When I first met Mel I was really struck by how joyful and relaxed she was in her approach to planning her wedding. To describe the kind of day she was hoping for, she used words like ‘relaxed’ and ‘happy’ and talked about wanting a welcoming party feel. She also wanted the rooms at Belair House to feel really summery and fresh with lots of whites and greens while “not looking too weddingish”.
I suggested many different white and pale green flowers so that there would be a real feeling of abundance. We went with several varieties of hydrangeas, roses and spray roses, freesia, astrantia, alstromeria and eustoma with delicate, daisy-like feverfew and lacy ammi majus. And then I went bonkers with all the lovely seasonal foliage on offer at GB Foliage at the market as well as fragrant mint and rosemary.
Mel’s bouquet was made up of David Austin “Patience” roses, freesias, hydrangea florets, astrantia, ammi and mint with the stems bound simply with garden twine. The buttonholes, in honour of Ruairidh’s nationality (the men looked very dashing in their kilts), were made of white eryngium thistles. And the little flower girls carried posies of ‘Akito’ roses and wore Alice-bands decorated with tiny spray roses and freesias. All really pretty and delicate and sunny!
Mel decided she wanted the flowers for the tables displayed in lots of different glass vessels rather than in anything too formal. So each table had what I call “a random collection of vases and flowers” placed in the centre. Of course, just like perfecting so called nude make-up, making things look random is actually quite hard work!
The results were gorgeous and I think you can see from all the fabulous photographs by the lovely Dan Biggins, Mel and Ruairidh’s wedding was a really relaxed and happy day, just as they’d hoped for.
You can see many more of Dan’s photos and my flowers on the super-cool A Touch of Modern wedding blog.
