It’s holiday season on the blog, and as our editorial team take a break to rest, recover and enjoy an Aperol spritz or two ahead of our super busy autumn season, we’ll be recapping our favourite weddings and styled shoots from the year that shall not be named on our pretty pages.
Check back daily for all the inspo, and to see if your big day or creative vision made it into our top ten picks!
If you’re in need of a mood enhancer, prepare to be elevated to a whole new level of happiness today as we share the fabulously bright and crazily beautiful wedding of Suzie and Rosie.
Taking place at dreamy rural venue Barmbyfield Barns in Pocklington, North Yorkshire, it was third-time lucky on their wedding date for these lovely ladies. Having originally booked a spring celebration, they were then shunted around the 2020 calendar due to Covid restrictions until they found a date that would enable them to have at least 30 guests.
In the end, they tied the knot on 26th September, rearranging the event at just three days notice. Not that you would know from looking at their awesome photos! There’s not an anxious expression in sight; instead, Suzie and Rosie are positively beaming, and every inch of their wedding looks executed to perfection.
Mirroring their upbeat attitudes, the day was an explosion of colour and fun with a pom-pom led theme and uber-vibrant colour scheme lifting all the spirits. We are totally in love with the dried flower bouquets and decorations in a tropical palette of hot pink, tangerine and sunshine yellow. The feel-good vibes continue with bright ribbons, balloons and paper lanterns popping against the barn’s natural features.
We must also praise Suzie and Rosie’s gorgeous choices of dresses, projecting their individual style and yet complementing one another to a tee. So, let’s not delay this fine fiesta of love any further as the newlyweds are here to fill us in on all the details…
With images by Hamish Irvine Photographer.
PROPOSAL
Rosie says: We got engaged in July 2018. When I got home from work, Suzie led me out into our garden where she had set up hundreds of candles and jars of my favourite flowers; it looked so beautiful. She asked me to read a collection of postcards strung between fairy lights and photographs. Each postcard spoke about our relationship and our journey as a couple. The final postcard said “will you marry me?” and was attached to a gift bag with a ring inside. We celebrated with a bottle of champagne and a takeaway pizza.
SETTING
Our original date was 11th April 2020. We picked this date due to it being the bank holiday weekend and in the school holidays, which would allow us to celebrate for longer. However, due to COVID-19, this got cancelled just weeks before the big day. So we postponed it to 17th October 2020. As the date got closer it was clear we would not be able to have the day we had originally planned, but we felt optimistic that an intimate wedding with 30 guests would still be a special day.
Due to the further changes in COVID-19 restrictions implemented in September, we were then going to be limited to just 15 guests. This would have meant that our immediate families wouldn’t have been able to attend. As such, we rearranged the whole wedding in three days so it could take place on 26th September 2020, allowing us to have our 30 guests.
We got married at Barmbyfield Barns in Pocklington. We knew we wanted a barn venue and instantly fell in love when we visited Barmbyfield Barns. We loved that it was a DIY venue, meaning we could put our own spin on decorating. We visited several other venues, but when talking about our dream wedding, we always found ourselves coming back to Barmbyfield Barns, so we knew it was the right venue for us. We loved that there was a separate barn for the ceremony and reception so we could set up the day before and not have to change the room around on the day. We also loved how easy going, knowledgeable and friendly the venue owners were, which made us feel super relaxed.
THEME
I love pom-poms and all things colourful, so our day centred around this. We set our friends and family on pom-pom making duties as soon as we got engaged! We wanted the day to be as bright and colourful as possible. Initially, we had planned for pastel shades of pink, green, blue and yellow which was perfect for an Easter weekend wedding. This somehow evolved into bright pink, yellow, orange, gold and silver. Which added bright, vibrant colours to our windy autumn day.
