Music is a huge part of Natasha & Luke’s lives – so their wedding day had to be a reflection of that, also they both have a slight obsession with skulls and Natasha is particularly keen on glitter and a total magpie….
Natasha says… ‘Everything in our home is black, white, grey, silver or skull related, with splashes of colour so it just made sense for our wedding to be inspired by that and kind of fell together perfectly’.
We think you’ll love their alternative, handmade glitter wedding – it totally rocks!
Glitter, Stars & Skulls Backyard Wedding
Words by Tash. Images by The Springles.
For my dress I had a very definite look in mind – fishtail (but not just a gentle fishtail – a massively kicking out kapow fishtail!) with an asymetric skirt, raw edges, lots of embellishment and a statement shoulder piece. I quickly discovered this didn’t really exist unless unless my budget was through the roof – which it was not!
I managed to find a local stockest of a Maggie Sottero dress which was similar to what I wanted in shape, but it was discontinued so the only option I had was to get the sample dress which was significantly too big… But, this turned out to be a plus as there was more fabric in the fishtail, so when it was taken in to fit there was the kapow!!
I worked with an amazing dressmaker to customise the dress into my dream dress! We changed the neckline (it had a single shoulder and a massive bow!) to make it sweetheart shaped and added a huge shoulder piece with diamante stones, spikes and chains made from Accessorize necklaces and then added more of the same to the embellishment on the skirt. We also added a little skull onto the skirt, as I have a strange obsession with skulls!
I had the final fitting a couple of days before the wedding and luckily I LOVED it as there would have been no time to change it!!
The ‘maids wore gorgeous silver floor length dresses with an origami bodice from Coast. We couldn’t find anything we liked until I spied one of them on a changing room rail… it was the only one they had as the dress was in the sale… Luckily the girl in the shop was very helpful though and called around some other stores to find us another one!
Our flower girls had hand made dresses by my mum as we couldn’t find anything we liked… Sequinned silver bodices with grey ribbon round the waists and grey tulle skirts.
Luke wanted an all black suit but couldn’t find the one he liked so bought individual pieces so it could all be a bit more unique.
He also wanted the guys to all feel like themselves so they all wore their own outfits – the brief was black rat pack!
For our flowers we went with Kate at The Gorgeous Flower Company who was amazing. She had done the flowers for my sister’s wedding the year before so we knew she was lovely!
I had found a really unique looking bouquet on pinterest with black lillies, white and pink orchids and feathers. When we went to Kate to show her our references, it turned out that what we had in mind was somewhat out of our budget (there seems to be a theme here!) so she spent ages going through all the other options with us to get a very similar effect but for a price we could afford.
She was so lovely and nothing was too much and took time to discus all our slightly quirky requests (including a display on a tom drum with a huge skull!) which she loved and totally went with it! She even helped us to source the pots to display them in!
We were so happy with the flowers when she delivered them on the day, they looked gorgeous, and huge!!
Our proposal and wedding ceremony were all within yards of each other so it felt pretty meaningful to have the wedding there in our hometown.
As music is a major part of our lives, the music we had for the wedding was very important to us. We chose lots of more romantic songs for the ceremony and the song I walked down the aisle to was ‘Brighter Than Sunshine’ by Aqualung.
It almost feels like the song of the wedding to us now as it was so emotional for us both.
We asked our very good friends Ash and Kat who are ‘The Springles’ to do our wedding photos. They are such amazing people and super talented so they made us feel so relaxed.
It was also extra special having our friends be such an important part of our day, from the getting ready in the morning right through to the evening. As a result we got some gorgeous, personal and candid photos that depicted our day perfectly.
We had a lot of handmade things to style our venue as we wanted it to be as personal as possible and really look like us. Our theme was music, stars, skulls and glitter and the colours were black and white, silver and pink so we made lots of things that reflected that.
One of the main things was hundreds of origami stars that we made into garlands on pink,black,white and silver string, and also hung them off chairs and generally scattered them about. They were made out of lyrics from lots of our favourite love related songs.
Our table plan was an upcycled chair strung with the same string with album covers from some of our favourite albums, which matched to all our tables which had the covers hanging above each table. We made table coverings of all the lyrics from each album and covered with glitter and silver stars.
Our menu was listed on 7 inch records which matched our wedding stationary – we sent out ‘album’s’ as our invites! Some of the matching records also hung about the place.
We also had a silver glitter tom drum covered in flowers and a huge white skull as a feature and lots of glitter covered champagne bottles with flowers scattered about, as well as the table centres which were our gorgeous flowers in silver glitter pots.
We asked a friends sister to make our cake, as with everything else we liked the idea to keep everything as personal as possible and use known or recommended people.
We wanted a top tier cake (jamaican ginger cake and white chocolate flavour!) with pink ink splatters, song lyrics and silver leaf and a skull cake topper, and then lots of mini cupcakes underneath (lemon sherbet and raspberry flavour!) with pink and white swirled icing, glitter and stars! The end result looked amazing and tasted delicious!
Other than walking in and seeing each other, we think the confetti throw was one of the most memorable parts of our day… we had made pouches of silver stars and glitter and when it was thrown it looked amazing and covered everyone within reach!
We spent the rest of the day literally sparkling and found it for weeks afterwards everywhere we had been!
If we could impart any words of wisdom we would say – Just enjoy it! We really didn’t find it stressful at all as it was just so much fun. The fact we wanted to make so much stuff for the day only added to how personal it all felt.
The one thing I would say though is, if you are setting up your own wedding the day before (or even the morning of!!) allow way more time than you think you need. It’s amazing how much time it takes to set it all up.
It is so worth the effort though as you will have a wedding no one else has and you will never forget.
Epic glitter and stars confetti! Love it.
wedding credits / photographer: the springles / wedding venue: the angel posting house / tipi: stunning tents / brides dress: altered maggie sottero / brides veil: home-made birdcage veil / bride & bridesmaids accessories: asos / grooms suit: asos & topman / brides shoes: nine west / grooms shoes: kurt geiger / bridesmaid dresses: coast / bridesmaid shoes: / hair: koko hair / florist: the gorgeous flower company / wedding cake: for heavens cake / catering: lewis bros / stationery: str uk
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