Rock n Roll Bride - The ultimate guide for alternative brides

Retro

That 70’s Show – A Retro Flower-Child Bridal Shoot

Kat

May 4, 2011

The 1970's are well and truly BACK. I don't know about you but I'm seeing the styling of this decade everywhere at the moment - from the rails of the high street to the lookbooks of the high end. Even kitsch 70's décor is back in vogue (apparently...not sure about the whole avocado bathroom thing making a comeback ...) So needless to say, I didn't expect it to be long until someone brought this iconic styling into a bridal shoot. Photographer Catherine of Lily & Frank Photography and florist Steph from Fairy Nuff Flowers worked together to bring this concept together. They set out their goals from the outset as they were keen to make this shoot stand out from the crowd. They wanted the flowers to take centre stage to the styling, to echo the 'flower-child' movement of the 70's I'd suppose, so they make a conscious decision not to use any jewellery or hair accessories on the models. They were also very keen to make it a retro style, rather than the oh-s0-popular vintage styling of the moment - therefore bold pops of colour and strong statement pieces moved to the forefront. Finally, an obvious British feel was imperative as was a vibe of laid-back, fun and alternative-ness.
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A Modern Retro, Bowling Alley Shoot

Kat

May 3, 2011

Today's shoot is one that celebrates all thing British-ness but without a blatant 'jumping on the royal wedding bandwagon.' Thank goodness for these guys and their original take on what it means to be British. "With the royal wedding drawing so much attention around the world to good Ol’ Blighty, I wanted to showcase a quirkier side of England!" stylist and wedding planner Mary of Forever & Ever Events told me. "So I teamed up photographer, Aneta Mak, who specializes in shooting on film, designer Delphine Manivet, milliner Edwina Ibbotson and Bloomsbury Lanes Bowing Alley for an inspirational shoot that celebrated what I consider truly British: high-end meets retro."
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Stav & Danielle’s Engagement Session on Wheels

Kat

April 25, 2011

Stav & Danielle met she brought her car into her local garage to be fixed, where Sav happened to work. Needless to say the couple have their mutual love of cars to thank for their relationship! Being a mechanic, Stav has a passion for old cars and restoring them. Danielle adores all things retro and loves the aesthetic nature of vintage cars, so using them in their engagement shoot was a no-brainer really. For the shoot, the couple were lent a collection of vintage cars from some of Stav's clients including a classic Mercedes, a clasic Woody, a classic Corvette and a classic Ford truck.
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N’tima & Steven’s Love Across the Sea

Kat

March 18, 2011

How are your emotions doing today? because I've got a wedding to share that will probably make you blub...there is just so. much. love right here! N'tima & Steven's love blossomed across the sea. The bride explained, "We lived in Okinawa, Japan when we met. He was 16, I was 14. We were kids. We were neighbours. We both were kinda dating people on & off here in America, so we were just friends.You see, my family had orders to be shipped to California in June. It was April, and Steven and I were starting to get close. We exchanged numbers, and everything moved so quickly after this point. Every day before I moved was spent falling in love with this beautiful boy. Although we denied it, and being together was scary to us. Distance obviously hadn't worked previously, so we decided we’d be just friends. Everyone around us knew we were ridiculously in love, but we kept telling each other that we had to stay friends. On May 26, 2008, Steven told me that he loved me, and that he would rather ‘try & fail with us, than not try at all.’ So June 6, 2008, I moved away, and we made the distance work for us. We lived through web-cam dates & 17 hour time differences. I visited November of that year, and April of 2009. By the end of 2009, Steven had joined the air force. He was sent to Basic & we lived through letters for 8 1/2 weeks. I visited for his graduation. He was then sent to Tech school across the country for four more months. I visited for Christmas. In January of 2010 he was sent to live 2 hours away from me here in California, completely by chance. How much luckier could we be, eh?"
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Tony & Cindy’s Pin Up & Tattoo Themed Wedding

Kat

January 28, 2011

"Tony and I have always been into tattoos and are both big pin up girl fans, both classic and modern," begin Bride Cindy. "Neither of us ever thought we get to have a wedding that truly expressed who we were, and we were soooooo wrong. The tattoo / pin up girl theme was one of the first things we decided on. If we were going to do it, we were going to do it right and really have our own wedding … for us and no one else … we got our wedding tattoos during our engagement photo shoot."
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Katie & Olivia’s Natural Beauty

