Today’s beautiful wedding is totally up my street. It’s vintage influenced. Incredibly glamorous, and, it’s a day filled with heartfelt joy, personal details and of course, romance!
Welcome to Gill and Jonny’s vintage gatsby glamour, black tie wedding! Held in a beautiful, shabby chic stately home and with heaps of 20’s props and gorgeous detailing, this is one wedding you’ll be swooning over again and again.
Words by Gill.
We had a bit of a Great Gatsby / vintage themed wedding. The dress code was black tie and we wanted it to feel like a really glamorous party. We hired pieces like a gramophone, typewriter, vintage champagne glasses and had lots of vintage tea lights and candles. All our stationery and signage was inspired by an art deco print.
I ordered a Deborah Moreland veil which was beautiful – it was cathedral length and so light. I found this on an American website, BHLDN. They have the most gorgeous things (I only discovered it a few weeks before my wedding (had I known about it earlier I would have bought lots of accessories from here!).
An important point though is that I had to pay tax when the veil arrived from the US, although it was still cheaper overall than some of the veils I was looking at in the UK. My headpiece was by Donna Crain which was quite vintage / art deco so fit in with the wedding theme.
We had a civil ceremony at Brympton House, Brympton is a 13th century stately home and is really beautiful but in a very relaxed, shabby way. It’s full of character and guests move around to different rooms for each part of the day so there is no turning over rooms etc whilst people wait outside.
It felt different from other venues where I’d attended weddings which is what we wanted. We could also hire it for the whole weekend, keep the bar open as late as we wanted and 40 of our guests could sleep there.
I had nearly 20 dress appointments which was probably excessive! I was starting to get to the stage where I was going back to boutiques to try on some dresses for the second time but was never totally blown away even though I’d seen a few lovely dresses.
When I went to Blackburn Bridal the lovely ladies who work there showed me a new dress that just so happened to be in the shop the day before it was going to a fashion show. I put it on and loved it immediately – it had all of the elements I wanted, sparkly, cap sleeves, a belt and a bit different!
I felt it was fate that it was just there on the day I happened to go in. It was next season’s collection so once it went to the fashion show the next day I wouldn’t be able to try it on again. I just made the decision straight away – I didn’t see it again until a month before the wedding which was a bit scary!
Our florist did such an amazing job of our flowers. We had so many comments about how beautiful they were. I wanted a really elegant and classic look so chose just white flowers with bits of grey and green foliage.
The main flowers were roses, orchids, gypsophilia, ranunculus, tulips with jasmine, eucalyptus and silver brunei. I asked for an oversized bouquet which was huge and quite heavy! The bridesmaids’ bouquets were a smaller version to mine.
We also had some subtle white feathers in the bouquet, button holes and flower displays to add some glamour. I think flowers are really important on the day because they really add to the sense of occasion so we had lots of different displays in the chapel and throughout the house.
My bridesmaids wore floor length navy blue evening dresses from Whistles which they all loved. They were classic, not stretchy or clingy, so they were very happy!
Jonny wore a Thom Sweeney tux which he had custom made. The groomsmen all wore their own black tuxs and Jonny bought them all matching champagne coloured bow ties.
The ceremony was my favourite part of the day. I was so happy to be marrying Jonny and it was so special to see all of our family and friends in the one room whilst we said our vows to each other.
We really put a lot of thought into the wedding ceremony, because we had a civil ceremony we didn’t want it to be over within 5 minutes without any personal touches. Jonny and I both wrote our own vows which I was really nervous about but I am so glad we did.
I worried that I would be too emotional to read them out on the day but actually it was really special reading out our own words in front our friends and family. Everybody was in tears including Jonny and I!
We asked Jonny’s 8 year old nephew to read out the words from The Beach Boys – Wouldn’t it Be Nice. It was so cute and everybody gave him a huge round of applause afterwards.
Even though we didn’t marry in a church we really wanted a song so we asked a friend to sing ‘Ho Hey’ by The Lumineers and Jonny’s nephew to play the guitar. Unbeknown to me Jonny had also planned for all the ushers and best men to stand up half way through the song and sing the chorus whilst playing the drums and tambourines.
Our friend had changed the words to the song so it was personal to us – it was funny and sweet and just made the ceremony so memorable for us. We loved every second of the ceremony and I’ll always remember it. So many of our guests said it was the best ceremony they have been to which is amazing to hear.
We were very lucky to get all of our stationery printed by Jonny’s family who own a printing business. With their help we designed all of our own stationery with an art deco / vintage inspired design.
We carried this design through to all the stationery for the day and had bespoke menus, table plan, place names and orders of service. We used our initials and the date of the wedding as a logo which we printed on all the pieces.
Half of the tables were decorated with large trumpet vases filled with our flowers and white feathers and the other half with silver candelabras, decorated with flowers. All of the tables had lots of vintage tea lights and candles which created a romantic atmosphere. I was really pleased with how lovely the ballroom (where we ate our wedding breakfast) looked.
I spent loads of time looking at favours and couldn’t decide what to do. As the wedding approached I decided to shelve favours altogether and save the time and expense of them. I didn’t feel they would add much to the day and I was wasting too much time thinking about them!
Our table names were the surnames of famous Gillian’s and Jonny’s – for example, we had tables named Depp, Rotten, Taylforth etc. Our guests were a bit confused at first.
Our wedding photographer was Matt Parry. He was brilliant and such a great guy to have around on the day. We were thrilled with our pictures, we look so happy and they really captured the moments during the day.
There was a beautiful sunset whilst we were having our photo shoot. It was so romantic and lovely wandering around outside together.
I ordered a mixed sponge, three tier Marks and Spencer cake. Our florist brought along extra flowers to decorate each tier and it looked lovely. We didn’t want to spend lots of money on a cake which nobody really pays attention to. I would really recommend this cake – it was delicious and such good value for money.
My Dad’s speech moved me to tears and Jonny’s speech just blew me away.
We had a pianist during the ceremony, a singer and pianist during reception drinks and an 8 piece funk and soul band in the evening. The pianist played Elvis Costello ‘She’ to walk down the aisle to which was lovely.
The band was The White Keys and they provided all of the entertainment during the day and night. They are a very cool outfit and were fantastic on the day.
We also printed a huge backdrop to be used as a photo booth area in the evening – this was covered in our logo and was rather red carpet-esque! We bought lots of 1920’s dressing up props and we have some brilliant photos of our guests.
Our first dance was also one of my favourite moments – we chose Starship Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now. It was a cheesy song choice but we wanted a fun, light-hearted first dance.
I was nervous about the first dance but actually it went brilliantly. It was so much fun and our guests were jumping around and singing along.
I know everybody says this but really just try and take everything in. The day passes unbelievably quickly so enjoy every moment and make sure you spend lots of time with your husband.
What a corker of a wedding huh?! Massive congrats to the gorgeous Gill and Jonny. Please do leave them some blog love.
I’m sure you’re also going to be wanting to steal lots of their wedding ideas. I love their table names idea, really fun to pick famous people with the same names as the bride and groom.
Do you adore the styling of this vintage Gatsby glamour wedding? Well you know I do… I’m a huge fan of the 1920s and art deco period.
credits | photographer: matt parry photography | venue: brympton house | brides dress: sarah janks via blackburn bridal | veil: bhldn | headpiece: donna crain | shoes: aruna seth | bridesmaid dresses: whistles | grooms suit: thom sweeney | cake: mark & spencers
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