Fun Stylish & Budget Oran Mor Wedding With A Sequin Dress

Oh, I do love an autumn wedding and Kirsty and Steven’s Oran Mor wedding in Glasgow, Scotland, was a corker! Not only did they achieve a small and oh-so-sweet celebration of a budget of £5000, but they did it in total and utter style!

After marrying and dining at Oran Mor, they headed to a pub for a good old party. I adore their outfits especially. Kirsty looked incredible in her sequin wedding dress and Steven was dapper in a wine-coloured tux. Don’t miss the dried flower bouquets, the slinky bridesmaid dresses and of course, all the love!

Thanks ever so much to Pocket Square Photography for sharing with us these divine images of such an exquisite day.

Oran Mor Wedding

The Proposal

After 6 years together Steven finally asked me to marry him during the thick of lockdown 1.0, on my birthday in July 2020. It was very low-key, but sentimental and thoughtful, just like him!

It was just at home, on the morning of my birthday, while our son Rory watch Paw Patrol and ate his breakfast on the sofa! Steven had kept little notes I’d written him throughout our 6 years together and used them as part of the proposal in such a lovely, thoughtful and romantic way. It was very chilled but totally perfect.

We both knew we’d be together forever, but I think lockdown made us both realise what a good team we could really be during the hardest time of our lives for our family.

The Vision

Neither of us wanted a big wedding. It’s never been something that was important to me but increasingly so as we both got older, had been together for 6 years and had a baby.

We just wanted something to mark the moment with friends and family in a way that felt authentic to us. We actually considered eloping but Steven has a big family and that just didn’t feel right. But certainly having something small and intimate was right for us, which was handy as there were still some COVID restrictions around guest numbers when the day came around in October 2021!

I didn’t have a vision so much as an idea of the feeling I wanted to achieve. Informal, fun, meaningful for us, and as stress-free as possible! I knew I wanted everyone to feel relaxed, comfortable and enjoy the day. Including ourselves!

The Ceremony & Music

We wanted a laid-back, humanist ceremony and we chose Vivienne Hyndman as our humanist celebrant who was perfect! She really summed up our story so well, and we co-wrote our own vows which was perfect.

Our three-year-old son Rory wasn’t used to being in a venue with so many people (thanks lockdown!). So he was a little unsettled but because of the relaxed nature. I felt more than comfortable picking him up and comforting him in the middle of the ceremony, so he could be with us both while we said our vows, and he even had a chocolate lolly during it all! It was such a perfect ceremony.

We didn’t include many traditional elements at all, except drinking for the quaich as we have one in my family so that was a nice touch and a nod to tradition. But then we switched it up again as my dad preferred to say a few words during the ceremony instead of a formal speech at the meal, which worked really well, and then at the meal I did my own speech!

I walked in to Only You by Yazoo and we all left together to This Will Be (An Everlasting Love) by Natalie Cole.

Budget

Small, we wanted to do it for around £5k which we just about achieved. We saved money by having small numbers for the ceremony and meal, I did my own makeup, we decorated the place ourselves, and made a Spotify playlist of all our favourite songs instead of hiring a band or a DJ.

The Venue

For our ceremony and meal we chose Oran Mor. I’ve always loved the ceiling mural by Alasdair Gray in Oran Mor, and because we were only having 50 people we booked the balcony area for the ceremony and the private dining room for the meal.

Afterwards, we wanted a proper party in the pub, so we moved to Innis and Gunn on Ashton Lane for the evening. We were lucky enough to be able to hire out the full venue. On the ground floor, we had some tables and made room for a dancefloor, and upstairs we had some quieter booths and an area for a buffet which we served around 9.30.

My sister-in-law made a selection of amazing cakes instead of a wedding cake and everyone just helped themselves.

Your Outfits

Since we were getting married in October I liked the idea of dark red, pinks and berry colours as a very loose colour theme. Again, since our budget was tight I knew I’d be buying my dress from the high street. Actually I didn’t even bother looking at traditional wedding dress shops as I knew they’d all be over budget, and I wanted something a little different anyway.

