An Informal Picnic Wedding with a Touch of Vintage: Michelle & Jodie

August 9, 2011

Being a wedding planner herself, newlywed Michelle knew exactly what she wanted for her British Summertime wedding to Jodie. In the 18 months of their engagement she spent hours crafting and painstakingly putting together their  vintage and craft themed day. “I wouldn’t change a thing!” she explained. “We had so much fun planning the day, we did everything from choosing the playlists to writing our vows and designing the picnic menus.”

“Being a planner I wanted to make sure our wedding was different from all the weddings I’ve been involved with, ensuring that the day reflected us and our love of all things vintage.  The first thing for me was that the day needed to be informal, a family event. I remembered having big family picnic in the park when I was little and how happy everyone was, laughing, drink and playing games in the sunshine, and that was the feeling I wanted our guests to have. Jodie introduced me to Babycham a few years ago and since then it’s become one of our favourite tipples, so it was only right that we have a Babycham reception complete with original Babycham saucers and mini bottles with cute stripy straws.”

“Our wedding breakfast was a yummy picnic, with sweet course of afternoon tea cakes and goodies,” she continued. “I’d collected over 500 pieces of vintage china, which we used at the tea. All the produce was sourced from local farm shops and suppliers, and then put into beautiful vintage hampers that I had collected over the years. Each hamper was finished off with a flower arrangement in a vintage tin and a table name (all were places close to our hearts) in the style of vintage beer mats.”

“The evening was all about having fun, with a vintage ice cream trailer, personalised with Mr & Mrs Miles, retro sweeties in ornate jars, a swing out carousel and vintage board games.  The guest book was a type writer, where we asked guests to type us a message and hand it on the wishing tree (a hat stand lovingly decorated by Jodie). We hung pictures of Jodie and I from our engagement shoot in Bath, to bring some of his home town to the wedding.”

“The car park had homemade flags of our home towns too. There are so many more details that I loved, the for your tears of joy vintage hankies that I collected and people help themselves to at the ceremony (lucky really as it was such a tear-jerker), the lace jars, face frames, haybale covers with vintage fabric collected from markets, the floral arrangements in birdcages, lanterns and vintage tins, the paper pom poms and lanterns that hung between the barn and stretch tent…. there’s just too much to mention.”

The majority of Michelle & Jodie’s wedding was homemade by the pair – from the decoupage pegs, to the paper pom poms and face frames.

Gorgeous huh?

Thanks so much to Michelle & Jodie and their photographer’s McKinley-Rodgers Photography for sharing this beautiful wedding with us today.

Photography Credit: McKinley-Rodgers Photography
Venue: Preston Court
Bride’s Dress: Candy Anthony
Bride’s Shoes: Shiraz by Else
Bride’s Headpiece/Jewellery: Vintage
Groom’s Suit: Lambretta
Bridesmaid’s Dresses: DIY
Cake: Jacqui Seal jacqui.bespoke.cakes@gmail.com & Lissy and Kate of The Sweetest Thing Cakery
Flowers: DIY
Band: Sugar Hill Jazz
DJ: Brad & Glen from Hotwax Associates
Hair & Make Up: Sara Austin
Car: 1949 Rolls Royce
Stationery: Sam Osborne
Tent: Pitch Tent Co.
Vintage China: Fusion Live Events (bride’s company)
Wedding Signs: Vintage Wall Art