Bonfire Night 2021. Sefton Park Palm House and a couple with whom I’d be with (photographing) as the question was popped and the answer was most definitely ‘Yes!’ Sophie & David’s Wedding last November was a very special day indeed!
The icing on the cake for me with this Wedding was meeting back up with Sophie & David earlier this year for a post Wedding Adventure Shoot with their dog Lyra (who played a lead role in their 2020 engagement! You can see more from that HERE) We headed to Llangollen and shot in 3 different spots, starting with World’s End before heading around to Panorama Walk and then finally dropping down into Llangollen for a well much needed cup of tea to warm up before heading to Horse Shoe Falls to finish up. Little did I know it wasn’t just Sophie, David & Lyra that I was photographing but they had a little stow away with them as well which I learnt about a few months later! 🥰
WORLD’S END
PANORAMA WALKHORSE SHOE FALLS
I would like to wish Sophie & David the Happiest of Anniversaries, it’s been quite the year and I can’t wait to meet little Lily at some point down the line. ❤️ I hope you’ve managed to find some time to celebrate over the weekend although maybe not in the midst of quite as many fireworks as last year!
Here are some of my very favourite images from last November and February this year! 😍
What can I say about Jack & Honor’s DIY Farm Wedding! It was ludicrously fun to shoot, there was non stop laughter from dawn until dusk, epic smoke bombs and a truly one of a kind bridal party entrance! Oh and I clocked approximately 50 million steps!
It would be easy to underestimate the amount of time and effort that goes into a DIY Wedding and there was a full on team effort going on when I arrived the evening before the big day! There were tables piled high with flowers, miles of fairy lights and a few bottles of bubbly fueling the last stages of decorating and organising. By the morning the field (usually filled with sheep) looked absolutely stunning!
It’s certainly not a feature at every Wedding I shoot to have the bridal party make their entrance in a flower clad quad trailer or to have a ‘first look’ location where the bride had to clamber over a fence! Nor have I ever had to master the art of climbing through a barb wire fence with 2 cameras swinging off me in order to significantly shorten the trip across several fields to get from the bridal preparation to the teepee set up! It was certainly a day of many firsts and a Wedding I will definitely never forget! What a day!
I do hope you enjoy this selection of my favourite images fromJack & Honor’s DIY Farm Wedding and if you are ever in need of a welly wearing, fence scaling, hill climbing photographer for your special day then you know who to call!! 🙌 😂
Cassie & Tom’s Willington Hall Wedding was such a pleasure to photograph back in October! Not only was it a gorgeous Autumnal day but I think it’s fair to say there was a deep sense of relief that the day was going ahead with no restrictions, no compromises and the plan was finally able to come together!
The initial Wedding date had been April of 2021 but it became clear soon after Cassie & Tom’s Engagement Shoot in Delamere Forest last Autumn that that was likely to change due to Covid & as it’s been with so many Weddings, the initial Spring plan for the Wedding was adapted to an Autumn one!
It was all so worth it in the end though and such a special day. If you follow my other work (Ciara Doone Rush Photography) you will understand how excited I was at the thought of Cassie & Tom’s extra special Wedding guests; Dennis the Horse & Wilma & Angus the dogs turning up for some photos! There aren’t many Weddings where you get to photograph the bride with her horse on the day itself and so this was a total highlight for me! The staff at Willington Hall couldn’t have been more accomodating and as Dennis was being so well behaved we got to take him anywhere we wanted. It was as if he’d starred at so many Weddings in the past and was a total pro…. His only quirk being that he desperately wanted to eat the bridesmaid’s bouquets!
Below are some of my favourite images from Cassie & Tom’s Willington Hall Wedding and I would like to say a huge thank you & Congratulations (again) to Cassie & Tom for entrusting me to capture their special day.
If you are looking for your special day to be captured (with or without any 4 – legged friends!) please don’t hesitate to get in touch for a chat, I would love to hear about your plans!
Our hearts really go out to anyone who is currently trying to work out How to Plan a Wedding during a Pandemic. These are tough, uncertain times and the overwhelm is real.
I know so many suppliers are doing absolutely everything they can to be as accommodating and flexible as possible – ourselves included of course! And I count myself extremely lucky to have the nicest clients who have made the process of rearranging their Wedding dates as painless a process as possible by keeping the communication open and clear and just generally being lovely. ☺️
As far as adapting and pivoting what we offer as Wedding Photographers. We have restructured how we offer our Wedding Photography services so it doesn’t matter how big or small your Wedding is or whether you want 2 hours or 12 hours covering, you can decide and and we will do absolutely everything we can to accommodate any adaptations or rearrangements as necessary.
