Wednesday 22 September 2010
Wonderful Wedding Ideas
Wedding ideas can come from anywhere, and one of my secret spots for finding inspiration is design websites. Along with all the bigger items, like furniture and lamps, they also have fantastic finds, like the selection below. They're fresh from the new season's collection at Love, Loans & Linen. I'm going to be using the blackboards to label the buffet; Dig in!, Enjoy!, Yum!, the wildflower sticks as favours, and the luggage tags as placemarkers. Check out Love, Loans & Linen for more wedding ideas.
Tuesday 21 September 2010
Lush Paper
There's something gorgeous about these vintage wedding invitations. Maybe it's the baby pink, maybe it's because I love letterpress, or maybe it's the combination of the crisp card and slightly wonky letters. Either way these invites are my new favourite stationery. Paperlush by name, and I say paper lush by nature. What do you reckon?
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Giant Hairclip
Not really a wedding idea, but I simply had to feature this giant hair clip. I love it! It's hilariously large, and deliciously comic, and best of all, useful. Designed by Adia Kibur, and available online from Shopbop, they come in gold, silver and black. Sometimes bigger is better.
If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS and click here for more hair-styling ideas and accessories.
If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS and click here for more hair-styling ideas and accessories.
Monday 20 September 2010
♥ Wedding Fairs ♥
If you always get that back-to-school feeling in September, cheer yourself up with the new season of Wedding Fairs! Targeted at brides and grooms who are planning their spring and summer weddings, they're a great way to spot all the latest trends for 2011. I'll be at most of them, in particular, the National Wedding Shows, where I'll be tweeting my favourite finds. Prepare for the onslaught of ideas by following my Twitter feed here. Listed below are the details of the big events, although there will be local fairs unique to your area - just search online.
♥ On the search for a bit of advice on planning your wedding? Don't miss The National Wedding Shows. The first one is in London between 1st-3rd October at Earl's Court, and the second is at the NEC in Birmingham, between 8th-10th October. It's an absolute must for all those planning their perfect wedding - I've been several times, and it's a great day out. With over 300 wedding experts and inspirational features you're bound to feel inspired. Buy tickets early, and get a free goodie bag!
♥ On the search for a bit of advice on planning your wedding? Don't miss The National Wedding Shows. The first one is in London between 1st-3rd October at Earl's Court, and the second is at the NEC in Birmingham, between 8th-10th October. It's an absolute must for all those planning their perfect wedding - I've been several times, and it's a great day out. With over 300 wedding experts and inspirational features you're bound to feel inspired. Buy tickets early, and get a free goodie bag!
♥ If you've got a bigger budget, or just big idea, check out The Designer Wedding Show. It's held in Battersea Park in London, and offers more than 100 exhibitors of wedding gowns, accessories, cakes, stationery, entertainment, cosmetics, shoes, tiaras, hats......you get the picture! Save the 8th-10th October in your diary and book tickets here.
♥ If you love vintage weddings, then don't miss the London Vintage Wedding Fair on October 24 in Notting Hill. A huge hit last year, this year promises to be even better! Don't miss the amazing stands selling everything from antique lace and Thirties dresses to handmade shoes, jewellery and headgear. Browse over a glass of bubbly - and don't forget to pick up your goodie bag on the way out! Tickets are £7 in advance and £10 on the door.
♥ If you love vintage weddings, then don't miss the London Vintage Wedding Fair on October 24 in Notting Hill. A huge hit last year, this year promises to be even better! Don't miss the amazing stands selling everything from antique lace and Thirties dresses to handmade shoes, jewellery and headgear. Browse over a glass of bubbly - and don't forget to pick up your goodie bag on the way out! Tickets are £7 in advance and £10 on the door.
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Real Wedding: Mary & John
If you're looking for wedding ideas, you're going to love this traditional and romantic Irish affair. John and Mary celebrated their big day on the beautiful West Coast of Ireland, at Spanish Point. Featuring an historic castle, a stunning sea-side view and a gorgeous princess gown, you're going to love this wedding. The strawboys even paid the happy couple a visit, keeping an ancient Irish tradition alive and kicking! For centuries these original wedding crashers have arrived uninvited at country weddings and entertained the guests. Their presence is thought to bring good luck for the happy couple, and despite their slightly messy appearance, they're always welcome. Other stealworthy ideas include Mary's matching bridesmaids dresses and ushers' ties, her gorgeous long veil, and her simple half-up, half-down hair style. Don't miss the hilarious caraicature cake toppers, and all of Mary's other vendors detailed below. Fantastic pictures published with thanks to Mary Brown Photography.
