Colourful Home Made Spring Country Wedding

This wedding totally stole my heart. Why? Let me tell you.

First things first Andrew and Clare held their wedding at the end of April, on the most beautiful Spring day, where the trees were filled with blossom and the light just perfect. They found the The Hall at Marthall in Cheshire and with it’s scenic views they fell hook line and sinker, who can blame them? It was the loveliest backdrop to their home made celebration and somewhere they could really put their stamp on. They crafted a colourful tissue paper wall, arranged the moss centrepieces and reams of bunting to name a few.

Then there were the Peonies! Wow those fluffy beauties looked amazing carried by Clare who wore a sheer sleeved gown by Ronald Joyce. The gents meanwhile wore matching suits with fun bow ties for a stylish statement. Didn’t they look marvellous?

Thanks so much to Rachel Joyce Photography for sharing these super gorgeous photographs.

THE PROPOSAL | We met online many moons ago and it blossomed into a relationship. When we met in person I remember waiting in the entrance of the Manchester Palace Hotel and Andrew came swooping passed me wondering where I was, walking out to the entrance of the hotel and I sat back and watched in amusement. I went and met him outside the entrance and remember thinking how tall he was, hence my nickname for him is Tall Guy. We had a long distance relationship for many years and we finally moved in together finding it very strange spending Sunday evenings in each others company, not waving goodbye like we did every weekend previously

The engagement…. I had just cut my hair extremely short for the first time in my life and we were decorating the Christmas tree as tradition it is always around my Dad’s birthday. All day he kept asking me if I wanted an early Christmas present and I thought I would be good this year and say no. I finally gave in and said yes. It was about midnight, my hands were dirty from putting up the tree, hair a mess and he presented me with a small box shaped present….. I was shocked to say the least. He presented me with a beautiful ring and a cheesy grin and the rest is history.

THE VISION | We wanted it to be colourful and home made. We really wanted to involve our family and also our Grandparents, who unfortunately have passed away.

THE PLANNING PROCESS | We started by looking for a venue driving around the countryside south of Manchester. We stumbled across a lovely quiet location overlooking green fields, lovely and tranquil. They had a few dates available and so we settled with 30th April, a date we soon discovered was Clare’s grandad’s birthday so it was perfect and meant to be! We booked our local church a short walk away from our home then rested for a long while with wedding planning!

THE VENUE | The Hall at Marthall in Cheshire. We wanted to escape to a countryside location in the middle of nowhere with beautiful views and so The Hall at Marthall was perfect. Nicky and Liz at the hall were amazing and so helpful throughout the process. We had a lovely day setting the hall up the day before the wedding with family and on the day of the wedding the sun came out and shone on the whole day.

THE DRESS & ACCESSORIES | I bought my dress from The Bridal Suite in Stockport from an amazing woman called Claire! Looking for a dress was my least favourite task but Claire made it a lovely experience and less daunting. It was the second shop I tried and I went for a dress that I didn’t expect I would like. I loved the lace and the subtle sparkle, must always have sparkle! It was strangely the same designer as my sister’s wedding dress Ronald Joyce. My necklace was a birthday present designed by Andrew. He had it made by Lesley at Mayfly Jewellery and he said it was my something new and blue for the wedding day. He sneakily had it made by the lady who created his wedding ring

GROOM’S ATTIRE | We got the suits from Marc Darcy for the groom, best man and father of the bride. Shoes from ASOS, shirt from Ted Baker and watch was my wedding present from Clare, it had been lovingly engraved before the wedding with the date of our wedding in Roman numerals.

THE READINGS & MUSIC | For our readings we wanted our sisters to read at our wedding. We wanted something formal and informal. Andrew stumbled upon ‘Us Two’ which was lovely and simple.

BEAUTIFUL BRIDESMAIDS | My nieces were my bridesmaids and flower girl and my sister Maid of Honour. My young niece was dressed in a little mint green dress with a little sparkle. My older nieces were in a dress from Chi Chi called Justice. My sister was dressed in Monsoon and added her own little diamanté detail around the waist.

