Timeless & Modern Classic Barn Wedding

Shaunna and Kristian are here to share with us their fun, modern and drop-dead gorgeous classic barn wedding. They were hitched at Hazel Gap Barn in Nottinghamshire in the summer months, and you are in for such a treat today.

There are so many fantastic ideas to take away from their day. I love their money-saving tips, from the DIY decor to how they sourced their items and even their dessert table – it’s a must-read. But they also highlight the importance of investing and choosing your photographer and filmmaker wisely. This is always sound advice, after all, your photos and film are one of the only parts of your wedding you have left to look back on.

Their styling was so beautiful, with green and white tones, a semi-naked cake, pretty blooms and very stylish outfits indeed. Wow.

A huge thank you goes to the very talented Firewood Film for sharing these totally divine images. I am sure you’ll agree they captured the most amazing moments which really showcase the whole feel of Shaunna and Kristian’s day.

Classic Barn Wedding

The Proposal

Arctic Fox Igloos – Rovaniemi

With a love of cold holidays and a birthday in January, it made sense that for Shaunna’s 30th they would visit somewhere snowy where they could see the northern lights. Having tried and failed on several occasions previously they settled on Finland and a glass igloo on a frozen lake. The tickets were booked and the countdown was on and two weeks before flying Kristian decided it was also the best place to propose.

In the two weeks between deciding to propose and them leaving for their trip, Kristian was able to become an expert in all things diamonds, design Shaunna’s engagement ring which included her emerald and her diamond, get the ring made and delivered to store ready to be collected the day before they left for the airport!

So Kristian put the ring safely into his hand luggage and off they went, Shaunna still none the wiser. He was even able to not arouse suspicion when stopped by security at the airport and when he suggested they buy two bottles of very expensive champagne to “celebrate Shaunna’s 30th” all that was left now was to pick the perfect moment.

He carried the ring with him through husky sledging over a frozen lake, riding snowmobiles through a snow-covered forest and even watching the sun set in a wood-fired hot tub. Now to most people these moments sound like perfect proposal situations but as great as they were, Kristian felt they just weren’t THE moment.

On the last evening, they travelled to the glass igloos in the hope that they would FINALLY see the northern lights. They were told by the guide there was a low chance of seeing the lights due to the clouds and that the clouds were due to clear by 10pm so they sat down to play Jenga. After several rounds and accusations of Shaunna being able to cheat because of the length of her nails imagine their surprise when they looked up and could see the northern lights! Albeit faint they were definitely there!

They couldn’t believe it and spent 30 minutes marvelling at the lights and taking them in. Now at this point MOST people would have probably grabbed the ring, got down on one knee and popped the question. Not Kristian though (he’s a perfectionist remember).

He suggested that Shaunna should start preparing the dinner that had just been delivered by the restaurant because he was ‘hungry’ (who proposes on an empty stomach?!) and ‘the lights will be back stronger later’. Shaunna commented that ‘the lights are a natural phenomenon and can’t just be switched on and off’ and reluctantly set about making the dinner.

At 9:30 as they were finishing dinner they noticed that the clouds had cleared and not only were the stars the brightest they’d ever seen but the sky was awash with green and red of the northern lights, just as Kristian had said they would be! They were back and much brighter than before!

After taking it all in, Shaunna decided to take some photos on long exposure which meant standing very still, holding her breath, for 10 seconds, in the pitch black. With 2 seconds left on her exposure, she was set up to get THE shot! Until a phone light went on behind her (pause).

Thinking Kristian had accidentally left the flash on when taking one of his photos and had inadvertently ruined her picture, Shaunna spun around to see Kristian (pause) on one knee (pause) holding a ring box.

Kristian didn’t get a chance to give his proposal speech or even ask the question as Shaunna immediately grabbed the box out of his hand shouting “my precious” I mean “oh my god, oh my god” over and over again to which Kristian answered “so is that a yes then?” and the rest is history

The Vision

Shaunna originally wanted to marry at La Baronia just outside of Barcelona however when the venue meant a lot of their family would be unable to join they settled on a venue in the UK. However, the vision of natural greenery and ivory covering an old building with a courtyard for welcome drinks remained the same, luckily Hazel Gap came up on my suggested pages on Instagram and I fell in love immediately.

