Welcome to the bright and beautiful big day of Claire and Jonathan, our first little piece of W-day retro pretty. Claire chose a 50′s-esque gown from Fur Coat No Knickers which she had “pimped” (her words!) to perfection and Jonathan went for a suit in the style of Sean Connery’s James Bond in the famous 1960′s film Goldfinger.
And if the fabulous fashion wasn’t enough Claire and Jonathan mixed old school cinema decor with contemporary colour pop blooms and a generous helping of personalisation. Love.
Oh and they chose what is possibly one of the cleverest (and funniest) ways of allocating people to their table that I have ever seen (have a peek at the end of the post if you want to join in…)
All of the quirk is courtesy of the Queen of Kitsch Julia Boggio.
Making A Style Statement
It really was the hair and make up that brought it all together. Jo Neilsen is a freelance make up artist who is an old friend and she was an absolute genius. We decided we needed a statement ‘do and it was actually Sadie who suggested the blonde hairpiece to make the side bun – I was a peroxide blonde for many, many years and it was a nod to that and it really worked. The amazing hair combined with the simple, yet immaculate make up really made the look work and I didn’t have to touch it up once.
I wore my Nanna’s pearl necklace and bracelet. The girls at FCNK sourced a fabulous diamante brooch to decorate the back of my sash and I had diamante pins in my hair to match.
Pimp My Gown
The girls at Fur Coat No Knickers created my dress. I knew I couldn’t carry off a traditional wedding dress and after a couple of disappointing visits to “proper “ wedding dress shops a friend recommended FCNK. As soon as we got in there I knew this was the place for me. I was worried that being on the larger side there wouldn’t be any vintage dresses to fit me but Laura and Emma were fabulous. We settled on what I lovingly called my “Corpse Bride” dress. It started life as a very long, high necked, long sleeved gown with gorgeous vintage lace and the girls “pimped” it to perfection. Although I love 50’s dresses I didn’t want to feel as if I was dressing up so we decided to go for the quirky graduation at the back which I loved. You can never really see what you look like in your dress until you see the photos and I absolutely loved it.
The Perfect Platform
My shoes were Jimmy Choos!! Gorgeous sparkling platform peeptoes. I am a nightmare when it comes to shoes as everything hurts! My bridesmaid Sadie almost killed me several times when we thought we had found “the ones” only for them to “pinch a bit here” or “rub a bit there”. The Choos were amazingly comfy, looked fab and didn’t make me tower over Jonathan. Perfect.
The Name’s Bond
We asked the ushers and best man to wear grey suits and white shirts. We picked the ties from Duchamp and they worked perfectly even though Jonathan wasn’t sure about wearing a pink, flowery tie to start off with!
Jonathan got his 3 piece suit made for him by October House and it fitted him perfectly. He chose the style of Sean Connery’s grey suit in Goldfinger – his favourite film.
A Cinema Ceremony
We couldn’t have confetti so I also made lots of ribbon wavers and signs saying “woo hoo”, “yay” and “Mr and Mrs Grant” for people to wave after the ceremony. I put everything in popcorn boxes and left them on the chairs in the ceremony room.
There was a display table with a brilliant sign I found on Etsy saying You Are The Gin To My Tonic, some vintage “C” and “J” playing card cards and also displaying our invitations which we got from Royal Steamline – we had different ones for the day and evening and the evening ones were perfect with a black and white chequerboard design to match the floor in the Temple.
Flowers And Fairy Lights
Athena at Rebel Rebel did my flowers and what a job she did! Andaz as a venue has a lot of features and each room is totally different so it didn’t need much decoration – just something to make it look a bit more weddingy! I had decided on pink, yellow and red as my colour scheme as I thought these colours would go with every room. The ceremony room is all pale blue and cream with a big bold print on the wall. When we went to see Rebel Rebel it was around valentine’s day and they had the big, red heart made from fairy lights in their window – I loved it and we agreed we could have this in the fireplace for the ceremony rather than plinths or flowers. The fairy light theme continued for dinner and we had gloriosa lilies suspended in water with little waterproof lights in them – it looked fabulous.