We’ve decided to put this short guide together to try and help in any way with the process of planning a Wedding right now. We have absolutely everything crossed that gatherings will be possible again from late Spring and that we’ll all be back on the dance floor before too long. I for one seriously can’t wait to throw some questionable moves in front of a live band at some point in the near future. 💃🏼
Communication With each other, with your suppliers and with your guests. To adapt the old adage – Everyone is in the same boat. I think it’s more like, everyone is in a boat… Everyone’s boat is very different but there is without doubt a general acknowledgement that things are not normal! Not even close! Your guests will understand that you might need to reschedule, cut the guest list (see #3) or even hold fire for a little while. An option to ease the stress of communicating with everyone constantly could be to set up a simple Wedding Website so everyone can check in on the latest plans without having to be contacted individually? If you’ve already had a couple shoot you could use some of your images from that to create a simple site. Not to be confused with us The Copper Knots, these guys over at The Knot offer free, simple to set up Wedding Websites. Keeping the communication open with your suppliers too is key. You’ve worked hard to find exactly the right ones for your special day and I can assure you they can’t wait to work with you when the day finally arrives! Keep them informed of any possible changes and chat to them about new possible dates. I know everyone in the industry is doing everything they can to support their couples in these difficult times. Finally and possibly the most important, keep the communication open between you and your partner. Your Wedding, whenever, however it happens will still be a very special, joy filled day.
2. Be Realistic Don’t hold out until the very last minute to reschedule, everyone will end up being a bundle of nerves! The latest coherent guidance on Weddings can be found on the Guides for Brides site HERE and of course you can find Government guidance HERE. I certainly have my fingers crossed that Summer, Autumn and Winter Weddings will be possible this year.
3. Work on your Guest List(s) If you haven’t done so already it’s probably worth having a couple of different guest lists. This can be a good opportunity to pare your list down to only those that you absolutely want to share your day with. Once you’ve got your ‘definitely not getting married without these people around us’ list, this might help when deciding whether to hold off and postpone depending on the updated guidance later this month or go for it as soon as you can with a more limited number. Don’t forget you can always opt to do the legal bit with a small number of your favourite people when it’s possible to do so and plan an epic Anniversary party for a year or so down the line when you know you’ll be able to have a good old boogie! It’s the perfect excuse to get another wear out of your dress too!
4. Consider Wedding Insurance I realise this might be a little late in the day and I have no doubt insurance providers will have changed their policies drastically over the past year but it’s definitely worth considering.
5. Check the T’s&C’s of your suppliers Whether you’ve already committed to certain suppliers or you’re still in the process of deciding who to go with, it’s worth having those slightly tricky conversations about what happens if you do need to reschedule. Everyone we know in the industry is being as accommodating as possible but it will certainly help put your mind at ease to know where you stand with each of your suppliers.
6. Be kind to yourselves These are difficult times and I can only imagine trying to plan a Wedding in the midst of it all isn’t making them any easier. Try and take some time out from it all and if you think taking the pressure off entirely and pushing it all back is the right way to go then do it. And if you’ve already had to push things back a little, you never know, you might end up with a more bespoke day that’s more you by taking this extra bit of time to plan…and replan… We love Whimsical Wonderland Weddings and Magpie Weddings and of course Rock & Roll Bride for inspiration!
7. Keep the big picture in focus It’s easy at the best of times when planning a Wedding to get so caught up in the minute details that you lose focus of the big picture. Add the pandemonium of the pandemic and who knows what can happen! Try and stop stressing over the tiny details and things you can’t control right now. I’ll let you in on a little secret… no one really cares whether the colour of your chair bows match your Wedding invites or your something borrowed is different to your something blue… or at least they shouldn’t be on your guest list if they do! 😆 It should be about celebrating something truly beautiful with your nearest and dearest. So ditch anything that doesn’t serve you and don’t forget about the truly important aspects of why you are doing this.
8. Have a Plan B I think it’s becoming clear that things are not just going to be bouncing back to normal in the next few weeks. This doesn’t have to be the end of your Wedding dreams though. There are so many alternative options for you and your loved one. From eloping to having a small and intimate ceremony and a plan to party when things allow or simply holding off for a little while, having a Plan B will certainly take the pressure off and hopefully allow you to enjoy the extended planning period and just build the anticipation for when you finally get to say your ‘I do’s!’
I would love to hear from you if you have any other ideas or experiences to add to this. In the meantime, take care and lets hope for some simpler and more certain times ahead.
The sun is most certainly back out to celebrate Andrea & Dotun’s one year anniversary and I really hope that there is time in both Andrea & Dotun’s crazy NHS schedules to allow for a little celebrating today. Most definitely not in the way I’m sure they were expecting but I’m sure there will be many many years in the future to make up for it.
I hope some of my favourite images from this day last year can transport you back to a time pre-pandemic when the only things to worry about were co-ordinating incredible outfit changes and making sure no one knocked over the Wedding cake while performing an impressive ‘dance to the Wedding Breakfast’ number!
Andrea & Dotun’s day was incredible. There was everything you could expect from a Nigerian Wedding combined with everything you could expect from an Irish Wedding and the results made for a day full to the brim of emotion, colour, laughter, epic dancing, excellent food and a pair of very cute ducks… a nurse and a surgeon fittingly!
I hope you enjoy the selection of images below and lets hope everyones Wedding plans can get back on track soon!
