When my favourite vintage wedding dress shop launched their own, self designed, collection based on vintage styles (but able to be sized up to a Uk size 22!) I was super excited to be able to host an exclusive competition for one of my readers to win one. Alongside Fur Coat No Knickers founders and designers Emma and Laura, I read every single entry, eventually picking the gorgeous Diana as our winner. Her story touched our hearts and we were all so honoured to be able to fulfil her dream to feel beautiful on her wedding day.
I am utterly thrilled to be sharing that wedding with you all today! It was held at Chester Zoo.
“Our wedding was us. It was just us”, Diana began. “It was the most laidback, chilled out event ever. Everyone commented on how impressed they were that we’d managed to instil a sense of ourselves through proceedings. Neither of us wanted a big fancy event. We just wanted to get married and have a kickass party and that’s what we did. The Doctor Who stuff was more me than Ben but I loved it and so did the kids.”
“I think the zoo setting marked us out straight away”, she continued. “We had a lot of comments after the Save the Date cards went out and messages asking if we were joking about the zoo. It got people talking so that was fun. I think Ben and I are fairly alternative anyway so it was just injecting that sense of fun into our wedding. We wore what we wanted and didn’t care about matching colours and fabrics and stuff. We just ran with what we liked and it worked out really well.”
“People knew that we just wanted everyone to have fun so people brought a change of clothes; dresses for the day and jeans for the evening. We were going on safari too so heels had to be abandoned!”
“Our biggest expense was our photographer, Sarah”, she explained, “but she was worth it. I was umming and ahhing over photography and we had decided to budget by having my brother do it but after speaking with some photographers and reading so many blog posts on Rock n Roll Bride, I knew we needed a professional and we needed to pay for it. I asked Sarah to do a half day (something she didn’t actually offer anymore) and she agreed. We met up and loved her. About two months before the wedding; I emailed her and asked her if she could do the full day and we just went for it. I don’t regret spending that extra money. It was totally worth it for those amazing images that I can’t stop looking at.”
“We saved money on my outfit as I’d won it through the Rock n Roll Bride competition! My advice to future couples would be definitely enter into every single competition you possibly can! But overall we just budgeted everything. We knew how much we wanted to spend on each area and we stuck to it as closely as we could. We were really strict with people and their RSVPs. We had a date set and on that date, I emailed everyone for confirmation of numbers and the people that hadn’t responded were removed from the guest list. It sounds harsh but it saved us quite a lot of money. Luckily, the zoo held off charging us the final amount as long as possible so I could round up the stragglers.”
“My other advice would be to talk. Talk about everything. If you want something, tell your other half. If they don’t like that idea, they need to open their mouth. I think if you communicate about everything then nothing can go wrong. Certainly nothing that you could’ve changed anyway. There’s no way Ben would have ever imagined us buying an inflatable TARDIS but once I’d showed him some TARDIS cake ideas too, it all came together. And then he got the shock of his life when he saw my TARDIS knickers – my something blue. Haha!! Communication is key.”
“And just be yourselves”, she concluded. “Don’t invite people your parents want there but you’re a bit unsure about. Don’t let someone else tell you that you should be trying to save money on parts of the wedding. Decide on what is important to you and go for it and screw what anyone else says. It’s YOUR day.”
“Finally a massive, massive thank you. Never in a million years did I think I would win the most amazing wedding dress ever so thank you, Kat, Laura and Emma for making me feel like the luckiest girl in the world! You helped make our wedding extra special.”
The Gallery
Suppliers
- Photography: Sarah Janes Photography
- Venue: Chester Zoo
- Bride's Dress: Fur Coat No Knickers, Flaunt It Collection
- Bride's Headpiece: Fur Coat No Knickers
- Make Up: Vicky Spencer at The Art of Make-Up
- Groom's Attire: Austin Reed
- Bridesmaid's Dresses: Coast and Debenhams
- Cheese Cake: Liverpool Cheese Company
- TARDIS Cake: DIY
- Flowers: Mimi Eden
- Stationery: DIY via Vistaprint
- Band: The Reno Corrado Pimps