Our Relaxed Wildflower Wedding Day
Today is our 3 year wedding anniversary and it's been lovely to look back at our special day and realise that a lot of the ideas behind Fancy Folk sparked during the planning and the little details I created for my own wedding, so I thought I would share them with you.
It all started with our venue The Out Barn where we fell in love with the wildflower meadow and how private and exclusive the location was. We could just get lost in nature surrounded by our favourite people and have a really intimate day. I painted a venue portrait and it became a big part of our wedding stationery and lovely keep sake of the day.
We visited the venue on an open day and I really recommend doing that when viewing places. You can really start to visualise your day there, meet the fab staff and suppliers that know the place inside out. Which later made for a slick stress free wedding day. It's much nicer than viewing an empty venue. The buzz and atmosphere is lovely at events.
We met our photographer Mark, who had the most stunning images of the venue in full bloom and we really could see ourselves on the day in the meadow. His style was very relaxed and un posed and thats something that resonated with us.
The meadow literally became an obsession, I found the perfect florist Grace, who created floral artistry. I loved the idea of an installation gallery feel as the guests entered and to bring the outside in with wild flower ceremony arrangement surrounding us as we said our vows. She included our favourite wild steams, fox gloves for Tom and daisies and sweet peas for me.
Before I knew it wildflowers were at the centre of all the details. I had hand embroidered all my bridesmaids PJs for the morning of the wedding with their favourite flowers, and a little daisy on mine. The lovely Ely got me and ready in the morning with natural make up and half up hair. My hair is terrible for keeping in a curl but Ely managed it somehow, they stayed in all day.
My dress had floral cutout lace element which was super comfortable to wear and good to dance in. My two priorities when I was searching. I found my dress at a lovely bridal boutique in Ilkley called The Aisle, the owner Katie made it such a special experience for us. I went back a second time and brought my late grandma who got to see me in the dress.... thought she preferred the princess dresses Id tried on ( just for her) and hoped Id go for one of those haha.
Beautifully hand crafter hair accessories & jewellery were also little flowers by Alabaster Dream, which I still love to wear now on special occasions. Id asked Rachel to make everything in rose gold to match my mums heirloom jewellery and it was just perfect.
Tom wore a Hugo Boss suit which is so timeless and classic and lovely quality. I think he looked really handsome, obvs. He was very committed to making me happy by dosing up on hay fever meds before the meadow pictures.
I was really anxious to walk myself down the aisle and the sadness in my heart of not having any of my family at the wedding, wishing so much it had been possible. But when I saw Tom waiting for me I couldn't stop grinning, it was impossible to control. I instantly felt lighter and so happy I was marring my best friend. We chose Elvis's - Can't Help Falling In Love, for me to walk down to, played by a lovely string duo String Infusion who entertained our guest while we had photos taken.
Toms and I love food, so this was always going to be a big part of the planning for us. We had the most fun doing the tastings and creating a bespoke menu of all our Italian inspired favourite things. The Cheshire Dining Experience was amazing and did a fab job of creating fine dining vegan versions of the main menu for our friends. In the evening it had to be pizza, we chose a local supplier Fratellis Pizza who were a big hit with all our guest, serving well into the night. We were very lucky to get expert wine advice from our mate John over Norther Wine and Beer who helped us pair the drinks beautifully to our menu.
I had the idea to make something super personal for our guests about 6 weeks before the wedding an illustrated portrait of everyone on the tables as place cards. Fab idea but coupled with a baby who didn't like sleeping very much it was a mammoth task. I spent sleepless night illustrating but it was so worth it. Everyone was so surprise and plenty of banter followed.
In the evening we had our favourite local band Radio Edit play a set list of our most loved songs. Nothing beats live music and the band got everyone up dancing and having fun. We also had lots of fun with Gary and his photo booth from Reflection Entertainment which turn the instant snaps into a lovely keepsake guest book which I had designed the cover of to match our stationery.
Getting married was so much fun! I wish we could do it all again. If your reading this I hope you enjoy the planning journey and try and keep things as chill as possible on the run up, no crazy last minute ideas like me!
Thank you to all our suppliers and friends and family who made it special.
I think ill need another blog post to show you my design journey for our invitations.
Viktoriya X