DRESSES
Suzie says: I chose a tea-length dress by Brighton Belle called Albany. I initially wanted something quite simple, but tried this dress on as a bit of a wild card and immediately loved it and couldn’t imagine wearing any other dress. It was purchased from Yorkshire Bridal in Wakefield. The team were great at making any amendments I requested, especially with such short notice in the end.
Rosie says: I wore the Betsy dress by Eliza Jane Howell, which was quite different from the idea I had in my head, but it was perfect for me. I loved the sequin and beaded detail and felt the love hearts were perfectly fitting for a wedding. I wore it with a last-minute veil which felt very bridal and looked amazing in the photographs. I had seen a photo of my dress on Instagram. Heidi at UNVEILED Network Member Lace & Co ordered the dress in especially from the designer for me to try, and I felt like the dress had been made for me. Heidi and the team were great, and nothing was too much trouble. They offered advice on styling and made me feel so special at my appointments.
BRIDESMAIDS
Our eight bridesmaids all wore a navy blue multiway dress from Marks & Spencer. We loved these because of the adaptable styling, which would suit everyone and looked great with our colour scheme. The fact they were also £13 in the sale helped!
BEAUTY
Sadly, due to rearranging so last-minute, our hairdresser was unable to make the new date. Everyone got ready together in the morning and helped each other with their hair. Our makeup artist was Amy George, who we had hired for our original date. She worked super hard to get through everyone in the morning and was a lovely calming presence. Nothing was too much trouble, even last-minute shopping for a specific lipstick and accommodating my demands for glitter and blusher!
PHOTOGRAPHY
Our photographer was Hamish Irvine. We met him at a Brides Up North wedding fair and instantly loved him. His photos were all so bright and colourful and captured the fun and love in each wedding so uniquely. We met him for a drink and hit it off straight away. We felt immediately relaxed around him and had no doubts he was the wedding photographer for us. This was so important to us as we’re not fans of having our photo taken and were worried about feeling awkward/uncomfortable. This was definitely not the case with Hamish, and everyone on the day mentioned how lovely he was. When postponing our original wedding date in April, we picked the October date specifically as he was available too. When we called Hamish and informed him we were planning to rearrange within the next three days; we were over the moon he was free.
We absolutely love our wedding photos and feel like they represent us and our wedding day so perfectly. He even made sure we got our dream sunset pictures and took such windy and miserable weather and turned it into photos full of fun and laughter. We honestly couldn’t recommend Hamish enough!
STYLING
The flowers and centrepieces were by Dottie from Hyde Park Flower Club. When we knew we would be having a more intimate wedding with the plan to have a big party when restrictions ease, we changed from fresh to dried flowers. We had met Dottie early into our wedding planning and loved her enthusiasm for our bright coloured vision. She took on board all our ideas and suggestions throughout the whole planning process and never failed to know exactly what we wanted. We rang Dottie explaining our plans to rearrange for three days time with the hope she would be able to provide any sort of flower arrangement. When Dottie said she would make sure we had the exact flower designs we had asked for, we couldn’t have been happier.
We both carried a large dried flower bouquet including bright pink pampas grass and yellow and orange palm spears. Dottie included pink, yellow and orange ribbons to match in with our bright colour theme. The bridesmaids each carried a small bouquet containing similar stems. The flowers looked amazing, and we received so many compliments for them! We also love the fact we can re-use them for our party and keep them as a memento of the day.
Our florist Dottie decorated the aisle with tall stems of hot pink pampas grass in glass bottles. Each table had a dried flower arrangement matching our colour scheme. There was also a dried flower meadow which was used as a feature in the ceremony, and it was then placed in front of the top table for the reception.
The venue staff had hung a curtain of fairy lights to create a more intimate space for our wedding breakfast and reception. We decorated this with gold tassel curtains, pink and white paper lanterns that hung from the beams and bright coloured balloons. Each table had a silver glitter table runner, gold geometric vases containing brightly coloured homemade pom-poms on sticks. Behind the top table, we had gold hoops decorated with balloons, paper honeycombs and ribbons. The room was filled with brightly coloured candles which added a cosy, relaxed atmosphere. The candlesticks on the top table were handmade by bridesmaid Nikki from Colour&Candle.
