US Jewellery designer Elva Fields has always been a favourite around these parts, so I did get more than excited to see the latest collection Summer 2013 pop into my inbox last week! Inspired by saturated hues, the pieces are bold and bright and full of the feeling and mood of Summer.

Bridal white is always a classic and something neutral to pair with your traditional gown for a modern touch. The Elva Fields philosophy of designer Emily Wheat Maynard continues – using pieces of old jewellery, mixed with new to create the unexpected, the bold and the enchanting designs.

Of course, where I think the Elva Fields designs really come into their own is with colour. I am always smitten with the idea of a bride wearing one of these bold, colourful beauties on her wedding day, or the bridesmaids! I even think adding it to your reception “look” is a fun way of adding a bit of colour and fun to your wedding day look.

 

 

Lauren and Leigh

Lauren and Leigh chose to celebrate their wedding with a party in the garden – Lauren’s grandmother’s garden to be exact, right under a Magnolia Tree planted when she was born. Guests celebrated under the star lit sky, feasted on paella and pizza and danced the night away. Party in the garden? I think so!

As for how they met, you’ll have to read on for another hint! But Lauren starts with, “Everyone who knows it is sworn to secrecy…..Haa Haa. It may or may not have been at 3:00am…… Let’s just say it was a set up by a friend that didn’t go entirely to plan. But everything worked out perfectly in the end.”

Photographs today are by Todd Hunter Mcgaw- who shot such rad photographs filled with joy, love and a little quirk!

Leigh and his groomsmen wore suits from The Cloakroom.

Peace Love & Letterpress created the wedding invitations for the couple.

Lauren and her bridesmaids wore gowns by Anna Campbell.

Lauren and Leigh met before the ceremony. Lauren remembering, “We loved having all the photos and our “first look” moment captured before the ceremony worked so well for us. We were so relaxed at the ceremony and it was nice to hang around and celebrate with everyone after we said “I do!” rather than have to leave.”

Of their photographers, Lauren remarks,  “Todd & Alyda are amazing! What else can we say really! As soon as we met we were in love. They understood us & what we were looking for right away. On the day they were incredible. I can barely remember them being there and when we got the photos we kept thinking “how did they get that photo?!” Oh, and on the day a few girls fell in love with Todd & somehow captured him in one of his own photos.”

 

Natalie Buhagiar from Our Love In October styled the wedding. Lauren tells, ” Natalie help me through the entire process. She really helped me organise all my crazy ideas and keep to a plan. On the day she took the stress out of my morning and helped finalise the last set up details that have to be done on the morning of. This allowed me to just relax in the morning and focus on being pampered!

One of our favourite decorations was a wall of flowers in bottles, tied together with string. The same concept was used outside with clusters of hanging flowers in bottles spotted along the balcony.”

When asked what she walked down the aisle to, Lauren remarks, “Nothing – Just the sound of my heart going a million miles an hour….its a bit of a blur really. I just wanted to run down the aisle to Leigh as quickly as I could.”

Lauren and Leigh married in a backyard in Buderim. The couple remark, “The ceremony & reception was in the garden of the house that Lauren’s grandparents lived in when they were still with us. We were married under a Magnolia tree that Lauren’s grandparents planted when she was born.”

“We had 2 close friends Rebecca & Michael do readings during the ceremony. They had free reign to write whatever they liked. It was such a lovely surprise to hear what they came up with. Weddings really show you how much love is out there for you and how so many people are there to support you.”

The decor at the wedding was very personal and representative of Lauren & Leigh. Lauren tells, “Leigh and I both LOVE to share a bottle of wine. Even better if we can share it with friends. Over the years we have collected the empty wine bottles from nights shared with friends. Each bottle has a note about the night, the date and the people we shared it with. All these bottles were used as part of the wedding decorations along with crystal jugs & cups made into candles by my mum & I, antique books, countless glass bottles & jars, my collection of Owls (this is a hint to how we met…it may or may not have been at a Night Owl…a set up by friends gone off course). All surrounded by bouquets of flowers, carefully put together by myself & my amazing group of girlfriends.”

“We have a incredible family and group of friends. Without them we could have never pulled off the wedding that we did. Everyone got together and helped us with everything from cleaning up the garden before to setting up all for the reception to cleaning up the day after. Lauren & a few girlfriends went to the flower markets a few days before and picked out all the bunches of flowers. They then spent hours putting all the arrangements together for the reception. It was so much fun being elbow deep in flowers laughing and chatting with the girls.” As favors, guests received frames for their photobooth strips from My One Sweet Day.

“Mum & I also collected all the timber chairs at the wedding. Over the months before the wedding we searched high and low through garage sales and op shops, haggled on Etsy & Gumtree and finally collected around 70 vintage timber chairs. There were many jokes that all the guests would get to take a chair home with them.”

