A Pretty Shabby-Chic Wedding with a Mint-Green Cake!

You'll easily spot my favourite detail in this lovely pastel-themed wedding. It's the mint green wedding cake! I love everything about it - from the ruffled icing {very this season}, to the shabby chic lace bow, and the pretty mini-bunting topper. It's perfect! There's plenty more stealworthy wedding details - you'll want to copy Heather's bridal style, her Pronovias wedding dress, unstructured bouquet and DIY'd limoncello wedding favours. I'm also a big fan of their twine-wrapped jam jar vases. Fabulous pictures by Jack from Firsthand Photography. If you missed Part 1 of this wedding click here!

We celebrated our wedding at St Edmund's Church at Holme Pierrepont, with our reception next door at Holme Pierrepont Hall.

At the beginning, we didn't have a definitive theme, however it slowly developed with the help of online blogs. We explored lots of ideas, and created our own wedding scrapbook.

We ended up with a kind of rustic, traditional feel to the decorations. Pierrepont Hall is an amazing venue with beautiful gardens surrounding it, and we were really lucky that the weather held out.

Our wedding caterer was Fiona Herbert, who also managed the whole day. The team were vital to the smooth running of our wedding, and everything ran perfectly. All our guests commented on how good the food was at our reception.

Our wedding photographer was Jack at Firsthand Photography. She was fantastic - we hardly knew she was there, and have had so many people comment on how great she was since our big day. 

Funnily enough Jack lives just around the corner from us, so she popped round one evening for an introduction, and we instantly felt at ease.

Mrs Umbels was our wedding florist. They were absolutely fantastic - such a talent and very patient with us. Once we met Sarah in her little hut in the countryside, we knew she was the florist for us.

Our wedding favours were little kilner bottles of homemade limoncello and sloe gin. These doubled up as place names, as the bottles were labelled with little luggage tags.

We had a three-tiered cake with frosting in mint to match the hall and the bridesmaid dresses. It had ruffled icing and a lace bow, and we topped it with mini-bunting saying ' Just Married'. On the cake table we also had matching cake pops and cupcakes, all iced with mint and orange.

I loved planning my wedding! My advice to brides would be start early, breaking this down into a {big} list, and don't settle - you only get one big day!

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A Pastel-Themed Stately Home Wedding with a Pronovias Gown

Take one Princess-style gown, sprinkle it with confetti, and add an elegant chignon, and you've got the recipe for a beautiful bride. Everything about this lovely shabby-chic wedding is romantic, from the white vintage car, to the incredible stately home venue, and the mint-green wedding cake. I've fallen head-over-hells for Heather's stunning Pronovias wedding dress - you'll want to add it to your must-try list. And her bridesmaids' strapless Coast dresses were a great buy! Enjoy these Getting Ready and Ceremony pictures by Firsthand Photography - look out for the inspiring Reception shots in Part 2, later today.

We celebrated our wedding at St Edmund's Church at Holme Pierrepont, with our reception next door at Holme Pierrepont Hall.

At the beginning, we didn't have a definitive theme, however it slowly developed with the help of online blogs. We explored lots of ideas, and created our own wedding scrapbook.

We ended up with a kind of rustic, traditional feel to the decorations. Pierrepont Hall is an amazing venue with beautiful gardens surrounding it, and we were really lucky that the weather held out.

I got my dress from Beautiful Brides in Nottingham, it was a Pronovias design which I still love!

I created our wedding invitations. Initially we sent out Save the Dates with an illustration of Holme Pierrepont Hall that Lee drew for me. I then designed the invitations, which were a collective set of cards - invitation, RSVP and directions / accommodation options. I tied them all together with some simple twine.

Lee wore a set of Ted Baker tails from Moss Bros. He added a silver-grey waistcoat and cravat, and a pink rose buttonhole.

My bridesmaids' outfits came from Coast. They were strapless, Grecian style gowns in mint green. They wore silver shoes, and they all had their hair up for the day.

