Inspiration

Ice-creams and shades at the ready folks as this wedding at Robin Hood's Bay is the epitome of Summer, with gorgeous coastal views, blue skies, quaint shops, and love and happiness everywhere. Taking inspiration from the seaside town lead to the rainbow colour scheme in the marquee reception at Victoria Hotel. What a euphoric happy atmosphere that must have been for guests walking into the wedding breakfast with all those colourful hanging paper lanterns and bright blooms greeting them. Plus Bride Pip in a Jenny Packham Eden gown and maids in white! Now you all know how we feel about these stylish looks. *Swoon*

The Wedding

Pip the Bride: The place of marriage was the stunning bride’s childhood village of Robin Hood’s Bay. We wanted a laid back wedding made up of everything that we loved! This meant lots of handmade items and involving our family and friends in our day. It developed naturally into a colourful country wedding, with acknowledgement to our home town of Sheffield and a slight nod to the 1920s era!

The Venues

We chose the Victoria Hotel because, even though they do offer packages, they allowed us to hire the venue without a package and do whatever we wanted for the entire day. This was exactly what we had been looking for. This was a very personal venue for me as I went there as a child and even did school coffee mornings there. The hotel was beautifully decorated already with an a 1920’s feel in the main room. The wedding coordinator, Lucy, allowed us free reign to design every aspect of our wedding and helped us to put all our plans in to place. Steve found the Swell Cafe, and I automatically recognised it as yet another childhood venue where I attended many events, and even washed pots there as one of my first jobs. It was great that it now does weddings. We both love a view of the sea whatever the weather and therefore also thought it was perfect with its huge windows overlooking the sea and the amazing views from the terrace garden to have champagne after the ceremony. Once we had a guest list we were realised we would need a marquee attached to the Victoria Hotel. We found one for an amazing price from a local farmer who runs a second business called Tentz. The Groom decorated it himself ourselves with the beautiful lanterns from The Hanging Lantern Company. My now daughter in law and the Groom’s daughter, Ella Jones, individually handmade each name place card with the ribbons we had for our other stationery. She completed 120 of these over her weekends with us and they looked absolutely stunning. Using our ribbons for the colours, the Mother of the Bride (Elizabeth Wise) chose all of the flowers and jars for our natural spring centre pieces and the Mother of the Groom helped her to arrange them all on the day. The Father of the Bride designed all of the table number signs for us using 1920s text to tie in. We printed out a picture of each guest to put at their place. We wrote a message on the back of each one thanking each person for their attendance and the things we appreciated them for. This was our “favour”. The children had some crayons and kinder eggs!

The Dress

I knew that I wanted a dress that I could feel comfortable in and move freely in, as we have a 2 year old son I still wanted to be just as much my son’s Mum on our wedding day as well as being a Bride. I also wanted to enjoy myself and be able to move freely, dance and go on the beach. Of course I still wanted to feel I was wearing the best dress I had ever worn! Before looking, I was completely convinced this was not achievable. By the second dress I tried, I found the Jenny Packham Eden! Such a beautiful dress with 1920’s beaded detail, that was also comfortable. I love the Gatsby trend that is popular at the moment but did not want a themed wedding. I fell in love with the dress as soon as I tried it on and no other matched. I wanted a head dress to match the dress and the 1920s/country feel of the wedding that was developing. Joan Brown Vintage Accessories had some beautiful pieces and allowed me to design my own. I was able to tell them what I wanted and they said they could make one for me for a great price. I absolutely love it and wish I could wear it all the time.

The Grooms Attire

The Groom wanted a formal suit with an individual edge. He chose an Indigo suit tailored by Moss Bros with a vibrant floral pattern on the waistcoat back and lining of the jacket. He also chose to have our initials and the date of our wedding embroided in to the inner pocket and added button hole detail and finished stitching to the lapel. He wore a treasured watch which was a present from his parents and his favourite bright socks and pants!