Food was a major part of the reception with catering by Spoon Fed Catering,  Senor Paella , The Woodfired Pizza King & Bottle Fed. Lauren remarks, “Good food & drink are really important to us. We wanted our guests to enjoy tasty drinks & yummy relaxed food. So we decided to have more market style food with multiple vendors. There was a woodfired pizza stall, a Paella stall, salad table and  of course a bar. Everyone could just mingle and eat at their own pace, but still get plenty of food.”

The Rush Band entertained guests during the reception.

“I surprised Leigh by doing a sneaky dress change half way through the reception. I popped into a cute yellow summery dress which is his favourite on me. When I emerged for the first time in the new dress everyone was caught by surprise and it was just a beautiful moment.”

Congratulations Lauren & Leigh on your marriage! Thank you for sharing your story wit us today! Thank you also to Todd Hunter Mcgaw - for sharing today’s rad wedding!

Jen & Patrick

Oh gorgeous Ballarat you do put on a gorgeous wedding – Jen and Patrick revised their wedding plans after their original venue closed down. They moved the entire celebration to Ballarat and had a beautiful, classic romantic wedding!

Jen tells their story. “The story of how we met was featured in our ceremony and earned a few laughs from our guests. Its not an entirely romantic story. Patrick and I met at the local pub. We were introduced by a mutual friend after Patrick texted her from across the room asking to meet her “hot friend”. After a few too many beers we left the pub together. I ended up leaving my necklace behind at his house. When he came to return it he realised he had actually forgotten the necklace so he borrowed a CD of mine seeing as he was returning again anyway. But then he forgot the CD. He just kept borrowing things every time we met up until I just couldn’t imagine life without him.”

Photos today are by Justin Hill  who has captured beautiful, light filled moments with so much romance.

   

Stationery for the day was designed by Simple Things Press. Jen says “Our beautiful ring bearers bowl was a Paloma’s Nest purchase. Be Happy, Be Loving , Be True.”

Jen wore a gown by Karen Willis Holmes. She explains, “My dress was something that I never thought I would get. My mother and I looked for months and months until I had made an appointment with a dress maker (I wanted something with lace cap sleeves and a tulle skirt). We went back into Karen Willis Holmes in Melbourne to try a different dress on. The waist detail from another dress caught my eye and I thought that I may as well try it on while I was there. It turned out to be my dress! So comfortable and the only dress that made Mum cry when I put it on. Completely not what I thought I wanted but suited me and our wedding so well. We put a deposit on it there and then and to this day I still love my dress!”

Petra Cremming of Pomp and Splendour styled the wedding flowers. Jen remembers “Our amazing flowers!! Petra is just simply a flower genius. My mother and I are trained florists so we wanted the flowers to be amazing. We had one meeting with Petra and I could tell that she just ‘got’ what I was looking for. She showed up on the day and the flowers were perfect!”

Jen and Patrick married at Willowglen Weddings . Jen remarking “We used Willowglen for our ceremony. We were only the second couple to ever get married there. The couple who own and run the venue were absolutely fantastic. They are passionate about their property and they were so helpful on the day. Superstars! They had the beautiful floating deck over the pond that we used for our ceremony spot. They also had lots of willow trees at the back of the property that we used for photos.

Nina Johnson of Blackboard Artworx created and sent our wedding program board down from the Sydney area. She was easy to work with and the board turned out so great.”

Jen walked down the aisle to ‘Your Hand In Mine’ by Explosions in the Sky. “It isn’t a very traditional song but as soon as I heard it I loved it and knew without a doubt that we would use that song.”

Jen did try to wear a veil! She tells “My veil wouldn’t stay in! I wasn’t sure if I wanted a veil but, while wedding dress shopping with my mum and sister, we decided that a veil completed the look. We had to put it back in three times before the ceremony and during the ceremony the wind blew it out. My sister caught it mid air before it fell into the pond! The flying veil was a memorable moment of the ceremony.”

“For our vows, we both thought we wanted to write them ourselves. Our celebrant gave us a few pages of examples and we both picked the same passage to use with no changes at all. It was a great feeling to know that we think of love in the same way.”

“We really tried to make sure that we were true to ourselves in everything that we organised. From the ceremony to the bridal party to the traditions we wanted to keep. We were beginning our lives as husband and wife and we didn’t want any expectations to shadow who we are as a couple.”

“Our oversized balloons were an idea to save on money at the ceremony. They looked fantastic and made for great balloon release photos.”

Of their photographer, Jen says “Our photographer was Justin Hill was recommended to us by another photographer. He and his wife, Angi (also his assistant) were so fantastic! They were such lovely people and fit into our day so well. On one hand, we had people wondering where the photographer was because he was so unobtrusive and on the other, we had people asking us if they were our friends that we had asked to do our photos. Justin captured such beautiful images on the day and was so flexible and worked so quickly. He caught the mix of documentary and traditional images we wanted so perfectly. We would recommend them to anyone!”

