Time for a particularly special DIY wedding treat in Part 2 of this Before Big Day inspired wedding! Fabulous couple Kate and John handmade tonnes of their wedding details, and create the most amazing wedding reception ever. Just take a look at the handmade seating plan {DIY blackboard & easel}, puffy pom poms, 'Just Married' bunting, table station, wedding stationery, wedding cake and cake topper! And that's only a few of the incredible DIY details. Kate and John also prepared their own evening buffet, hung up thousands of fairy lights, {bought in the Christmas sales}, and collected dozens of vintage glass jars and milk bottles for the flowers. Kate even handmade all the cake-pop wedding favours - although I'm not sure she'd recommend that to other brides - they're harder to make than they look! Don't miss out on Part 1 - plus all of Kate's fantastic wedding hints to other brides - seriously inspirational stuff.
Having the family connection for our wedding reception was very important to us, so when my Aunt and Uncle offered their garden for our marquee we jumped at the chance! We created all the wedding decorations, with lots of coloured pom poms, plus fairy lights around the edges, and blackboards that we also made ourselves, for the table plan and other messages.
There was no distinct theme, but we wanted it to feel like a large garden party with some vintage elements thrown in, and the colours we ended up using were muted pinks, greys and cream. As a couple, we are more laid-back than formal, and we wanted this to come across in the feel of the day. This was reflected in the food as well – we had roast lamb served as a whole leg to each table, so one guest had to carve and serve. This was a great way to break the ice with people who didn’t know each other, and was also very very tasty! John’s mum made lots of cheesecakes for the dessert as it has been John’s favourite since he was little, which added another personal touch.
John designed our wedding stationery on Photoshop – everything from the Save the Date luggage tags, to the wedding invitations, RSVPs, place names and table numbers. We bought card from eBay, printed them all out at home on our printer, and used alphabet stamps for everyone's names. We were thrilled with the vintage feel to them, as it matched the style of our wedding day. It also saved us a lot of money and made the invitations much more personal, although it did take a while!
Initially we decided to make a donation to Cancer Research UK for our wedding favours, and printed out the small cards, that you download from the website, for each guest. I have lost family members to cancer, so it was important to me to have that detail. I then found out about cake pops on my extensive wedding internet searches, and fell for them. Having seen how much they were per person, I {stupidly} decided they couldn't be that hard, and made 120 of them myself the week before the big day. Luckily they turned out pretty well.
A good friend offered to make the cake for us, and it was amazing. She had only ever made one wedding cake before, and spent so long making it so lovely that I felt quite guilty in the few days before the wedding! The colours tied in with our wedding flowers and bridesmaid dresses. The tiers were decorated to look like presents.
We couldn’t decide on flavours, and eventually she made different tiers with fruit cake, chocolate fudge cake, red velvet and a layer of lemon sponge as well. The cake topper was inspired by one I had seen on Etsy, but was made my one of my bridesmaids.
I loved planning our wedding. We tried to do as much as we could ourselves, but hired an on-the-day wedding co-ordinator - Andrea Swift at Fabulous Day Events, so she was instrumental in helping everyone set up and letting us both have the morning to relax and get ready. In fact, Andrea even came over on the Friday to help us decorate the marquee – well over and above her remit, and she was invaluable to us in the run up to the day, especially as we live in London. Trying to organise all the different aspects remotely was quite a challenge.
My advice to brides is that you don’t have to spend a fortune to make things look good. If you have time, doing as much as possible in advance helps massively – we bought all our wine, champagne and fairy lights in the Christmas sales and saved a fortune. We made the pom poms up months beforehand in the evenings while watching TV. This takes the pressure off in the run up to the day itself. Lastly, just remembering that everyone who is coming is there to help you celebrate, and the feeling of goodwill you will get from having all your family and friends in one place wishing you well is the best feeling ever!