Colour Scheme/Decor

I love vibrant bright colours and always think of Robin Hood’s Bay with it’s beautiful wild spring country flowers which are both vibrant and bright. We chose 6 ribbons for our handmade invitations and this was the start of our “colour scheme”. I also love the nude colours that are in fashion at the moment and wanted the bridesmaids to have a natural look so their flowers really stood out. We sent the same ribbons (hot pink, peach, yellow, royal blue, deep purple and mint green) to The Hanging Lantern Company who put us together a package of lanterns to match in the marquee. The Flower Pot Whitby also used the ribbons to decide our flowers. We asked him for small natural flowers in a “non- arranged arrangement”. He certainly delivered. Our confetti and balloons even matched the ribbons. We tried to do the bright colours in the small details so that it was not overwhelming and brash.

Flowers

We wanted natural flowers that reflected our none regimented approach to our wedding. Tim at the Flower Pot did an excellent job of delivering this for the bridesmaid posies, brides bouquet, posies in the Swell and the podium in the Swell.

The Wedding Party Fashion


We had bridesmaids of very different ages and it was almost impossible to find a dress that suited them all. We found the gorgeous tulle skirts that they all loved and they chose their own tops to match their body shapes and comfort zones. This meant they feel comfortable and in control of what they were wearing. They all wore neutrals which allowed their bright bouquets to stand out. This was slightly unusual to have the bridesmaids almost matching the bride but we thought it looked great in the end.

Ceremony

It was extremely important to make the ceremony as personal as possible. This was not as easy as we thought as we had a non religious ceremony with many prescribed parts from the council. To make sure it was meaningful we asked my Mum (Elizabeth Wise, Mother of the Bride) read “Desiderata” by Maz Erhmann. This poem is a practical and kind poem about making sure you are grounded, humble and happy. There was no- one better to read it to us. We also used the music throughout the ceremony to express our feelings from Pachelbel Cannon in D (walking in), Amy Winehouse – To Know Him Is To Love Him, Fleetwood Mac - Everywhere and Walk the Moon – Shut Up and Dance (exit). We wanted to have our personalities reflected throughout the ceremony. We had an outtake from Philip Pullmans, Amber SpyGlass on our homemade Order’s of Service starting with “I will love you forever; whatever happens.”

Entertainment


We had a swing band, Tessa and the Applejacks before and after the food to keep guests entertained through the quieter periods such as when we were having our photos taken. We did not use them for our first dance as we wanted to use the original track, but they were excellent and matched our 20s laid back approach. TomFoolery’s photo booth provided so much entertainment throughout the evening for all ages. We thought that the photo booth might have been overdone, but we are so pleased we went for it anyway. Everyone had a great time.

Food

Our menu was down to earth traditional RHB food, chips and ice cream. 
The cake was a present from my Grandma and Aunty, neither of us saw it until the day and we were absolutely blown away! We absolutely loved it and spent lots of time identifying landmarks from Sheffield. We loved that it looked just like the urban artist McKee’s poster which was also displayed with the cake. It tasted amazing as well!

Photographer


Navy Blur were the first piece of our wedding puzzle to fall in to place. We found their photographs online and absolutely loved their photographs. We thought that their style suited us as they are quirky, bright, non- conventional yet sincere. After speaking with them we were more convinced. Their attitude was laid back and they understood our family values. On the day they became our wedding mentors, they reassured us before the ceremony, made us feel amazing during their photo sessions and our hour with them immediately after being married was extremely special to us. We felt we got to be together alone, even though they were with us. Our guests also loved them.

Videographer


Gracie Films is a friend of father of the bride, a present from him.
Charlotte O'Shea

Written by Charlotte O'Shea

Bridal Gown: Jenny Packham Eden | Bridal Shoes: Jenny Packham | Headpiece: Joan Brown Vintage Bridal Accessories | Wedding Bands: Tiago Jewellery | Venue: The Victoria Hotel | Swell Cafe | Marquee: Tentz Marquee | Florist: The Flower Pot | Lanterns: The Hanging Lantern Company | Confetti: Confetti Lane UK on Etsy | Cake: Connies Cakes | Band: The Applejacks | Photo Booth: Tom Foolery Photo Booth | DJ: Pete Crossier | Groom Suit: Moss Bros | Grooms Shoes: Kurt Geiger | Page Boy: Oliver Childrenswear | Bridesmaids Tulle Skirts: Elsie's Attic | Bridesmaid Tops: H&M | Topshop | Flower Girl Dresses: Light in the Box | Videographer: Grace Films

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