was King and Cross by Asgier which really reminds us of our road trips around Aus as we would always listen to the same albums over and over on the long car journeys.

Food


We used Beautiful and the Feast who were absolutely delicious and have an amazing ethos, sharing foods. Everyone stated how it was the best food they had ever had at a wedding. We still reminisce about it now! We had towers of different flavour brownies for dessert (chocolate, hazelnut, peanut butter) with fruit and cream also from Beautiful and the Feast. My lifelong best friend and bridesmaid Lily made our beautiful and delicious 4 tier wedding cake covered in fruit and gold dust. It looked and tasted amazing!! Toms mum made delicious vanilla fudge for our favours, which we packaged in cellophane, tied with twine, and labelled with a homemade craft paper tags. We also had a pimp your proscecco stand my brother Si and his partner Becky made which went down amazingly. And we mustn’t forget our GIN BAR! We LOVE gin. We had a bar with a few different types of specialised gins and different ways to have them with tonic. Our friends who also share our love for Gin thought it was awesome.

Photographer

Our photographer Oliver McGivern was also such a legend, he was a friend of Toms known from Uni and so fun and easy to be around. He created such memorable and stunning shots of the day recording it perfectly.

Favourite moment / memory from the day

One unexpected highlight was being taken by tractor to a field with Tom by our photographer and venue owner to get Sunset shots. Little did I realise how special the moment would be, we got to watch the sun setting from a field over the sea together on our wedding day. It was incredible. 

Another great surprise was a video that one of my bridemaids Karolina and her husband Francois had created to watch after the speeches. It was a funny video of my 2 year nephew Rowan saying funny things about both of us with a montage, which made everyone have a giggle. He was by far the real star of the day! 
My mum is from a state in North East India called Nagaland, and is in a tribe called the Kuki tribe. (Not many have heard of it so I wouldn't expect you to!) They have many tribal shawls which my mum gave to the bridesmaids and a kind gesture, and ties to the groomsmen which they all loved. Tom also got given a shawl plus a tribal name for joining the family - Thongkohlein. Essentially he was named after a ‘namesake’ which my mother chose to be her brother who has passed away. It was very emotional and touching. 
Unfortunately my family from Nagaland couldn't attend, but were certainly there in spirit. My cousins sent us gifts, and one cousin Abi in Nagaland bakes cakes, and had made us one for the day, she sent us a picture of the family with it and was so was beautiful.

Advice

I love how everyone contributed something and we had so much D.IY. Get as many of your friends and family involved in creating and contributing different things towards the wedding. They really want to help out somehow and it adds such a personal touch, whilst also keeping costs down!