Jonathan had a single gloriosa lily as his button hole and the wedding party had a mix of red, pink and yellow roses. My usherettes had beautiful wrist corsages in contrasting colours and Sadie had an amazing bouquet of spiky dahlias that matched her dress perfectly. My bouquet was full of pink, yellow and red spiky dahlias and it was exactly what I had imagined.
Bold Brights
My girls followed the colour scheme brilliantly and were quite happy that I had decided against the traditional bridesmaid dresses. As there were three, we had a pink, a yellow and a red. Sadie bagsied the red being chief BM and we found the perfect thing in Karen Millen and even got the matching red and pink shoes. My usherettes Heather and Abby got their dresses from ASOS and we decided on gold shoes to match mine. As thank you gifts I got the girls vintage pearls to wear that also matched me.
The Right Decision
After listening to (and seeing) so many horror stories about poor photography at weddings, I knew that having a great photographer was an absolute must. After deciding and booking Andaz as our venue I knew I wanted Julia Boggio to take our photos as she had shot the Andaz brochure which was stunning. Jonathan and I went to visit Julia and her husband James at their studio in Wimbledon and we knew immediately we had made the right choice. We had a lot in common with regards to loving films and everything vintage and we booked immediately. It was absolutely the right decision and the photos really speak for themselves.
I had also seen Julia’s wonderful Vintage Boudoir package and I knew this would make the perfect gift for Jonathan. About 3 months before the wedding I snuck off to Wimbledon for a fabulous day of being transformed in to a 50’s supermodel and we had so much fun at the shoot. After the shoot I went back for a viewing session with James and we decided on a beautiful brochure featuring 10 prints for me to present Jonathan with on the morning of the wedding. Choosing the final shots to be put in the book was really hard so I had another image enlarged and framed. I asked Sadie to hang this in our bedroom whilst we were on honeymoon so when we got home it was another surprise for Jonathan. He was blown away!
A Plan Of Pornstars
I really wanted there to be a DIY element to the day so I decided to make my own orders of service, place cards and table plan. Jonathan and I thought it would be funny to put everyone’s names down using their porn names (first pet and Mother’s maiden names) – there were some crackers.
I also made two very big boards full of photos of everyone who was at the wedding surrounded by red, yellow and pink hearts. This was really to give people something to look at and feel part of the day during the reception – it was a great conversation starter!
Magical Music
Our first dance was “To The End” by Blur. On holiday last year we were talking about the key pieces of music we needed to have for the wedding – going down the aisle, coming back up the aisle and of course, first dance. We decided to let the iPod decide and hit shuffle and decided that the next three songs would be the ones we would use. What a lovely story that would have been but the first song was Gold Digger by Kanye West and I think another was a song from Les Mis so it didn’t really work. However after a few attempts “To The End” came on and we knew we had to have it especially as we were going to be in the Temple and it had that wonderful ethereal sound that made it very magical indeed.
The other two songs we had were for walking down the aisle – You Only Live Twice by Nancy Sinattra (my Mum heard it on the radio and knew it would be perfect – she was right) and One Day Like This by Elbow for when we walked down the aisle together married after having seen their epic set at Glastonbury this year.
Having Your Favourites
I decided to make the cake myself – firstly as part of budgeting and secondly because I love baking and cooking and thought it was worth giving it a go. The girls came round the day before and we all made it together – it was lots of fun and we were very impressed with how it looked. It didn’t form part of the meal so was really just a gesture to cut. It was chocolate with rich chocolate buttercream and fresh raspberries and we had it with the evening buffet.
We also had a pork pie cake. I am a major pork pie fan so to have this was really my dream (yes really). Jonathan’s parents sourced the three tiers locally and each were different – pork and apple, pork and pickle and plain pork. Sadie got the little piggies and made their wedding attire and the picnic blanket and it really was the star of the show.
Important Advice
It’s your day – do what you want. Remember you will only get to do it once and you don’t want to think back and say I really wish we had done that now.. better to regret something you did do rather than you didn’t do.
Pick your battles – there will be some. Whether its with parents, suppliers or between the two of you – think about how much you really, really want it. If your gorgeous groom really doesn’t want to wear pink socks that’s probably OK, but if you are adamant he must, must wear a grey and not a blue suit that is probably the one to go for.
