Stef & Dean

Good vibes only pretty much sums up Stef and Dean's relaxed, stylish city wedding. They chose the Clapton Country Club for their reception, which I think is a new venue to RMW? It looks gorgeous though, and certainly one I'd like to see more of. Stef and Dean chose RMW favourite Carrie Lavers to photograph their day, and we're so glad she did. I love her natural, atmospheric style and she always brings the fun too. Enjoy this one loves, if you like industrial styling you're going to swoon over this...

Our Wedding

Stef the Bride: Some of the best advice we were given was to individually write down your top three priorities for the wedding, and combine these as a to make your top 4. A dress never came close to being a key item for me. My mum and I did the bridal boutique experience when she was over from Sydney in 2017, which was amazing to do together as we were 12,000 miles apart for most of the wedding planning process. In the end though, I found a gorgeous and affordable dress online from a designer in Manchester, Frock and Frill. I looked and felt good in it, and it fit the budget.

The Wedding Party

My two best friends, Emma and Bec, were bridesmaids and I couldn’t have asked for funnier, calmer or better people to have in my life, or on the day. We’ve lived and travelled together; they have laughed with me in my highest highs and picked me up from my lowest lows, and they are the women I aspire to be more like. Their dresses were from The Iconic, an Australian e-retailer. Coming from different sides of the world our wedding felt like the one opportunity we had to have all our favourite people in one room. We were truly overwhelmed by how far people travelled to celebrate our next adventure. My closest friends and I hadn’t been in the same room for over 9 years as we’d all moved interstate, overseas or gone travelling at different points. It was so humbling to have them make such an epic effort to come and celebrate with Dean and I, and I will be forever grateful for that.

Asylum Chapel Wedding Ceremony

We toyed with the idea of a festival-style wedding in the countryside, but quickly abandoned that as neither of us wanted to stress about anything, let alone the uncontrollable British weather. Being both lovers of London, we decided on a city wedding, which also made it easy for any people we had travelling from near and far. We wanted a dry-hire wedding to provide our own food and booze in the style of our choosing (and to be honest, to fit our budget). I’d seen the Peckham Asylum in the past and instantly fell in love with it’s beautiful, but broken style. The drama of the stained glass windows and crumbling walls with the romance of an altar filled with flickering candles called to the showman in me. Dean was initially against the venue because of its location, but - true to form - he never objected to anything that made me happy. Mike, our coordinator on the day, was absolutely perfect!

The Clapton Country Club Wedding Reception

We hired a double decker bus through London Retro Bus Hire to get our guests across London via Tower Bridge by pure chance, and everyone loved it, especially everyone who came over from Australia. Our reception was at The Clapton Country Club.

The Decor & Theme

The theme was really to infuse our day with as many personal touches as time and patience would allow. I designed and illustrated all our invitations and stationary, a real labour of love as I’m not naturally artistic, but was so proud of the final outcome. We love coffee, so used coffee cups to serve our ceremony drinks from stamped with our ‘Labbett-Rose’ stamp. The same stamp was also used on our table runners, filled with quotes and untranslatable words about love. My dad built us a bar bike from a vintage bicycle and we served cocktails from this after the ceremony. With the help of family and friends, I handmade paper roses that lined our aisle and we had festoon and fairy lights all throughout the reception venue. Our table names were a selection of favourite cities from our travels, all displayed on a world map table plan.

The Ceremony

Our ceremony was a comedy of errors, from Dean stumbling over his words, Stef snorting with laughter and Carrie, our beloved photographer, taking a tumble half-way through. Ricardo, our registrar, was hilarious himself and made the ceremony full of love and laughter - we couldn’t have asked for more. We also wrote our own vows, which made the ceremony personal too.

The Photographer & Videographer

Top tip: pick vendors who are as excited about your wedding as you are, or at least act it! Carrie was one of our first decisions, and undoubtedly one of our best. Her style of photographs speak for themselves, but her calm, relaxed manner made us feel like we’d invited another friend to the wedding. We also had an engagement shoot with her - whilst this is something I never thought I’d agree to, I’m so happy we did. It put us at ease on the day and made us all the more excited for our wedding. Jade, from Hushabye Films, was another perfect choice. Her fun and bright films are exactly what we wanted - the previews alone are killing me, I can’t wait for the final edit! She was beyond perfect on the day, genuinely like having another friend there. If you haven’t budgeted for a videographer, change that now!

The Food & Entertainment

We went for simple, delicious and filling food so had British picnic style canapes after our ceremony from M&S; pulled pork or beef buns with sweet potato fries from Chop & Chip as our main meal and a grazing station of cheeses for evening food. We had planned more evening food, but they got the date wrong and it never showed, but no-one went hungry. We’d asked some family and friends to bake for our sweet treat station and everyone pulled it out of the bag! Our superstar cake was made by good friend Amy Foy.

{Watch the Film}