The Before the Big Day Bridal Q&A - Mary was kind enough to fill in our bridal questionnaire, aimed at helping other brides with their planning process. Feast your eyes on her answers for helpful hints and tips from someone on the other side of her big day!
Where and when did you get married?
Carron in County Clare in Ireland on 7th June 2010
What was your thinking behind choosing the venue and the decoration of the reception?
We chose the Armada Hotel in Spanish Point because the view of the sea there was beautiful. The hotel took care of all the decorations so one less thing for us to think about.
Did you have a theme, colour or motif in mind?
Purple – my favourite colour
Who made your wedding outfit (dress, veil, shoes and accessories), and how did you come to that decision?
My dress was from the Ella Bridals Collection, which I purchased from Aphrodite Bridal in Newcastle West, Limerick. They were extremely helpful and the dress just felt so soft and light that I loved it. My sister-in-law lent me her tiara. I purchased simple silver sandals from a local shop and I already had a necklace and earrings.
What about your husband’s outfit? Where was it from?
We rented it from Mike O’Connell’s Menswear in Limerick
And how about your bridesmaids’ outfits?
They were purchased from Brides First Choice in Limerick.
What type of cake did you go for, and how did you come to that decision?
We chose a four-tier topsy-turvy cake from the Cake Gallery in Ennis. My husband-to-be was in charge of choosing the cake because he has a sweet tooth. He saw a picture in a magazine and thought it looked cool and different. Each tier was a different flavour! The personalised figurines were from Anita Caricatures.
Did you have any favours? What were they? Was there any particular reason why you picked them?
Yes, lotto tickets. They were used in a wedding we had been to previously and we thought they went down very well and added a little excitement to every table.
Who was your florist, what flowers did you choose, and how did you come to that decision?
Mulqueens Flowers in Ennis. I wasn’t too bothered about the specific flowers, so I just showed the florist a swatch of the bridesmaids dresses and told her our budget, and she did everything else.
Who was your photographer and how did you choose them?
Mary Brown Photography in Dublin. She is married to a friend of my sister-in-law and came highly recommended. We viewed her website and loved her natural style. We arranged a meeting with her, loved her personality and knew she would fit in well on the day.
Did you have any entertainment at your wedding?
We had up-and-coming Irish indie band O'Emperor. They had a busy summer recording their debut album, Hither Thither (out 1st October) and playing the festival circuit, but since their lead singer and guitarist, Paul, is John's cousin, they made an exception to play at our wedding.
Did you enjoy planning your wedding?
It was a little stressful to say the least as we didn't leave ourselves a lot of time to plan it, but it was nice to work on things together.
What advice do you have for brides planning their big day?
It’s never too early to start planning – don’t leave everything to the last minute. You want to be nice and relaxed on the lead up to the wedding, not stressed out. When sending off RSVP cards with the invites remember to write a number on the back of them and keep track of what name matches what number as people will reply and forget to put down their names. Put some time into planning your honeymoon – it tends to get a back seat compared to the wedding – remember the wedding is just one day, the honeymoon will be a lot longer. Packed for your honeymoon before the wedding – there may not be a lot of time afterwards. Get a good nights sleep the night before – it is a long day. Also eat a good breakfast – there is not much time for eating until you get to the meal.
If you have a lace up dress give yourself extra time to get this tied – it may take a few attempts to get it right! Have water and a few snacks in the wedding car – you will be hungry after the ceremony. Have baby wipes in the car in case your dress gets dirty. Bring extra hairpins as your hair or veil might fall down. Wear comfortable shoes. Keep a list of all the gifts you received and from whom on Excel so you know who to send thank you cards to. Cherish every moment of the day – it passes very quickly.
Supplier List
Hair: Evelyn Tigue at Ev’s Hairdesign, Quin Tel: 086 845 2278
Make-up: Keane for Beauty in Ennis
Church Musician: Singer and harpist, Jean Wallace
Videographer: SES Digital
If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS or click here for more purple-themed weddings.
The Before the Big Day Bridal Q&A - Mary was kind enough to fill in our bridal questionnaire, aimed at helping other brides with their planning process. Feast your eyes on her answers for helpful hints and tips from someone on the other side of her big day!
Where and when did you get married?
Carron in County Clare in Ireland on 7th June 2010
What was your thinking behind choosing the venue and the decoration of the reception?
We chose the Armada Hotel in Spanish Point because the view of the sea there was beautiful. The hotel took care of all the decorations so one less thing for us to think about.
Did you have a theme, colour or motif in mind?
Purple – my favourite colour
Who made your wedding outfit (dress, veil, shoes and accessories), and how did you come to that decision?