Going DIY is brilliant and is a great budget trimmer – if you enjoy making and doing then do it, but don’t get stressed about it and don’t let it take over your life. Of course you want the day to be perfect but will people really notice if you hand sew every single one of the invitations in thread that is exactly the same colour as your lipstick? Will people really be upset if their order of service is a fraction of a millimetre smaller on one side than the person next to them? Probably not. Attention to detail is great, but enjoying the planning and fun leading up to your wedding is better!
Get a good team around you. I honestly couldn’t have done the wedding without my bridesmaid Sadie, my usherettes and my Mum. They weren’t all involved all the time but they each had a big part to play in their own certain way. And of course, involve your groom. Jonathan wasn’t a particularly hands on groom and even if yours isn’t tell him what you are planning and what you are worried about. Jonathan brought me back down to earth so many times and made me remember we were getting married and not putting on a big production – he kept me grounded.
Brides Gown – Fur Coat No Knickers
Brides Shoes – Jimmy Choo
Grooms Suit – October House
Photography – Julia Boggio
Maids Dresses – ASOS
Venue – Andaz
Stationery – Royal Steamline
Blooms – Rebel Rebel
So what is your “Porn star” name (first pet + mothers maiden name)? mine is Poppy Meredith, Vix’s is Sophie Llewellyn and Adam’s is… Flopsy Wedgebrow.
No – I’m not even kidding.
Don’t forget you can win a sexy camera or London notebook for leaving some love on this post folks!
Big I’ll Have Mine With Ice And Lemon Love
Charlotte xxx
Tara Gale…
Brilliant, but as Mike and his family have never had pets *true… and I still find this weird* not an option for us! But bloddy brilliant idea! Love the colours in this wedding
Tara Gale…
As Mike and his family have never had pets *true… and I still find this weird* not an option for us! But bloddy brilliant idea! Love the colours in this wedding
The Andaz is one of my favourite hotels (it would be a strong contender for if we could have our wedding day all over again
)
Such a gorgeous wedding, fabulous.
And…my porn star name would be: Minty Beaumont!!
xoxo
Her hair and make up and dress and shoes and EVERYTHING are perfect! This wedding is the most fabulous wedding I have ever seen. What a BEAUTIFUL bride!! xx
Claire’s makeup is absolutely exquisite – how gorge does she look?!
Such a cool wedding – and adore the porn star table plan. Mine would be Chip Allen (Chip was a gerbil). xx
Porn star name “Mina Maribel”!! jaja
It’s the most fun and original table plan I’ve ever read. As a guest to read your name you know you’re at the most fun wedding you’ve ever attended to. Great!
I love EVERYTHING about this wedding so much it almost hurts…
Red hair and red nails is always a winner for me, and the dress is just too gorgeous (*runs off to book a FCNK appointment…*). I’ve just suggested to my other half we have a ‘grooms pork-pie cake’ and he wept with joy, and am shamelessly stealing the porn-star-name-table-plan (not quite sure how we are going to explain that to the kiddiwinks, but still…)
Huge great awesome-wedding round of applause
Just amazing!
I would be Cindy Horton. Love the table plan idea!
What a gorgeous wedding – seriously loving the colour scheme!!
Brilliant table plan – would love to do it, just not sure how well it would go down with my VERY Christian side of the family (could I just not tell them what it meant??!) Haha.
My porn star name would be Missy McRae!
Fab wedding, massive congratulations xx
pixie pinnington… and proud of it.
very original idea!
Sophie Pickles…
Love this wedding, it looks like it was such a fun day. And that table plan is just genius.
Xx
duke hudson – which might be ok if i was a dude…! Love the 2nd to last picture (of the couple) she looks like she’s literally walking on air!
Above everything else…I adore the bride’s hair! I love seeing a ginger bride!
Fab alternative to confetti as well!
Porn star name…Misletoe Rigby…sheer class!
Mine is Cheeky Orbell – love the Flopsy one hahaha!
She’s right – the make-up just makes it! Who was it that did it? Very retro siren…
My ‘porn name’ sounds like a librarian, curiously.
