So far this
year, Hyperemesis Gravidarum and anaemia have brought normal blogging service grinding
to a halt. However, I am feeling slightly more human these days and to
celebrate here is a post on our wedding as featured in Handmade Wedding magazine
(pages 86-91). The article
is written really well and sums up the spirit of our wedding beautifully.
In
short, our wedding was a colourful, handmade family affair from the wedding
dress and cake to the laser cut invitations, paper pompoms and laser cut birdy bunting. We hired a heritage red London double decker bus to transport the
guests (and ourselves) to and from the venue to create an informal, relaxed
atmosphere before the ceremony started. The theme was birds and buses - buses
to fit in with the transport and birds to reflect my passion for them. I
designed, laser cut and hand foiled invitations shaped like buses with a robin
riding on the top deck. My son was given the role of bus conductor, collecting
the individual tickets that I had made for everyone. The colour theme was hot
pink and turquoise, a real feast for the eyes on a rainy day in south
Manchester!
My family's
creativity ran throughout the wedding - my mum made my tea length baby blue
wedding dress out of duchesse satin and lace, we based it on an elegant 1950's
Vogue pattern, my grandma made the sugar paste flowers to sit on top of my
sister's cupcakes, an old family friend made the bridesmaids dresses and I even
trained up my husband (and son) in the art of origami so that he could help make
180 paper flowers for the tables. It had the look of an old fashioned but
vibrant English summer fete by the time we had finished complete with hog roast
and local English ales.
Tips for other brides-to-be looking
to add handmade details to their big day.
Handmade
elements really personalised the wedding and ensured that we could have exactly
what we wanted. I would thoroughly recommend adding your own touches to the day.
Do gather lots of ideas together from wedding magazines
and online sources such as Pinterest (elements of our wedding can be seen here)
Do keep a tight control on the budget, handmade is not
necessarily a cheap option
Do involve family members with making details for the
wedding. My husband was brilliant at making the origami flowers!
Don’t be afraid to ask family and friends
to help out otherwise you will become overwhelmed with the prospect of
decorating a whole venue yourself!
Don’t forget to have fun! As the wedding
day approaches enjoy the making and planning.
Photographs
were taken by the talented Kelly Clarke of Imagesplash.