From the start we wanted to have a theme that complemented the venue, Hazel Gap is such a stunning venue that we really wanted to make sure we added to the atmosphere and that our decor didn’t take away from the charm of the venue.

I also knew I wanted something timeless. I can be really impulsive and indecisive so I knew that if I went for something ‘on trend’ I would look back and wish I had had something different. The venue also had an amazing trailing ivy wall that separated the bar from the breakfast room so we decided to use this as the base of our theme and the vision of soft greens, and whites was born.

We wanted a theme that felt easy and natural, almost as though the items had been there for years but not rustic which is how we settled on the black hardware.

Budget

£26,000

The Venue

Hazel Gap Barn – as soon as we walked into Hazel Gap we knew it was the one. Not only were the team really helpful but the venue and the grounds were stunning. What was supposed to be a quick drop-in on the way to York for our friend’s birthday turned into me cancelling all of our other venue viewings and putting the holding deposit down the morning after. Hazel Gap was the first and last venue we viewed!

Kristian has been in the wedding industry for a number of years so we really wanted a venue that had a good flow, which is something Hazel Gap has in spades. No matter where you are you feel like you’re part of the party thanks to the large glass windows and the centralised courtyard.

We really wanted our guests to be able to hear the party and be tempted back to the dance floor instead of being separated into too many different rooms. The surround sound funkiton system was another huge draw for us.

Add to the fact the team at Cripps are the best at service in the business Chris and Jodie were on hand whenever we needed them and made the day and night run seamlessly. The food choice was outstanding and we loved the fact that all of the food was ‘hearty, locally produced food’ that had been elevated and done really well.

All of our guests commented on how great the food and service was on the day. The rotisserie chicken and cripps chips with burnt salsa was one of the best meals we’d ever had!

Your Outfits

Shaunna

I knew I wanted a simple dress that was timeless but also modern and loved the clean lines that a solid Ivory dress creates. TDR Bridal in Halesowen was the third bridal shop I had been to visit. I’d had terrible experiences at the first two shops and was starting to think I’d never find the right dress. As soon as I walked into TDR my mood completely shifted, when Chloe sat me down to ask what I liked/didn’t like I immediately felt at ease.

They have a huge range of dresses and they are size-inclusive. Chloe let me walk the floor on my own to pull some I liked and to really take it all in which was something else I was really grateful for! The first dress I pulled was a stunning Justin Alexander dress (style 8936), also tried on a few others however I ended up going back to the first dress I tried. I loved the fact it was clean and modern on the front but had a dramatic deep v-back with diamantes and buttons all the way down to the floor.

I set about finding ways to alter the sleeves as long sleeves would (hopefully) be too hot for a June wedding and stumbled upon Charlie Brear who specialized in bridal separates. When I saw that she made organza and ostrich feather detachable sleeves I was able to order them through Rebel Rock Bridal who very kindly posted them out to me as soon as she received them. I also chose to close up the top of the back of my dress which made it easy to wear a bra under my dress.

I found some stunning baroque pearl earrings from a seller on Etsy called BySAMjewellerystore and paired them with a Pearl Headband from Six Stories and wore my grandmother’s engagement ring on my right hand.

My shoes were from Rainbow Club. I loved the fact that they dye them for you after the wedding and that they weren’t too high. After the meal I changed into white commes de garcon Converse and was ready to dance the night away.

Kristian

We had originally decided that Kristian was going to design and tailor his own tux. We went to Moss Bros to look at suits for the groomsmen and noticed they sold a tailored fit option which we thought might save money on alterations for the wedding party. We were really impressed with the quality so decided to not only order the groomsmen’s suits but also order one for Kristian.

We wanted him to stand out slightly as the groom so we went for a shirt with different buttons, a waistcoat and a different texture bow tie and pocket square. He paired this with black Gucci leather lace-ups and a Rolex with a sage green clock face.

The Ceremony & Music

When we booked our venue we hadn’t realised that registrars have set time slots to perform ceremonies and when we called to book one in the only time they had was 3pm. We had the venue from 12pm so we wanted to make use of it all day so this didn’t work for our timeline.