I am loving that table plan! I am always quite proud of my name…marsha mellor! (Marsha…the best rabbit there ever was…)
also having hair envy…currently very blonde after spending 2 years with fire truck red hair I am loving the hair on this bride!
congrats on a beautiful wedding!
x
Everything about that wedding looks amazing!
love this wedding and very much looking forward to more from retro week!!! right up my street!!! bring on some serious inspiration!!!!
Hmm, you can call me Humphrey Barber. A bit too masculine for my liking.
This bride has the best hair ever!
Love her dress and the colour scheme. Makes me feel more confident in my decision to go for bold bright colours for our day.
I had 2 little fish for my first pets, so I can choose between Cleo and Monstro Smith depending on my mood?!?
Fabulous wedding and photography.
Love the pornstar seating plan..mine would be Fluffy Long!!!
Bloomin’ Lovely!!
Such a beautiful Bride – I lurve the hair, make up and dress. If I had the chance to do it all again this would be the look I’d go for.
As for the table plan? G.E.N.I.U.S.
Love this wedding, beautiful dress and brilliant table plan! Mine would be Snooky Atkinson (not so sexy, huh?)
Great original photos, beautiful couple and awesome idea for table plan. How did you explain it to the grandparents though? I’d be a bit worried about asking my granny what her porn name would be but knowing her she’d have the best one and be proud of it!
Congrats on your wedding
Love Mopsy Marston. (Rebecca) xx
Sian Harburn + Jimmy Choo TLA x
Such beautiful colours to brighten up a dreary Monday afternoon!
I also love the alternative to confetti idea, we’re also not allowed confetti at our venue which I was a bit disappointed about but this could have solved my problem!
Xxx
P.S. Mine would be Judy Spray :S (Judy as in Punch and Judy, the best goldfish in the world!)
The dress is amazeballs! i love the wee cinema nood with the goodies in the popcorn boxes….a great alternative if you are having a venue that does not allow confetti…genius! I really would love the fairy lights heart for my W-day…although i am not a big heart fan i love it!
Ruddy delightful!
And SOOOO many smiles = perfection!
Loving the popcorn boxes. A very cool and stylish wedding. Some unique ideas and great advice too!
Amazing wedding! What type of jimmy choos are they?x
that red hair is stunning on a bride!! And my pornstar name would be: Bobbins Linden x x
Woop this is my venue!!!
Cannot wait to get married there! Love the popcorn boxes with the little flags… and of course the amazing Julia Boggio!!! xxx
Oh and my porn star name is Poppy Cox!! Isnt that the best!! xx
The pornstar names is a really original and funny idea!
Such a happy colour scheme! LOVE the bridesmaids in different colours looks perfick!
Xx
@Adam – another Flopsy here!! Flopsy Way!
I love this wedding – the colours and ideas are sheer genius!
xxx
Oooo flags in a popcorn tub, what a quirky idea! In fact I could steal this and put my pin wheels inside them! Also I LOVE the dress, it has the same hem line as mine!
x
Midnight Smith…
What an amazing wedding! As I scrolled through the pictures and read the words I kept thinking I’ll have to comment on this, this, this and this… Instead of rewriting the entire post I’ll just say that it’s all brilliant!!!
And as soon as my other half gets home I will tell him all about the Pork Pie cake. He’s already told me he wants one of those!
Your dress is beautiful! You look absolutely stunning!
I love love love the popcorn boxes thinking of how I can steal that one and twist it so suits my day, oh and of course the porn star table plan
Claire looks amazing! I wish I could pull off red lippie with such aplomb… What an all round gorgeous wedding. I def need a ‘You’re the gin in my tonic’ sign for my flat, and a gin and tonic, just generally
Wow, what a beautiful, fun and vibrant looking wedding! You have given me some amazing ideas, well I want to steal them all to be honest
Thank you xx
Geoffery Porter – confusing for a lady pornstar!
Absolutely beautiful wedding, love love x
Such a beautiful wedding!
And my porn name is Mocha McNair. hehe. xx
I really enjoyed reading this post every idea they had was unique and personal which I’m sure made for an amazing wedding. I love when a wedding shows off the characters of the couple and this definitely does.
Oh and my porn star name – snowy Laurenson – absolute pants xx
Mine is Geoffery Porter – bit confusing for a lady pornstar!