Mrs Umbels was our wedding florist. They were absolutely fantastic - such a talent and very patient with us. Once we met Sarah in her little hut in the countryside, we knew she was the florist for us.

We chose lots of different pastel colours for our wedding colour palette, and they all came together beautifully.

We chose the traditional Wedding March for walking up the aisle, and our first dance was 'Grow Old with Me' by Tom Odell.

Our wedding photographer was Jack at Firsthand Photography. She was fantastic - we hardly knew she was there, and have had so many people comment on how great she was since our big day. 

Funnily enough Jack lives just around the corner from us, so she popped round one evening for an introduction, and we instantly felt at ease.

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A Perfect English Summer Wedding with a Teepee! - Part 2

This summer wedding season has been all about the teepee marquee, and I'm happy to wager the trend will last us all the way into 2013. I love their rustic simplicity, and the fact you don't have to buy in expensive draping and lighting. Add in family style dining tables, big vessels of wildflowers and hay bale seats snaffled from a local farmer, and your all set for your wedding reception. Cheryl and Richard celebrated their big day on the perfect English summer's day, with tonnes of beautiful wedding details. I love how they themed their tables with personal photographs, and DIY'd their place-markers with bird stamps. Their wedding cake is work of white chocolate art, hiding a rather delicious chocolate biscuit interior, and their flowers were DIY'd by one of their bridesmaids. Huge thanks to Cheryl for all her lovely recommendations on how to plan your wedding, and big love to wedding photographer Hester Marriott, for her amazing pictures from the day. Don't miss Part 1.

My flatmate at the time, Charlotte Bromley Davenport is a wedding photographer, and she recommended Hester Marriott who is not only local to the church but a brilliant wedding photographer. We were adamant that we wanted someone with a great eye and reportage style as well as a warm and likeable personality, so soon as we met and she showed us her portfolio it was clear she was our photographer. 

On the day itself Hester was a true professional yet sensitive and gentle with us all; we hardly saw her and yet we were given the most beautiful shots which perfectly captured our day.

I have so may wonderful memories from the day - standing at the back of the church on the hottest day of the year seeing all my favourite people in one place, having our photographs taken as a family in the gorgeous sunshine whilst our friends sipped champagne, standing barefoot on a hay bale as my new husband gave his speech, my new husband grabbing my hand and pulling me out of the tipi to see fireworks overhead....I could go on and on!

I'm a country girl at heart so it felt only right that we have a country-style wedding. Richard was wonderful and really let me indulge my little-girl dream of a tipi outside the church overlooking the farm, hay bales, lanterns and a fire. It was rustic and beautiful - everything I had hoped for on my wedding day.

One of my bridesmaids offered to do the flowers, which was brilliant. I was pretty specific about the look that I wanted; traditional mismatched English flowers tumbling from vintage jugs, watering cans & enamel buckets.

We were kindly lent the vases for the table decorations so deliberately chose a mismatched rustic look. We wove ivy around the beams in the tipis and hung lanterns everywhere which were lit as the sun set.

Our photographer, Hester Marriott, recommended the caterers Mange 2 who are local to the church. As soon as we met Georgie and had our tasting session it was clear they were the ones for us. They worked with such sensitivity to give us our dream wedding, with hessian baskets for the sweet jacket potatoes, the most incredible hog roast and fantastic staff to serve it all. 

The food was absolutely exceptional; literally every single guest commented on it, especially our fabulous canapes and our beautiful chocolate biscuit wedding cake covered in white chocolate.

I loved planning our wedding day. We had five months to pull it all together and it far surpassed everything we had hoped. I had to find my dress pretty swiftly to ensure it was made in time but everything else fell into place. I'm a huge fan of lists (!) and found that a detailed plan for the day was crucial, to enable the ushers to follow your instructions on the day without overloading anyone.

Our wedding band Saloon Star came through a recommendation from a friend; we were absolutely DELIGHTED as they encapsulated the folksy, lively, rustic feel to the wedding. Everyone danced their socks off!

♥ Want more wedding marquee ideas? ♥ Or how about more blue themed weddings? ♥

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