{Wedding Credits}
Wedding dress: Caroline Castigliano
Veil: Richard Designs
Shoes: Charlize by Benjamin Adams
John's suit, and ushers suits: Debenhams
Bridesmaid Dresses: Von Vonni
Venue: St Margaret's Church in Bodelwyddan & then my Aunt's garden for the reception
Band: Fonix Music
Photographer: James Berry of Mr November Photography
Flowers: Anne Jacques at Lillibet Flowers
On the day co-ordinator: Andrea Swift at Fabulous Day Events
Hair and make up: Laura Mayers from The Bridal Make Up Team
Food: Marc Macauley from MM Catering
Cheese cake (in the evening): Marks and Spencer
Photobooth: Picture Blast
Marquee: Neil from M&B Marquees
Bar: Zac from Parkhouse Bars
Having the family connection for our wedding reception was very important to us, so when my Aunt and Uncle offered their garden for our marquee we jumped at the chance! We created all the wedding decorations, with lots of coloured pom poms, plus fairy lights around the edges, and blackboards that we also made ourselves, for the table plan and other messages.
There was no distinct theme, but we wanted it to feel like a large garden party with some vintage elements thrown in, and the colours we ended up using were muted pinks, greys and cream. As a couple, we are more laid-back than formal, and we wanted this to come across in the feel of the day. This was reflected in the food as well – we had roast lamb served as a whole leg to each table, so one guest had to carve and serve. This was a great way to break the ice with people who didn’t know each other, and was also very very tasty! John’s mum made lots of cheesecakes for the dessert as it has been John’s favourite since he was little, which added another personal touch.
John designed our wedding stationery on Photoshop – everything from the Save the Date luggage tags, to the wedding invitations, RSVPs, place names and table numbers. We bought card from eBay, printed them all out at home on our printer, and used alphabet stamps for everyone's names. We were thrilled with the vintage feel to them, as it matched the style of our wedding day. It also saved us a lot of money and made the invitations much more personal, although it did take a while!
Initially we decided to make a donation to Cancer Research UK for our wedding favours, and printed out the small cards, that you download from the website, for each guest. I have lost family members to cancer, so it was important to me to have that detail. I then found out about cake pops on my extensive wedding internet searches, and fell for them. Having seen how much they were per person, I {stupidly} decided they couldn't be that hard, and made 120 of them myself the week before the big day. Luckily they turned out pretty well.
A good friend offered to make the cake for us, and it was amazing. She had only ever made one wedding cake before, and spent so long making it so lovely that I felt quite guilty in the few days before the wedding! The colours tied in with our wedding flowers and bridesmaid dresses. The tiers were decorated to look like presents.
We couldn’t decide on flavours, and eventually she made different tiers with fruit cake, chocolate fudge cake, red velvet and a layer of lemon sponge as well. The cake topper was inspired by one I had seen on Etsy, but was made my one of my bridesmaids.
I loved planning our wedding. We tried to do as much as we could ourselves, but hired an on-the-day wedding co-ordinator - Andrea Swift at Fabulous Day Events, so she was instrumental in helping everyone set up and letting us both have the morning to relax and get ready. In fact, Andrea even came over on the Friday to help us decorate the marquee – well over and above her remit, and she was invaluable to us in the run up to the day, especially as we live in London. Trying to organise all the different aspects remotely was quite a challenge.
My advice to brides is that you don’t have to spend a fortune to make things look good. If you have time, doing as much as possible in advance helps massively – we bought all our wine, champagne and fairy lights in the Christmas sales and saved a fortune. We made the pom poms up months beforehand in the evenings while watching TV. This takes the pressure off in the run up to the day itself. Lastly, just remembering that everyone who is coming is there to help you celebrate, and the feeling of goodwill you will get from having all your family and friends in one place wishing you well is the best feeling ever!
{Wedding Credits}
Wedding dress: Caroline Castigliano
Veil: Richard Designs
Shoes: Charlize by Benjamin Adams
John's suit, and ushers suits: Debenhams
Bridesmaid Dresses: Von Vonni
Venue: St Margaret's Church in Bodelwyddan & then my Aunt's garden for the reception
Band: Fonix Music
Photographer: James Berry of Mr November Photography
Flowers: Anne Jacques at Lillibet Flowers
On the day co-ordinator: Andrea Swift at Fabulous Day Events
Hair and make up: Laura Mayers from The Bridal Make Up Team
Food: Marc Macauley from MM Catering
Cheese cake (in the evening): Marks and Spencer
Photobooth: Picture Blast
Marquee: Neil from M&B Marquees
Bar: Zac from Parkhouse Bars
♥ Want more DIY wedding ideas? ♥ Or how about marquee wedding ideas? ♥
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