A love of music and mud spurred Diana and Richard on to having a festival of a wedding in the height of summer last year. Diana’s parents graciously gave over their gardens for a huge marquee in which guests partied into the night in style. Photos by Liam Bailey Photography.
Wedding Date: 30th July 2011
Venue: Diana’s parents’ garden
Photographer: Liam Bailey Photography
We met… at a gig in the Astoria many years ago!
The proposal… We flew to New York to see a favourite band, Jimmy Eat World, and to shake off our jet lag we wandered up to Central Park. We were sat on one of the huge rocks there, drinking coffee, when I turned around and Richard was down on one knee, holding out his hand, which was covered in a beanie. I lifted the beanie and there was the Tiffany’s box!
My bridesmaids… My two best friends, Sophie and Jenny, were my bridesmaids. They wore navy blue Two Birds dresses with Vivienne Westwood shoes.
The groomsmen… Richard had two best men, his brother Rob and best friend Ross. They all wore navy blue suits, pale blue ties… and Converse sneakers!
My dress… I bought my Cymbaline dress from Mirror Mirror in Islington, it was only the third dress I tried on and I just fell in love with it. I loved the lace details, and it was very easy to wear, which was important for our country wedding.
My most memorable moment… There is a moment that Liam captured when we had just left the church, we’d done the nervewracking part of the day, and there is a look of such relief on both our faces!
Our reception… We held our reception at my parents’ house in Leigh, Near Cricklade. Our theme was ‘festival’ – so our seating plan was a copy of the Reading Festival poster, as we’ve spent many a happy and muddy August bank holiday there with our friends. Due to his music background Richard was very much in charge of the entertainment, and helped with transport, the drinks and more. He also did all the lighting for the garden, which was really stunning. We bought our disposable cameras and table name holders and lots of other bits and bobs from Confetti!
The food… Tamara Fox and Sophie Meredith of Foxy Ladies were out caterers and created a really delicious menu. We had amazing canapés to start and then a fig and mozzarella salad, herd crusted pork tenderloin for the main but the best part was the pudding – we had mini sticky toffee puddings, with toffee ice-cream and little brandy snaps –they were delicious! We used Primrose Hill Bakery for our cakes – many many mini cupcakes of all flavours!
The flowers… Ruari McCulloch of Pinstripes and Peonies came up with a great theme – we had three glass bowls in decreasing sizes, one filled with sweet avalanche roses, another with pale pink peonies and the last with sweet peas.
The favours… We did little jars of sweets, but the best part of the flowers was that the guests could take a vase of blossoms home with them at the end of the night!
The entertainment… Ben Parker put together a band for us – which everyone absolutely loved, and a friend DJd till the early hours.
Any glitches? Apart from worrying that it might rain, everything went very smooth. We did have a stroppy coach driver on the day, who decided he wanted to leave an hour earlier than we’d booked him for, but that was about it!
My advice to other brides… All I’d say is enjoy the day, and take some time out of the festivities just to breathe. It can be overwhelming and it goes in a flash, so enjoy it!
