Lizzy & Rob

If you fancy taking in some of our city's iconic landmarks this afternoon then this is the wedding for you. Lizzy and Rob started their London wedding journey with an adorable ceremony at the Houses of Parliament, before heading down the Thames on a boat to their fabulous reception at Trinity Buoy Wharf. The beauty of Trinity Buoy Wharf is each couple who celebrate there get to transform it into their own unique space. Lizzy and Rob's vision is simply spectacular with DIY bunting, a homemade naked wedding cake and a truly fabulous wooden crate and plant pot table plan which I think you are going to go Pin-crazy for. The wonderful Sara Dalrymple Photography not only captures the love between this gorgeous couple, but also London, and all the classic and urban cool in-between.

The Dress

Lizzy the Bride: In order to keep costs down, in the first instance I avoided the pricier London bridal boutiques as I knew from friends that it was easy to get carried away not only with the dress itself but also with bespoke alterations! I ended up getting my dress from Brides Visited with a Mon Cheri dress. A very talented seamstress added the sleeves after I had purchased additional lace from Mon Cheri directly (matching the dress). I wanted cap sleeves that fell just on the shoulder and went along with a page of pictures I had found on the internet of the type of sleeves that I wanted as well as a page of those that I didn’t so that I wasn’t disappointed at the end result! I borrowed my veil from my bridesmaid and my head dress was from Gillian Million who was at a London Wedding Fair. I wanted something simple and Gillian’s range was fantastic.

Grooms Attire

Rob wanted to wear a two piece suit and after comparing hiring versus buying we bought all of the groom’s and groomsmen’s suits from Leonard Jay who had a good multi buy deal on at the time. Our colour scheme was teal green, after discovering that my preferred Peacock Blue was just too hard to match up for everything! Rob wanted a silk tie and silk pocket square, we got the ties from Ties Planet and after several orders got the colour match I was after. As a present on the day we gave all of the men in the wedding party navy braces by Albert Thurston and Rob wore Albert Thurston pink braces so that he stood out!

The Venue

We wanted a space that we could make our own, which we could serve food that we wanted and were not restricted by a set menu. Our caterer recommended Trinity Buoy Wharf, we went to see it and loved the space. Just because the original price seems low don’t be fooled, we spent the same (if not more) than we would have had we gone to a traditional London venue. At TBW you have to order everything (down to the ovens and cutlery) yourselves, this was stressful to say the least, but worth it in the end! We used Casbalanca as they gave a competitive quote in January – a good time to search to get some good deals. There was no corkage at TBW, we got the alcohol from Majestic Calais which was a huge cost saver. When we went to visit TBW the option of arriving by boat was discussed and as the entrance is otherwise via an industrial estate we were keen to incorporate a boat into our day. We wanted a ceremony venue with close proximity to the river and researched all of the licenced premises in each of the London Boroughs along the River Thames. We chose The House of Commons because it had a room that could accommodate 150 people, was more reasonably priced than hotels along the river and of course, the prestige of getting married in such a place helped!

Colour Scheme/Décor

We did a lot of the décor ourselves, my mum ended up making 350m of bunting! We had the venue the day before and friends helped us to transform it. My dad made all of the blackboards (including the large menu board which we hung in the alcove).

Flowers

Our flowers were provided by the lovely Kelly who has a stall at Lower Marsh Market near Waterloo Station. I had envisaged doing the flowers myself, I am so glad I didn’t because Kelly did a fantastic job for a very reasonable price and helped transform the venue.

Bridesmaids’ Fashion

The dresses were from Not any Boring Bridesmaids Dress Shop. The shop is run by Polly who you can tell genuinely loves what she does and because the shop is dedicated to bridesmaids’ dresses it has a huge range of really lovely dresses.

Ceremony

We wanted a fun filled ceremony as after all it is supposed to be a happy occasion! I walked down the aisle to the acoustic version of Ave Maria (composed by Bach and Gounod) which is special to me given that I used to play it over and over again on the piano growing up! My grandmother read “To Love is Not to Possess” by James Kavanaugh and a close friend, Howard read “Falling in love is like owning a dog” by Toni Mali.

Entertainment

We had a band (who also came with a DJ for the periods when they weren’t playing) called The Mad Hatters Tea Party. They were recommended by a friend, we had heard them play a pub in Reigate and loved them! If they can rock a small old man’s pub then we didn’t think they would have any problem rocking our wedding! A close friend who is also a very good wedding singer got up on the stage for a few songs, we wanted her to enjoy the wedding rather than have to work, but in the end we got the best of both worlds. Jo also made our cake… she is a jack of all trades!

Food

Food was extremely important to us, and to an extent dictated the venue and our whole day! We booked London’s Pop Up King, Jimmy Garcia who has even appeared on This Morning! Rob wanted to serve curry which I agreed to (mainly because I then had a massive bargaining chip for the rest of the decisions!). We worked with Jimmy to come up with a fantastic unique curry-inspired menu. For desert we had DIY pancakes which went down a storm! A friend told us that the curried lamb was the best lamb he had ever tasted… praise indeed from a farmer’s son!

Photographer

I was keen to have a photographer that didn’t take too many staged photos and after a recommendation we found Sara Dalrymple.

Advice

If you have a lot to plan don’t get overwhelmed. I love a list as much as the next girl, but I avoided writing lists until the last two weeks! Instead I set myself a task per week and then without even realising it I was ticking off things on the list-in-my-head before you knew it! Writing a list at the beginning would have been too overwhelming. Ask your fiancé for his opinion, although narrow down the choices first! He may surprise you! Shop around where you can. The internet is your friend! If organising a holiday of a lifetime is a step too far, postpone it. It’s great to have something to look forward to!