How did he propose?
Lee had been planning the proposal for months, I had no idea at all, after 6 years of waiting I had almost given up on the idea! We were going away on holiday together and he had got pretty anxious about getting the ring safe and secret into another country so decided the night of the flight to get down on one knee in our kitchen. It was really sweet and intimate, in fact, I had just got out the shower, had wet hair and just a t-shirt on – at least he had waited for me to paint my nails!
Tell us all about your preparations for the big day and finding your perfect dress
We decided early on to get married early abroad so we used a lot on online vendors for all our shopping and research. I am an online bride, so I used a lot of Pinterest, Instagram and Etsy to find all my inspiration, particularly when it came to creating my own flowers and centrepieces.
I always knew I wanted a lace wedding dress, but the idea I had in my head was a long sleeved and once I we decided on our overseas location I realised it was going to be the height of summer on a Greek island, so I quickly did away with the sleeve idea, although I still love those gowns.
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I only went to two stores and the first gown I tried on was the one I ended up buying. I am pretty in tune with what I like and so it was very easy to discount a lot of gowns from the offset. I only took my mum and I wasn’t prepared to find “the one” that day, it was only supposed to be a nice mother and daughter outing, however I fell in love with that first gown. Every dress I tried there after just was not as dramatic or as special. It is entirely lace, sequined from head to toe, nothing could match that drama!
I got my gown from Brides and Gowns in Derby, I picked the Ronald Joyce style Ellie in champagne, with the matching champagne cathedral length veil. I never thought I would go for a champagne gown though, but once I had tried on that colour, white just didn’t look right on me! I still get excited thinking about it now, I have NEVER in my life worn a gown so beautiful and probably never will again. It was all about the drama. I have always loved fashion and the very Gatsby style feel to it is right up my street. Every inch was covered in lace and sequin, beading around the front and back. I always wanted either a thigh split or a very dropped back and this gown ticked that box too. It was just such an eye catching gown, the way the light hit it.
I realised I needed to keep the veil simple and let the gown do all of the talking so we matched the colour and left it there. I wore some accessories, my wedding ring was a custom made rose gold teardrop morganite from a jeweller in Cornwall and I purchased a Santorini made blue gold ring from Caroline Svedbomb as I wanted to wear a little piece of Santorini on the day, the blue is just exactly right. My shoes were pale pink and heart Vivienne Westwood that I had ALWAYS wanted.
Was the wedding everything you dreamed of?
I really enjoyed the planning stage as I am a bit of a control freak, there were a couple of questionable moments, but generally it went really well. I had a wedding planner out in Santorini who was a real god send once we got nearer to the date, she helped source a lot of things that I wouldn’t be able take with me, such as candles. I made all my own bouquets except my own! Those were real, you cannot tell from the photographs, but we saved hundreds of pounds on fresh flowers that people wouldn’t be able to bring home! I also made the flower table runner, buttonholes and the cake we kept it to a small wedding cake, good job we didn’t bother spending much on it because there was almost an entire cake left over at the end of the night! People were far too interested in eating their meal, dancing and drinking to worry about cake.
The best bit was finally walking down the aisle. I completely lost it, it was the most emotional experience of my life, dad had to hold me up because I was struggling to contain it, extremely overwhelming and I really put that down to how stunning the entire venue was, it was like a dream came true and I simply couldn’t believe it was for me! The funniest was the speeches, we had some tears and we had lots of laughs, it was so nice to have so much laughter and love in one place.
What advice do you have for brides-to-be just starting their journey?
Get married abroad, seriously. It is the most spectacular experience, our wedding lasted 2 weeks as opposed to a day. We had a week together before people joined us, my son included, then the wedding and 4 days honeymoon thereafter. Being away with all of our favourite people just made it even more wonderful.
Photo credit: WedVisions