In the end, I went for a Needle and Thread sequinned blush gown and Steven choose a wine-coloured three-piece suit from Slaters. I complemented the gown with deep pink lipstick (The Queen by Charlotte Tilbury), a beaded blush-pink headband from Silver Sixpence In her Shoe, and we included deep pinks in the wedding flowers which tied everything together perfectly.

Your Photographer & Filmmaker

We chose Neil Jarvie from Pocket Square Photography as our photographer. He was exactly what we were looking for in a wedding photographer, and folk who don’t generally love having their photos taken!

I asked for relaxed, mostly candid shots and that’s what we got, and they are gorgeous and tell the story of the day perfectly. It’s hard to remember all the little details but Neil captured all these so perfectly, without anything feeling too staged or posey.

He took us away after the ceremony for some shots of just the two of us and it felt like just having a wee walk about with a pal, rather than him directing us this way or that. He has a very keen eye for the right angles and shots, and a lot of the time we didn’t even realise he was shooting, which was ideal!

The Honeymoon

We still haven’t had a proper one yet! Shortly after the wedding, I discovered I was pregnant with our second son Arran so our lives have been pretty busy and getting away just the two of us has been impossible!

We did have a wee overnight in Arrochar right after the wedding to try and come down from the excitement of it all and just soak it all in, but we’ll definitely get our proper honeymoon one day. Might take us a few years yet though!

The Styling & Decor

Because of our smaller budget, I sourced most of the decorations either myself from things I already had like jam jars, dried flowers, fairy lights, or online from Etsy and even Amazon. We hired Make Believe Events to put up string fairy lights in the private dining room at Oran Mor.

Then we hung paper garlands I found on Etsy from the windows and decorated the tables ourselves, using mine and the bridesmaids’ bouquets as centrepieces as there were only three tables, and some ribbons, jars, lights and confetti on the tables too. For favours, we used bags of lavender grown at my mother-in-law’s allotment.

Our flowers were from To A Mountain Daisy and we opted for dried floral arrangements so we could keep them after the wedding and I’m so glad we did! We have my bridal bouquet which is still good as new, proudly displayed in our home.

As I mentioned, myself and my bridesmaids did our own makeup but I opted for a deep pink lip to fit with the loose colour scheme, and my bridesmaids wore pink satin dresses from Coast.

For the reception, we decorated the pub quite minimally with fairy lights and some confetti, and provided an Instax camera and photo album for guests to take photos and leave messages. My sister-in-law made a series of cakes and brownies instead of a traditional wedding cake and guests could take them away in little goody bags.

Memorable Moments

For me getting ready with my two best friends and bridesmaids was pretty memorable. We stayed in the Hilton on Great Western Road the night before and got up early to do our own makeup and get ready together. We listened to music, had one or two glasses of Champagne and just enjoyed ourselves. I was nervous but it made a big difference having my friends with me and we all felt pretty chilled out considering!

The ceremony seemed to fly by, but I loved saying our vows, it was so special having written the ourselves and having our son Rory with us was a moment I’ll cherish forever.

Giving my speech was memorable for me. Again, I was worried I would be nervous but I found that after the ceremony everyone was in really good form and like the rest of the day the vibe felt relaxed and informal, so I wasn’t nervous at all in the end! I don’t know why more brides don’t make a speech!

I’d like to say the party was memorable, and it was of course, but some of the specifics were lost to a fair few gin and tonics. Thankfully we have our amazing photos to look back on!

Advice For Other Couples

We really tried to stay true to the idea of an informal, small but fun wedding with meaningful and personal moments. I’d say try not to get too caught up in all the tiny details and instead just keep your overall vision in mind.

At the end of the day, neither you nor your guests will likely remember what the place settings looked or what song was playing during the drinks reception, but they’ll remember how your day made them feel. Was it welcoming, was it fun, was the ceremony touching, were the speeches funny, did everyone have a good laugh?

Try not to compare your wedding with others you’ve been to, yours will be totally unique to you and that’s exactly how it should be. Also, if you’re working with a limited budget you can definitely save on decorations by getting stuck into some DIY. Get your friends round, crack open a bottle and make a night of it. Pinterest is priceless here!