My dress was from the Ella Bridals Collection, which I purchased from Aphrodite Bridal in Newcastle West, Limerick. They were extremely helpful and the dress just felt so soft and light that I loved it. My sister-in-law lent me her tiara. I purchased simple silver sandals from a local shop and I already had a necklace and earrings.
What about your husband’s outfit? Where was it from?
We rented it from Mike O’Connell’s Menswear in Limerick
And how about your bridesmaids’ outfits?
They were purchased from Brides First Choice in Limerick.
What type of cake did you go for, and how did you come to that decision?
We chose a four-tier topsy-turvy cake from the Cake Gallery in Ennis. My husband-to-be was in charge of choosing the cake because he has a sweet tooth. He saw a picture in a magazine and thought it looked cool and different. Each tier was a different flavour! The personalised figurines were from Anita Caricatures.
Did you have any favours? What were they? Was there any particular reason why you picked them?
Yes, lotto tickets. They were used in a wedding we had been to previously and we thought they went down very well and added a little excitement to every table.
Who was your florist, what flowers did you choose, and how did you come to that decision?
Mulqueens Flowers in Ennis. I wasn’t too bothered about the specific flowers, so I just showed the florist a swatch of the bridesmaids dresses and told her our budget, and she did everything else.
Who was your photographer and how did you choose them?
Mary Brown Photography in Dublin. She is married to a friend of my sister-in-law and came highly recommended. We viewed her website and loved her natural style. We arranged a meeting with her, loved her personality and knew she would fit in well on the day.
Did you have any entertainment at your wedding?
We had up-and-coming Irish indie band O'Emperor. They had a busy summer recording their debut album, Hither Thither (out 1st October) and playing the festival circuit, but since their lead singer and guitarist, Paul, is John's cousin, they made an exception to play at our wedding.
Did you enjoy planning your wedding?
It was a little stressful to say the least as we didn't leave ourselves a lot of time to plan it, but it was nice to work on things together.
What advice do you have for brides planning their big day?
It’s never too early to start planning – don’t leave everything to the last minute. You want to be nice and relaxed on the lead up to the wedding, not stressed out. When sending off RSVP cards with the invites remember to write a number on the back of them and keep track of what name matches what number as people will reply and forget to put down their names. Put some time into planning your honeymoon – it tends to get a back seat compared to the wedding – remember the wedding is just one day, the honeymoon will be a lot longer. Packed for your honeymoon before the wedding – there may not be a lot of time afterwards. Get a good nights sleep the night before – it is a long day. Also eat a good breakfast – there is not much time for eating until you get to the meal.
If you have a lace up dress give yourself extra time to get this tied – it may take a few attempts to get it right! Have water and a few snacks in the wedding car – you will be hungry after the ceremony. Have baby wipes in the car in case your dress gets dirty. Bring extra hairpins as your hair or veil might fall down. Wear comfortable shoes. Keep a list of all the gifts you received and from whom on Excel so you know who to send thank you cards to. Cherish every moment of the day – it passes very quickly.
Supplier List
Hair: Evelyn Tigue at Ev’s Hairdesign, Quin Tel: 086 845 2278
Make-up: Keane for Beauty in Ennis
Church Musician: Singer and harpist, Jean Wallace
Videographer: SES Digital
If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS or click here for more purple-themed weddings.
Sunday 19 September 2010
My Wedding - Save the Dates
This is where I tell you all about planning my own wedding. After all, if I'm publishing all these Real Weddings, it's only fair I share my trials and tribulations. Read the rest of my wedding diary here.
My plan for our Save the Dates was a disaster. If you check out my last posting, you'll see that I'd decided to use wooden cards (see below) with the symbol of a key stamped on one side, and the Save the Date message stamped on the other. Unfortunately it really didn't look good. The font of the message stamp is light and feminine, and the key stamp is really heavy and clunky, and they clashed horribly. It wouldn't have been that much of a disaster, but in my enthusiasm, I'd already stamped all the wooden cards with the key, meaning I couldn't use them any more. If you're planning your own DIY invitations, I'd definitely recommend creating one template, to check out the finished effect, before you go stamping crazy.
Several weeks then passed where I tried to figure out what to do, and meanwhile the clock was ticking, because we were going away for August, and I wanted to get the Save the Dates out before we left. In the end, I decided to save the wooden cards for the reception, and use white luggage tags instead. By now, I'd left it too late to buy the perfect sized tags from Etsy, so I had to buy regular ones and chop the ends off them. As you can see, my scissor-skills leave something to be desired, so the edge wasn't entirely straight, but hopefully my guest won't notice!