Jen and Patrick chose Lydiard Wine Bar for their reception. Jen explaining, “Our reception venue was a bit of a dream come true. We had originally planned and booked our entire wedding to be held near Phillip Island and only six months out from the date our reception venue closed suddenly. There was no other venue in the area that fit our requirements (intimate and a bit glamorous, great food and wine with great service) so we cancelled everything and re-planned our entire wedding to be in Patrick’s hometown of Ballarat.

We had been for dinner at the wine bar once before and absolutely LOVED everything about it. We were frantically sending emails on the day we found out the previous venue had cancelled and the wine bar were free. Not only was our weekend the only weekend left available in the wedding season but they were also in our budget! Amazing!”

“I made the MR & MRS sign in the week leading up to the wedding and also made all the table numbers, table list display and all the signs.”

“At each place setting we laid a stem of lavender that we picked from our garden”

Each guest received a jar of honey. Jen remembering, “My fantastic mum and sister spent a weekend pouring honey into little jars for our favors.”

“My amazing Dad made the frame for the Polaroid photo display which was a lot of fun. The wedding photos of all our previous generations’ wedding photos were also displayed.”

Of their first dance, well there wasn’t one! Jen explains “Patrick hates dancing (and being centre of attention) so we decided not to have a first dance. We asked the band to start playing and we invited everyone up on the dance floor. It was so much fun and we were much more comfortable dancing our silly dance without the spotlight. Our ring bearer, our nephew Jack, was the star of the dance floor. He had some impressive break dancing moves!”

Congratulations Jen and Patrick! Thank you for sharing your day with us! Thank you also to Justin Hill  and Pomp and Splendour for sharing today’s wedding with us!

 Alana and Dave

Can a black tie wedding have an element of relaxed chic? Alana and Dave totally pulled it off – marrying by the beach, they have both the sense of glamour and the laid back feeling that I love and it all came together to represent them.

Alana tells of how they met. “Dave and I locked eyes across the beer garden at the Golden Sheaf in Double Bay back in July 2007. I immediately liked the look of Dave and decided I had to speak to him no matter what. I tried to be classy about that fact that I had just fallen in love at first sight however, so I waited and waited, intermittently glancing across at him. My patience (or lack of) ran out after about 10 minutes though. Rather than walking across the beer garden to strike up a conversation, I beckoned Dave to come to me. Believe it or not, Dave actually pointed at himself and mouthed the words “me?”. We hit it off immediately and within 24 hours I had decided Dave was the man I would marry.”

Gorgeous photographs today from David Campbell Photography which, like the wedding are relaxed and chic.

Alana wore a custom made gown with alterations by Linze Couture (03) 9589 7224. her bridesmaids wore black gowns from Saba.

Sails On The Bay, Elwood Beach hosted the wedding, Alana remarking, “We had our ceremony and reception at Sails On The Bay in Elwood. The main reasons we chose Sails was the amazing uninterrupted view of the beach from the venue, the reputation for quality food and wine and the most genuine staff we came across during our venue hunt. The staff were incredibly helpful, professional and friendly throughout the whole process (not just the initial meeting). We planned our Melbourne beach wedding from Sydney however the distance wasn’t a disadvantage at all. The staff were more than accommodating with setting up skype meetings to discuss the finer details when it suited us. On the day the wait staff were fantastic. They were attentive, professional and friendly.”

Alana walked down the aisle to A Thousand Years – Instrumental by The Piano Guys.

” We had our wedding ceremony streamed via I Do Stream for Alana’s grandparents who couldn’t attend the day.”

“I carried my great Nana’s blue handkerchief which she hand crocheted for my mum. It was old, borrow and blue. The groom and groomsmen wore personalised cuff links – one initial on each cuff.”

Of their photographer, Alana says, “We have personally known David Campbell for years and have had the pleasure of watching him develop his art into the unique, personal style that shines through his wedding photography today. We couldn’t have asked for a better wedding photographer to capture our down to earth nature and natural love for each other on our wedding day. David’s calm and gentle nature together with his artistic eye and professional manner put my mind at ease. He produced amazing shots that tell a story about who we are and what our wedding day was about.”

“We made our centerpieces which were glass vases filled with river stones and natural branches entwined with fairy lights. We used the vases to display the name of the table also. We made our own tags for the cupcake boxes and gifts as we wanted to keep the font consistent throughout every detail.”

For their first dance, Alana recalls, “We had a lot of fun with our first dance! We both have two left feet so we took three lessons at Fandango Dance in Maroubra in the lead up to our wedding. Our aim was to learn a few basic steps so we were comfortable and at least looked like we knew what we were doing. We learned the basic waltz and added our own few touches.”

Congratulations Alana and Dave! Thank you for sharing your day with us! Thank you also to David Campbell Photography for sharing today’s wedding.