Lucy and James’s wedding at the wonderful Woburn Sculpture Gallery is just gorgeous. Every detail is so elegant from Lucy’s lace dress to James’s Jeff Banks suit (yippee no Moss Bros!), and set in such a great art deco wedding venue – I love it!
There are of course some fantastic wedding photos here by the lovely Aaron Collett, but do read Lucy and James’s wedding report at the end of the feature as they share some great wedding day tips for future brides and grooms. With huge thanks to a wonderful couple – I hope you enjoy today’s wedding on the English Wedding Blog!
Lucy and James – our Woburn Sculpture Gallery wedding with an art deco vibe
Our wedding report: Lucy and James
Wedding venue:
Woburn Sculpture Gallery, Bedfordshire. We chose the venue after visiting during an open day to the three available venues at Woburn, we won’t lie, the main attraction was the safari park pass! However, the second we walked into the Sculpture Gallery we both fell in love. The entrance through the deer park, tall ceilings, big windows and rather grand sculptures created a feeling of calm. We just felt confident that this was the place. The girls got ready at The Inn in Woburn, just in the village, which is also lovely.
Wedding photographer:
Aaron Collett. We found Aaron through his website and loved his style of photography, and after meeting him for coffee felt we were in safe hands. He was brilliant on the day and guests said they had hardly noticed the photographer, which I suppose is one of the best compliments. We are thrilled with our pictures.
Invitations and reception stationery:
We made all our stationery ourselves. A weekend at the office to borrow software to design a few motifs and much Word formatting later we created some simple black and white art deco inspired invitations. We then used the same text and motifs throughout the remaining stationery to create the theme. Our table names were family maiden names, to represent the families coming together. We created a ‘family tree’ for our table plan which James enjoyed making as it meant power tools. For us, the significance of using family names was very personal and we were proud of the result, and even got some old family photographs into the guestbook.
What did you wear?
I wore Maggie Sottero ‘Violet’, bought from the Ivory Wardrobe in Woburn Sands. I was waiting for ‘the one’ moment, and after about 25 dresses I finally experienced it, even before the dress was pinned in place. Laura at the Ivory Wardrobe was absolutely fantastic.
I couldn’t find the right style of headpiece and didn’t quite trust buying a piece off the internet for fear of it being too ‘blingy’. Instead I met with Andrea at Modern Vintage Bride and explained, rather badly, what I saw in my head. She then made my headpiece using vintage broaches which was beautiful and unique. My shoes were an ebay purchase (won during a friend’s wedding which I took to be a very good sign!).
I had my make up done by Liam from Giorgio Armani in Milton Keynes and hair by Natasha Welsh from Maxwells, in Biggleswade. Getting ready in the morning was as lovely as the rest of the day, and both suppliers were wonderful, arriving on time, being amazingly calming and really going above and beyond: Liam even jumped in mums car to go up to the venue to apply some finishing touches for us all.
James wore the Oxford Silk suit from Jeff Banks and got accessories from Debenhams. He couldn’t be persuaded to buy new shoes for fear of blisters!
I was fantastically lucky and won a competition in ‘Brides’ Magazine (these things do actually happen) and won all four bridesmaids dresses and 5 pairs of Freya Rose shoes. The dresses were custom made by designer Tabitha Webb for each girl and I got to design them exactly how I wanted. This solved the major headache I was having of how to dress my sister, who is 6ft and bridesmaid Megan who is 4ft11’!
A little about the wedding ceremony:
We chose a reading titled ‘These Are The Hands’ which was beautiful and sentimental followed by ‘A Lovely Love Story’ which provided some light relief.
Tell us a little about your wedding venue styling and details:
The Sculpture Gallery really doesn’t need much in the way of decoration so we kept our table centres simple with tall candelabras and low flower vases with tea lights, hired from Wedding Day Hire in Sandy. Our wonderful florist Julie Mitrovic provided all the flowers and set up the venue beautifully. We collected glassware from charity shops over the year to create a sweet table and to provide the art deco look we wanted. We couldn’t find any cake stands we liked at all and instead we decided to make our own out of glass plates and old candlesticks (cutting the cake was a delicate affair but the glue held!. We also made our own photobooth and props which was great fun and cheap to make.
Wedding music and entertainment:
My sister’s friend, Sophie Ackroyd, kindly sung for us during the ceremony. We chose ‘Sea of Love’, an old 1950’s song for the entrance – Sophie is very talented and had written her own piano accompaniment so it was really personal, followed by an aria and ‘Your Song’ during the register signing. We had a DJ during the evening, Steve from pure rhythm, and also booked a dance lesson for our guests. I’ve been dancing for a few years and booked the local instructors from CEROC, who gave a beginners lesson. Because everyone rotated dance partners it was a really good ice breaker.
Memorable wedding day moments:
So many, but our DJ doing Gangnam Style as his own impromptu dance class, my underwear falling down during our photoshoot, and my close family member presenting us with ‘bop-it’ were all up there (when James and I first spent Christmas with her about 6 years ago we played the game and she made the joke that she would play it in the aisle as we got married – she was true to her word!) It’s the unplanned and spontaneous moments that are the best and most memorable.
Wedding day advice:
Plan your day how you want, you only get one chance (hopefully!). Whilst you can plan for hours about the smallest details and research every option (I know, I’m a spreadsheet lover) sometimes you just have to abandon google and follow your gut instinct-it is usually right. Take time to really appreciate the day and think of all the people who have helped you along the way – we found it incredibly humbling to think that all our guests had turned up to help us celebrate and we are eternally grateful for the love and support of our families. That’s what it’s all about after all!
Recommended wedding suppliers:
Dress: The Ivory Wardrobe www.theivorywardrobe.co.uk/?
Photography: Aaron Collett www.aaroncollettphotography.co.uk
Headpiece: Andrea at www.themodernvintagebride.co.uk
Suit: Jeff Banks
Hair: Natasha Welsh at Maxwells, Biggleswade www.maxwellshair.com
Make up: Liam Firth at Giorgio Armani, Milton Keynes
DJ: Steve at Pure Rhythm Disco www.purerhythmdisco.com
Singer: Sophie Ackroyd
Flowers: Julie Mitrovic http://floraldesignsbyjuliemitrovic.com
Dance class: CEROC central http://www.ceroccentral.com/
Decorations: Wedding day hire, Sandy www.weddingdayhire.co.uk/
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