CAKE
We had a cake table consisting of two Connie the Caterpillars from Marks & Spencer and a large Battenburg cake made by our caters. Unfortunately, our friend, who was originally making us the wedding cake was unable to make anything as she had tested positive for COVID-19, so Rosie enlisted a colleague for a last-minute bake. Vanessa of Okey Dokey Delicacies made us a two-tiered sprinkle, pastel rainbow cake, which perfectly fit our theme and was delicious.
DINING
We hired UNVEILED Network Member Baba Ganoush for our catering after meeting them at a wedding fair. We picked halloumi fries, mini pies and arancini from their extensive list of canapés. The starter of baked camembert, cured meats and Caprese salad went down amazingly with our guests. We then opted for a sharing board chicken roast dinner as we loved the look, and it matched our informal wedding style. We finished with a duo of desserts so we could both have our favourite, sticky toffee pudding and Eton mess. The food was so delicious; we wish we could hire them for all our meals!
The team at Baba Ganoush went above and beyond with ensuring our meal was perfect, including making sure we had our full menu despite the late notice. Maggie and the team made sure everything ran smoothly and were so attentive.
SPECIAL TOUCH
We decided to have a ‘first look’ before the ceremony as we were so excited to see each other and wanted this to be a more intimate moment just between us. It allowed us to have some time just us two, which we felt was important for the wedding day. It also meant that we could have some photographs taken prior to the ceremony, meaning we wouldn’t have to sneak off during the drinks reception. Especially with the reduced numbers, we didn’t want to be gone for long, and definitely didn’t want to miss out on the canapés and fizz!
THANKS TO
We would absolutely recommend Barmbyfield Barns to anyone looking at getting married.
The venue inside is beautiful, and the rural surroundings make it feel very secluded. With the two indoor barns, bar area, and an outdoor barn/courtyard, Barmbyfield Barns is perfect in any weather and allows guests space to spread out. We loved that the venue allowed us to use all our decorations and didn’t mind the amount of glitter we left behind. Paul and Harriet were great hosts and worked hard to make sure everything was perfect and ran smoothly for our wedding day, so we didn’t have to worry about anything.
All our guests stayed at Coachhouse Cottages the night before and the night of the wedding. Kerry and Amy there were so accommodating, especially with so many last-minute changes to ensure our stay was in line with government guidance. We loved having everyone stay together and getting to make a whole weekend out of it.
We honestly felt like every supplier went above and beyond. Everyone was so happy for us, even with the late notice and made sure we had the best day possible.
BEST BIT
Actually getting married! With all the restrictions and everything going on in the world, we felt at times like the wedding wouldn’t ever happen. So, finally getting to walk down the aisle with our parents and say “I do” felt like a dream come true.
We loved that everything came together in such little time so perfectly, and although some of our closest family/friends (including a bridesmaid) couldn’t make it, it still felt so special.
Neither of us could imagine the day having been any better if things had gone ahead in April. As it was an intimate wedding, we felt like we got to spend precious time with each of our guests and with each other, which we will treasure forever.
We also love knowing that we have a party to look forward to in the future once restrictions are lifted and that we’ll be able to celebrate again with everyone as a married couple. This will include a blessing, a re-run of the amazing speeches and lots of dancing! It will also be a great excuse to wear our dresses again!
HONEYMOON
Our main honeymoon was cancelled due to lockdown and travel restrictions. But we managed to book a few nights away at a cute cottage in North Yorkshire with a hot tub.
We have rearranged our full honeymoon to America for later this year; fingers crossed, we get to go!
ADVICE
Remember what’s important. It’s easy to get swept up in planning the perfect wedding and focusing on current wedding trends. But getting married, with your family and friends there to celebrate with you is the most important thing.