When we were looking for alternative options we came across humanist celebrants, we still wanted a traditional ceremony but this way we were able to personalise our entire ceremony – the words, readings, music etc with no restrictions and it worked out cheaper!

This is how we stumbled across Stuart Primarolo. Stuart tailored our whole ceremony and over the 45 minutes our guests laughed (a lot) and cried a lot of happy tears. It was amazing to see how he brought the words to life in front of all of our friends and family and all of our guests commented on how personal the ceremony felt afterwards.

As guests arrived we had a playlist with acoustic covers and I walked down the aisle to Sam Ryder’s cover of Set You Free by N Trance and we walked back together to Stevie Wonder – signed Sealed Delivered which really got the party started.

Your Photographer & Filmmaker

Firewood Film

The Styling & Decor

Decorations: I spent hours on Pinterest to get an idea of the style and theme we wanted to go for. Once we’d decided on a theme, I contacted some venue styling companies however the fees were going to push us over budget so I set about trying to find the decorations myself.

Google has an app called ‘Google Lens’ which allows you to input a photo and filter by items in the photo to find similar/the same products for sale online. It also shows you where they are for sale at the cheapest price. This allowed me to get all of our decorations including candles, cheesecloth, charger plates, name tags, candle holders, glass card box, faux flowers etc for under £400, which saved us over £3000 in total.

The only thing I couldn’t find cheaper was the black taper candle holders that we really wanted for our top table. I had managed to find the same ones in rose gold so we sprayed them with matt black spray to get the same look for much less.

We created our welcome sign on Canva and then used Vista Print to Print on A1 Foamex. We put our order of the day and seating plan on the same board and turned it when required to save money. We signed up to Vista Print’s newsletter which gave us money off our first spend. So the two A1 signs and our thank you notes on the tables cost a total of £25. We were quoted over £100 per sign to order them premade.

Kristian’s mom and Aunt offered to make our flowers for us to save on florist costs. There are plenty of flower warehouses that are open to the public which is another great way to save on costs.

The plan was always to save as much money on the cake as possible, have a dessert table instead and put the money we would have spent towards a photo booth. We ordered our cake from Marks and Spencer 4 weeks in advance of the wedding and picked it up the day before then added some dried fruit and foliage as well as a cake topper.

We then went to Costco to stock up on mini doughnuts, cake pops, brownies and crisps for our dessert table, which cost a total of £75.

Instead of favours, we had drinks tokens – everyone used them and nothing was left behind.

The Honeymoon

We flew out to Bali the Monday after our wedding for 2 weeks. We started in Ubud where we were able to visit waterfalls, rice terraces, and temples. We saw a tonne of monkeys and were able to make our own silver rings at a Balinese workshop before getting the ferry over to Gili Trawangan where we cycled around the island and saw some incredible sunsets. Before finishing in Uluwatu for some much-needed R&R, we even had dinner in a cave!

Memorable Moments

The singing waiters – everyone was so shocked but had such an amazing time and they got EVERYONE up dancing. This was a really good way to kick off the party after desserts and avoid the post-food slump. It’s also one of my favourite parts of our wedding video!
The photo booth – we used it that much that they agreed to stay for another 2 hours! It was great to have the photos to look back on immediately while we waited for our wedding photos!
The band breaking into Man I Feel Like A Woman by Shania Twain straight after our first dance. This was an amazing way to get everyone on the dance floor so the photographer/videographer could get some great party shots.
The DJ – played a fantastic mix of songs and the dance floor was full all night!

Advice For Other Couples

You can have your dream wedding on a budget! Planning is key, prioritise your big-ticket supplier costs first.

Pick your photographer based on their photography style and personality as opposed to price. They will be with you all day and the pictures will last a lifetime. You wont regret paying extra for photos that really capture the emotion of your day.

Invest in a videographer if your budget allows. We weren’t originally going to have a videographer but I’m so glad we did. Every time we watch the video all of the emotions we felt on the day come straight back!

If your venue has a coordinator – put your trust in them to deliver your vision!

And lastly, remember it’s your wedding, have/plan the day YOU want. Don’t sweat the small stuff and keep having fun with wedding planning because everything will turn out perfect on the day!