THE FLOWERS | Flowers were sourced from Northwest Flowers in Ashton. My sister meticulously created the venue flowers for the centre pieces. We wanted the flowers to look like they has been picked from the garden, nothing structured. We had white, peach and pink ranunculus and multicoloured freesias to add a mixture of colour. Eucalyptus was our greenery with limonium maine blue with sprinkles of lavender on top of the moss surrounding the jars. The church flowers and bouquets were created by myself and my nieces and mother. These were bunches of freesias, eucalyptus and limonium maine blue tied  up in multicoloured ribbon draping at the end of the pews.

THE CAKE | Made lovingly by the Groom’s mum. She made the cake a week before, froze it and decorated it on the Friday amongst the chaos of her mixer breaking! There were three tiers, Victoria sponge, yummy chocolate and Lemon drizzle. It was decorated with butter cream which I had to try as she was making it…..

YOUR PHOTOGRAPHER | The amazing Rachel was our photographer. We wanted a documentary style photographer who took beautiful creative photographs. She was amazing and just got us and what we wanted out of our photo’s on the day. She made it a lovely experience and was keen to experiment with ideas and locations on the day.

THE DETAILS & DÉCOR | We absolutely loved the time we spent with family planning and creating things for the wedding. I have a little obsession with post boxes so my Dad lovingly made us a postbox for cards. He also helped create the huge flower wall with my mum and Andrew as we just wanted some colour to the venue. My dad built a wooden structure whilst my mum, Andrew and myself created the flowers out of tissue paper.

Our friend Rebecca Wright illustrated and designed the beautiful invitations, order of service, table plan and tables names really made the wedding special. We used our grandparent’s names for the table names and Rebecca suggested adding a little biography about each. This was a lovely talking point and brought back lovely memories our relatives talked about on the day. It was our way of having our Grandparent’s with us on the day. Our relatives thought it was beautiful and have asked for copies for them to keep for themselves.

Andrew’s dad made the trip to Calais to buy the wine with Andrew. The logs were cut by my brother in law and decorated by Chris with his delicate hands. The place settings were the wedding favours and were made by the ladies in my family. We created little clay hearts imprinted with the guests name tied in a different coloured ribbon.  I made some sparkly garlands using a circle cutter and some metallic cotton and draped them in between crepe paper. Jars were collected by everyone, the award for the most I think goes to Andrew’s mum for eating lots of jam! I stayed up late one night and tied ribbon around each in different colours and then placed a candle and diamanté in each. We placed different coloured lace around the flower jars to add some more colours to each table.

Bunting was lovingly created by Andrew and was lit by sparkly lights across the ceiling of the venue. Something we can use for future celebrations.

The desserts were all lovingly made by family members and were yum! I tried them all!

THE HONEYMOON |  New York to Memphis to Miami! I have always dreamed of going to New York and Andrew to the blues capital of America. He has been very romantic and surprised me with a trip to the Empire State building and a booking at Serendipity! We’re so excited and very grateful that our family and friends have helped our dreams come true with there generous gifts!

MEMORABLE MOMENTS |  Clare: Saying our vows. It meant so much I crumbled and whispered through tears to say I would be with him through sickness and in health. Having family and friends come together. It was lovely seeing people catch up, mix and bond with each other.

Andrew: Seeing Clare in her dress. Seeing family and friends happy and together.

ADVICE FOR OTHER COUPLES | Do as much as you can in advance. You will feel like there is a lull and you can’t do anything more until nearer the day, but it soon arrives and you feel you have no more time. If things don’t go as planned, don’t stress, just go with the flow as the most important thing is that you get married, plus nobody else will notice only you. Get an amazing photographer, like we did! You will want a record of everything on the day and the people who were there and Rachel and her assistant did an amazing job.

CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE |

Photography | Rachel Joyce Photography

Flowers | N W Flowers

Bridesmaids | Chi Chi Clothing

Wedding dress | The Bridal Suite Cheshire

Jewellery | May Fly Jewellery

Suits | Marc Darcy

Venue | The Hall at Marthall

Car | Grosvenor Classic Cars

Just perfection.

Thanks so much to Andrew and Clare for sharing their lovely wedding story with us xo Lou