Our flight left on Tuesday evening, and I decided to buy the luggage tags and start stamping on Tuesday morning! So it was a bit of a lastminute affair, but The Boy chipped in, and within a couple of hours, we'd managed to stamp and put together 100 or so Save the Dates, and carefully put them in the envelopes. We took them with us to the airport, with the plan of posting them just before we got on the flight. I'd decided on gold 1st class stamps for the look, but because of the pegs, they were too fat for a standard stamp, and needed more postage. So we ended up sticking on over 200 stamps with only half an hour to go before our flight took off. Tense wasn't the word!
The whole experience was good fun, but I'm not sure I'll DIY our actual wedding invitations. Despite all the impressive efforts of other DIY brides, I'm thinking they must have more raw talent than me, and I'd really like our invitations to look more professional. Although I will go on with my DIY attempts in the hope that I get a bit better! By the way - I'm always hugely inspired by the blog I Do It Yourself - definitely worth a look!
My plan for our Save the Dates was a disaster. If you check out my last posting, you'll see that I'd decided to use wooden cards (see below) with the symbol of a key stamped on one side, and the Save the Date message stamped on the other. Unfortunately it really didn't look good. The font of the message stamp is light and feminine, and the key stamp is really heavy and clunky, and they clashed horribly. It wouldn't have been that much of a disaster, but in my enthusiasm, I'd already stamped all the wooden cards with the key, meaning I couldn't use them any more. If you're planning your own DIY invitations, I'd definitely recommend creating one template, to check out the finished effect, before you go stamping crazy.
Several weeks then passed where I tried to figure out what to do, and meanwhile the clock was ticking, because we were going away for August, and I wanted to get the Save the Dates out before we left. In the end, I decided to save the wooden cards for the reception, and use white luggage tags instead. By now, I'd left it too late to buy the perfect sized tags from Etsy, so I had to buy regular ones and chop the ends off them. As you can see, my scissor-skills leave something to be desired, so the edge wasn't entirely straight, but hopefully my guest won't notice!
Our flight left on Tuesday evening, and I decided to buy the luggage tags and start stamping on Tuesday morning! So it was a bit of a lastminute affair, but The Boy chipped in, and within a couple of hours, we'd managed to stamp and put together 100 or so Save the Dates, and carefully put them in the envelopes. We took them with us to the airport, with the plan of posting them just before we got on the flight. I'd decided on gold 1st class stamps for the look, but because of the pegs, they were too fat for a standard stamp, and needed more postage. So we ended up sticking on over 200 stamps with only half an hour to go before our flight took off. Tense wasn't the word!
The whole experience was good fun, but I'm not sure I'll DIY our actual wedding invitations. Despite all the impressive efforts of other DIY brides, I'm thinking they must have more raw talent than me, and I'd really like our invitations to look more professional. Although I will go on with my DIY attempts in the hope that I get a bit better! By the way - I'm always hugely inspired by the blog I Do It Yourself - definitely worth a look!
Friday 17 September 2010
Real Wedding: Victoria & Will
As autumn approaches, I'm already missing summer weddings, and this one makes me feel all the more wistful for the sunshine. A gorgeous English countryside affair, it's packed full of sweet details and inspirational ideas. Victoria and Will celebrated their big day with an intimate humanist ceremony in a tiny little village called Little Bardfield deep in the Essex countryside. Will's childhood home made for a magical setting, and the different marquees dotted around the grounds ingeniously divided the outside space into different areas according to the different stages of the day. The happy couple decided on a topsy turvy wedding day schedule, with the Pimms reception first, followed by their ceremony. This ingenious idea {one I might just steal} resulted in a truly special day that really reflected their fun personalities. Other stealworthy ideas include the quirky old-skool hat-themed seating plan, flower decorated cake, lavender bag favours, and the traditional English flowers arranged by Amelia Cornish. Fantastic photographs published with thanks to the Marianne Taylor.
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Wednesday 15 September 2010
Real Wedding: Heather & James
A brand new morning, and a brand new photographer for Before the Big Day! Meet Amelia Lyon and drool over her amazing pictures of her cousin Heather's wedding to her high school sweetheart James. We're talking serious details, folks - so keep your inspiration notebook close. This was a truly family affair, with aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents chipping in with a helping hand, including the catering! My favourite details are almost too many to count. Let's start with the fantastic bold colour palette of aqua and orange, and move on to the heavenly parasols, handmade paper garlands and personalised soda labels. I'm also seriously loving Heather's pretty waist corsage and James' funky tie. Most of all, I love what they did with the venue. Is there anything more romantic than a roof of sparkling lights? Gorgeous photos published with thanks to Amelia Lyon Photography.
If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS or click here for more rainy-day weddings.
If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS or click here for more rainy-day weddings.
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