Absolutely beautiful wedding, love love xxx
My porn star name is Geoffery porter…bit confusing for a lady! I think that is a genius idea. What a beautiful wedding, love love LOVE! X
Love these! They look so cool and I love the idea that you have to wait while the film is processed to see how the photographs will turn out! Can’t wait to get my hands on one and start clicking!
Love these! They look so cool and I love the idea that you have to wait while the film is processed to see how the photographs will turn out! A real/reel (!) test of patience! Can’t wait to get my hands on one and start clicking!
Love having the comparison against the digital and the analogue.. I’m with you, love the balloons..
Richie Hammond..
Love the DIY of this wedding, looks like they really took their time and thought of everything!
Love the cameras! Photos with heart!
Hello, I’m Jessie Coker (actually has a ring to it!) Love the dress here is absolutely gorgeous and the colour pops. PS can I have you hair?!?!
These are pretty things indeed, I love already
Lomography, pornography (talking about the names from the post before, nothing pervie!) lovin’ the ‘ography’s today.
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Joan Holloway from Mad Men – the bride is a dead ringer except cooler, that blonde twist is epic!
What a gorgeous colourful stylish sunny joyful inventive wedding.
I am loving retro week!
Those flowers are pretty amazing – I’ve never seen anyone use ones quite like that!
I love the photo with the confused man waving the flags and bits would have a lot of that if was my family! Looks like a lot of fun was had and love celebrated! My name would be Dotty eagle (or spotty they were both fish but obviously dotty was my fav…not just because it makes a better name!…do fish even count as pets?!)
My pornstar name would be Goldie McShane.
Bit too close to Goldie Chain for my liking.
This wedding is amazing. Exactly what I needed to brighten up my rather rubbishy afternoon. That, a tuna melt and a big cup of tea!!
What a great Wedding Theme! Love the photos.
Frank Davies…..hmmm not sure my pornstar name would get me many gigs!! Haha great idea though! Xx
Wow! I am going to buy one of those prints for my living room and I am also totally going to “borrow” the idea of those flags for my confetti free day as well!
haha – I shall forthwith be known as Piti Cordes. What a great idea…perhaps could be transposed to titles/ credits in people’s wedding films, too…
aargh…can’t even spell my real name any more, should have been ‘ines’ x
Oh Pork Pie cake! Yummers!!! What a gorgeous wedding, the bride has got more than a bit of a Christina Hendricks vibe going on! HOT! I have to admit, I was hoping you’d have a couple of the boudoir shots on here as well!
Love, JR Barakat x (pornstar name)
This wedding seems like it would have been really fun to go to. Porn * names is a great idea – mine is (and I kid you not!!) Pussy Wigg!
Love love love her beautiful dress, wedding seems informal and relaxed, so you know, its gonna be memorable one
. Pork pie cake, what a winner!!! X
So lovely and different and true to them which is so nice – I love the dress and the hair, I’m a redhead it’s the best hair colour!! I will definitely try and stop worrying about what I think other people will think and concentrate on what we want – like you say I’d rather regret doing something than not doing it at all R xxx
Love, love, love it! So much pretty going on; the dress, the flowers, jimmy choo shoos and awesome red hair. Adore the Lomography. Pornstar names made me chuckle – mine’s Honey Khunmana – rocking! x
What beautiful dress!
What a sensational and joyful wedding! They are just beaming.
Ooooh had me a little moment when I saw the pork pie tower!! Love me a packet of flying saucers BUT a with a savoury feast you can’t go wrong. Gorgeous, retro, stealworthy loveliness. Thank you!
Gorgeous wedding. That dress is just gorgeous!
The table plan is a genius and very funny idea, I would be Honey Higgins! after Honey the hamster.
As a FCNK Jimmy Choo bride myself *MASSIVE HIGH FIVE* you look utterly amazing and absolutely gorgeous! xx
That dance floor is calling to me!
Sorry to be slow but can anyone tell me what the black cards are for with the colourful ribbon – they look very stylish but I can’t work out what they’re for. Thanks.
My porn star name would be Smokey McCarthy! I would love to get hold of your makeup artist but can’t find her when I google!
if possible could you let me know her web page or e mail address? Thanks! Edel