The Prettiest Tea Party…Part 1

There is no denying I am a sucker for a beehive hair-do for W-day. And Danielle’s voluminous locks teamed with a statement pink peony is quite simply one of the greatest versions I have ever seen. Then of course there is the dreamy layered princess-esque gown and the waiting-list only Laboutins…

Yep. This lady has got style by the bucket load folks.

Danielle and Kevin were married at St Margaret’s church in Downham, Essex with a tea-party styled reception in the Danielle’s parent’s garden.

You gorgeous lot are going to just LOVE it.

All of the lovely images are by Love Lust List member Jon Mold.

Retro Beauty

My hair was done by my friend and regular hairdresser Jaid Cordery – I knew she had done a lot of wedding hair and I asked her if she would be up for helping me on the wedding day.

I felt much more comfortable having someone I was familiar with as I’m not a big fan of going to the hairdressers – my nan had the same hair style when she got married.
We had great laughs with the hair piece Jaid made to go in my hair in the run up to the wedding and named it Barry….it was like a pet.

My Make up was done by Bernice Beaumont, I was worried about finding a make up artist as I’ve never really liked my make up when it had been done before, she was recommended to me and before the trial was even finished I knew she was perfect, I was so pleased with her and the end result. She did a fantastic job on the girls and my mum as well.

Lovely Surprises

I always knew I would have a veil and what that would be like long before I chose my dress. I described what I wanted to the lady in the bridal shop and she went and found one for me that was exactly the same as in my head. I wanted a classic retro looking veil, It was a medium length plain with a white silk trim.

I had a pink peony in my hair that my florist wired for me. I wanted to keep it simple as the hair was so big, so I wore a pair of pearl earrings my bridesmaids bought for my 30th birthday. My granddad bought me a beautiful pearl set for my 21st birthday and I’d always said I’d get married wearing them but I was devastated when they were stolen, so the girls replaced them for me for my 30th. We all cried our eyes out when I opened them.

Kevin surprised me on the morning of the wedding with a beautiful dainty pearl tiffany bracelet…..he’d given it to my mum to give to me in the morning and he asked her to give it to me as we were leaving for church. She was way to excited and gave it to me first thing, I’m glad she did now as his note had us all crying.

As a little surprise for him I asked Jon Keith (Jon Keith Diamonds) who’d made our rings to engrave a little personal message to Kev in his and managed to keep it from him until the wedding morning when I wrote him a card and told him to look inside.

A Short Story

My dress designer was Paloma Blanca. The dress was one of things I was panicking about the most, I felt such worry that I would never find a dress to suit me as I’m so small. The Paloma Blanca dress was the only one I was interested in trying on really, before I’d even left the changing room my heart started beating really fast when I looked down at all the ruffles. Everyone burst out crying, and declaring this was the one.

I did have a wobbly few months whilst my dress was being made wondering if I’d made the right decision and can’t count the amount of times I stared at it on my computer screen but as soon as I went for my final fitting I knew I’d made the right decision… Plus I surprised EVERYONE including Kev with my choice. They all expected me to be wearing a short dress which is my usual style.

The Talk Of The Town

I still get SO excited about my shoes. This was the most enjoyable, exciting part for me. I took my nan shoe shopping with me as she is not only a brilliant shopping partner she loves a pair of shoes as well…When anyone asked about the wedding and my dress I would say ‘its all about the shoes’, I went on about those shoes so much, I think that’s another reason people thought I’d be wearing a short dress!

When we got back to the house from having our photographs taken everyone was asking to take photos of the shoes ha ha!!, they really were the talk of the afternoon.

I went for skyscraper Louboutins. They are hand made in a slight off white lace, peep toe platforms with a little bow on the front and obviously the bright red sole.
They were blue inside which I loved as well. There are the only pair in the country in that colour and I had to go on a waiting list for them, there were about 4 people in front of me on the list and it’s a miracle I managed to get them. I was the happiest girl in the world when I bought them home and was so excited I showed Kev straight away, I didn’t know or care if that was bad luck.

Falling In Love With Fashion

We wanted to buy the groomsmens suits but in the end it was really hard to get the colour and material we wanted to go with Kev’s suit that was being made. We wanted a mod feel for all the men and found a brilliant little local suit company who had the most perfect Navy Suits in Tonic Mohair – which was exactly what we wanted so we hired those and bought their shirts from Savile Row – Kev was very particular about the collar they had!

I originally wanted the girls in all different colour/style dresses, but they ended up all falling in love with the same dress from Dessy, we got some big flowers on dressy online that we attached to their dresses. I found the most gorgeous shoes from Karen Millen and once again they all fell in love with the same shoes so they ended up all wearing the same. I was so jealous of their shoes even with my gorgeous Louboutins. They were a dusky/pale vintage pink.

Vintage Inspired Blooms

The flowers were by The Flower Mill – Karen had done one of my bridesmaids wedding flowers a month or so before ours. I was SO happy with the results and we got so many fantastic compliments on the flowers. Before I went to see Karen I must admit I wasn’t excited about the flowers, but after being with her for ten mins that had completely changed. I wanted a real vintage feel with the flowers and a complete mish mash to go with everything else in the tent – we didn’t have a colour scheme so it was anything goes.

My bouquet was a mix of pale pink Peonies, vintage spray roses, Amnesia Roses, Ivory Trachelium, vintage pink Hydrangea, Pink pin cushion flowers and Ivory Spray roses.

As I don’t really like matchy matchy we decided to pick each of the flowers out of my bouquet for the button holes so everyone had a different one. Kev had a vintage rose for his.

The girls had a smaller version of my bouquet with mainly white Amnesia Roses and pink vintage roses, all the bouquets were all hand tied with lace.

Dressed To Kill

Kev’s suit and shirt was handmade by Dressed to Kill – he wanted a mod style suit and spent ages choosing the colour and fabric. He went for a Kid Mohair suit in Two tone blue. Kev chose all the details and had his initials sewn into the shirt cuffs and our names and date sewn in to the jacket. They got it wrong at first…it looked like he was marrying himself, which was a bit of a worry.

He had flashes of red stitching in the suit collar and had a blue button on the shirt cuffs so he didn’t have to wear cuff links. Kev wasn’t going to show me his suit until the wedding day but couldn’t resist trying it on a couple of days before, I was so pleased with all the choices he made, it fitted him perfectly and was the most dapper I’d seen him look. He said that he felt like he was getting married when he put it on. Looking at old pictures it’s really similar to the suit his dad wore when he married his mum.

I was SO excited to see him, one of our ushers came to the house to collect the buttons holes and I jumped on him asking how Kev was, really worried he’d be stressed or nervous….he told me he was absolutely fine and was clowning around…..obviously just me panicking then.

When I saw him standing at the alter I nearly burst out crying…I think I was just so relieved to see him and I’d really been trying to hold it together, I don’t know how I did. Thankfully we started with a hymn and he started giggling, what a pair, him giggling and me on the verge of full on sobs.

Photography – Jon Mold assisted by Kim Hawkins

Brides Gown – Paloma Blanca

Brides Shoes – Christian Laboutin

Grooms Suit -Dressed to Kill

Maids Dresses -Dessy

Florist – The Flower Mill

See? The greatest beehive In. The. World

And just wait until you see part 2…. so many detail ideas to steal!

Big Statement Peony Love

Charlotte xxx