Kat

January 26, 2011

Today's first feature actually isn't wedding-related at all, but I just loved it so much that I had to share it anyway. Sisters Katie & Olivia's shoot took place at the home of photographer, and friend of their family, Lee Anne Havens of Flower Child Photography. The idea for the shoot was inspired by the girls' natural beauty and a desire from Lee Anne to create something unique. "It took me a long time to decide how and where to do this shoot, and in the end I settled on just doing everything at my home studio and made some crazy "costumes" for them," explained Lee Anne.
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A Quirky, British, Cupcakey Kinda Day

Kat

January 17, 2011

Oh I do love a pretty & retro photo shoot to brighten up a Monday morning and this fabulous one, sent over my Bethan of Haywood Jones Photography, fits the bill perfecto! "The main aim of this shoot was to achieve a real vintage glamour look and feel," began photographer Bethan. "We wanted a big slice of silver screen elegance with a large portion of delicious cupcakes on the side! My Pretty Little Things specialise in making veils and fascinators which hark through the eras of the 20's right through to the 50's and approached me to organise a vintage themed session. When organising the shoot, I contacted Queenies Cupcakes who have a shop in Ironbridge right around the corner to me, to see if we could use them as a location for part of the day. They were absolutely brilliant and we all had a good nibble on the cupcakes while we were there, work is so hard sometimes!"
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Chris & Jenn’s Rockabilly Car-Inspired Wedding

Kat

January 5, 2011

"The style and ambiance of our wedding had more to do with who we are as people than outside inspiration," newlywed's Chris & Jenn explained. "We find culture and appeal in a simpler moment in history. The 1950's are, after all, the birth of subculture; car culture was at the heart of this movement. We live, breathe, and bleed this car culture so it followed suit to incorporate our life into our wedding." So it was themselves and their own personal style and outlook on life that inspired their rockabilly wedding. The Californian couple made the wedding their own and wouldn't have changed a thing. Jenn's dress by Allure Bridals wasn't perfect for her until she cut it short herself to show off her awesome saddle shoes. Aren't those gorgeous?
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Charlie & Jo’s Unconventional Music Gig Wedding

Kat

November 26, 2010

Charlie & Jo's reception took place the day before their ceremony and that's not the only thing about this awesome wedding that was unconventional. "We decided to get married and the Registry Office had a date free in two months time so we had a short amount of time in which to plan and make everything happen," the couple explained. "We already had many things that we wanted to have at our wedding, incorporating lots of themes that we love. Many of these themes were not obviously related and not directly relevant to a wedding but we were more interested in these than having a traditional wedding. It all came together perfectly in the end. The less we worried about what we ‘should’ be doing, the more time we had to be creative and make our ideas possible in the time we had."
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Emily & Daniel’s Classic and Caring Wedding

Kat

September 7, 2010

I've known (as in online-known) photographer Katie Malone for about 3 years. We got married about the same time and were both members of the same forum during our planning. I love when she emails me weddings she's now shooting. It's incredible how we're both still surrounded by this wedding-world after all this time...and doing it in a bad ass way of course! I've loved her photographs ever since she first started experimenting. She usesa variety of cameras to give her photographs a totally different look to anyone else's. Infrared, Vivitar ultra wide & slim, Holga & Polaroid are all used alongside her digital SLR to get her unusual and intoxicating techniques.
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London Calling – Lindsey & Alex’s Quadrophenia Wedding

Kat

July 28, 2010

I've branded this the 'Quadrophenia wedding' because of all the fabulous retro British details. Makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside to be English doesn't it? The couple embarked in a lot of diy to make it all super personal and everything from the pub they held it in being called The Britannia to the pork pie 'cake'; from the Vivienne Westwood shoes (a national treasure in my eyes!) to the red, white a blue throughout were put together to make their theme perfect. The bunting had a union jack vibe, the table plans were quintsentially British themed and the guests were even transported in a open top double decker routemaster red bus.
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Motorbikes & Lucky Strike

Kat

July 22, 2010

This awesome shoot was put together for Little White Dress bridal boutique in Bakersfield, CA. I love that a bridal shop went for such a retro rockabilly look for their promotion. "I really wanted to do an out of the box bridal shoot in a retro cigarette style ad reminiscent of the old Winston \ Lucky strike ads" photographer Jeb told me. "Our model Rebecca Lotze has such a unique classical look that we picked her for this shoot not only because of her gorgeous look, but because of the genius she brought to the shoot. We collaborated with another designer, Brandon Smith of B-Love clothing, and came up with the "Trust No Man" shot."
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