Homemade & Pretty Country Wedding | Whimsical Wonderland Weddings

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Nigel and Emma had three wedding venues, a church service, followed by a meal at Quinnettes Barn and a party at Churt Village Hall. They wanted their wedding to be relaxed and country whilst remembering those that sadly couldn't be with them.

Emma looked beautiful in her Monsoon wedding dress, which she teamed with custom made shoes from Shoes of Prey. Nigel went for a smart grey suit and the bridesmaids dresses were handmade using Liberty fabric.

I so love the country garden flowers, the horse shoes table decorations and that chocolate cake.

Thanks so much to the lovely Sophie Duckworth for sharing her photographs with us.

The day itself was always going to be tinged with sadness, as Nige and I have both have parents who have passed away (My Dad and his Mum). So we had to try and figure out how to create a joyful day whilst also dealing with the huge amount of sadness that comes with having such a significant day of your life without certain people present.

Once we had sorted the Church we started looking for reception venues. We wanted everything to be based in one place so people didn't have to drive but given that Churt is really quite small, we didn't make things easy for ourselves! I happened upon an absolute gem of a place called Quinnettes while I was looking at local caterer's websites. The barn at Quinnettes is absolutely beautiful - not too big but with bags of character, set in beautifully landscaped gardens, surrounded by pretty little houses. I'd lived in the area for years and never knew it was there!

Initially after we had found Quinnettes and decided it was perfect for us, we didn't think we would be able to use it after all because being in a grounds surrounded by private houses, the latest they cater for parties is 10pm - and we like to dance! Then we saw the Village Hall, which is halfway between the Church and Quinnettes, and decided that it could be quite fun for us all to walk the short distance from the barn to the hall. So we booked all three and took it from there!

I didn't want a veil but knew I wanted something in my hair - I decided on a gorgeous floral crown which I found on etsy. Our florist added real flowers which made it look utterly amazing. I loved it!

My shoes were a mission! I love shoes so originally decided to treat myself to an amazing designer pair but couldn't find quite the right ones. Then I discovered this incredible website called Shoes of Prey where you can DESIGN YOUR OWN SHOES!!!!!! Many a happy hour was spent designing hundreds of pairs (literally) before I decided on my dream pair - fuchsia with a green binding (to mirror the colours of the bridesmaid dresses - again!). When they did finally arrive I realised I'd mixed up my sizes and ordered half a size too big. Arrgh. Shoes of Prey were amazing and let me keep those ones whilst they made me a new pair - which arrived about a week before the wedding and fitted perfectly. Phew.

For jewellery - Nigel bought me a tiny crystal pendant which was perfect and Mum had commissioned a pair of feather drop earrings for me which were beautiful. I also wore a gorgeous Tiffany bracelet borrowed from my bridesmaid Liz. It had a little turquoise heart on it which matched a turquoise and pearl ring I wear all the time.

Groom's Attire... Nige had a fairly good idea of what he wanted to wear and a traditional morning suit wouldn't really have worked, so he hired suits online for himself and the best man. Kayne our best man, and his gorgeous wife Rach, were flying over from New Zealand so we only saw them a couple of days before the wedding. Kayne's trousers ended up being a bit too small so after the ceremony Kayne got changed into his jeans and jandals! Nige also had his jandals on so it perfectly suited the relaxed vibe we were after anyway!

The Details + Decor... The flowers for the St John's were just masses of country garden flowers in jugs, along with a beautiful floral arch over the doorway. Mum and I had decorated little metal hearts with ribbon and buttons, which we hung on the pew ends.

Quinnettes was such an amazing place that it didn't need much doing to it really. We again had heaps of country garden flowers in little vases that my Mum had been collecting from charity shops, which looked amazing. Ivy from her garden was strung onto the chandeliers and we hung horseshoes which Nicole had strung onto ribbon around the walls. Mum had been on a willow weaving course so she, Naledi and I made some willow hearts which I twisted ribbon and some little paper flowers into. Our table plan was a map of the world, with tables named after places we'd been together (all to do with horses as well!). The table names were displayed in horseshoes which I'd been collecting for years (knowing they'd come in handy one day!). I'd cleaned and painted them all before Nige made little wooden stands. We also had gorgeous little chubby ceramic birds from Laura Ashley, one on each table. We also had a special guest of honour, in the form of a little plastic horse! This was to represent Trifle the horse, who was a wedding present from some amazing friends in Devon!!

Mum and Naledi made metres of bunting using the remnants of all the fabric Mum and I had bought when choosing the bridesmaid's dresses. The boys strung this up around the gardens and it looked stunning. I'd also made a string of bunting for the fireplace, using some leftovers from the bridesmaid dresses and some New Zealand fern fabric that Mum had picked up over there. We had snacks and drinks in the garden for people whilst we were off having some photos on the common. We'd ordered some New Zealand beer which Nige put in a wheelbarrow with lots of ice!

The Village Hall had been decorated by our crack team of wedding co-ordinators after our wedding rehearsal! Nige and I along with Mum, Nicole, my brother, Kayne, Rach and Naledi all went there after the rehearsal. We strung fairy lights across the whole roof, with bunting (made by my bridesmaid Tamsin's Mum, for Tamsin's wedding, then borrowed by us!) across the roof too, and had tissue paper pom poms on fishing wire strung across the dancefloor area. The pom poms were a nightmare to make (thanks Nicole you're a star!) and a pain to string up but they did look amazing!!! Walking into the hall once it was dark and all the lights were on was fantastic! So pretty!

Our wedding invitations were from Lovat Press, we originally found Gillian on not on the high street when I ordered some save the date cards. They were so pretty that we got our invitations from her too.

We made the rest of the wedding stationery ourselves. My sister in law designed us a gorgeous floral heart with our initials in, which echoed our invitations but used the flowers from the bridesmaid dresses. I downloaded a lovely font from the internet and we used this, plus the floral heart, on the order of service, menu and place settings. We'd been collecting corks for ages (again, they'll come in useful one day!) and Nige made these into place settings which looked amazing. Every place setting had a quote on it that meant something to us.

My wedding car was my brother's Mini - in which we both learnt to drive! There was never any doubt in my mind that a Mini was the only car for me and James pulled out all the stops to make sure his was in full working order for the day - and made the trip down from Manchester as well! My Mum had organised 'surprise transport' for the girls, which I was a bit apprehensive about (not good with surprises!) but she'd absolutely come up trumps and organised for another four minis to accompany us! Roaring to the Church in our Mini convoy is a very special memory for me. Nige had booked a little MG midget as his wedding transport and we went off to the common in this after the ceremony.

After the emotions of the ceremony it was fantastic to blast off to the common in our little MG. Nige had brought along two little bottles of champagne so we shared that whilst Sophie was taking photographs. She was so unobtrusive that it was just as if we were out for a walk (albeit in very fancy clothes!). She shots she took there and at the green by the Church are utterly beautiful.

The speeches were phenomenal! The boys did such a great job and really hit the right tone. Kayne had everyone in stitches; it really was the best best man's speech ever! Nigel's was heartfelt and lovely - he was even a bit nervous which is very unlike him! My brother did an amazing speech and managed to hold it together until the last moment. There are no words to describe how proud of him I am.

We also had a BBQ at Mum's the next day (a Kiwi tradition) and it was so fantastic to spend time chilling out with people the next day - I thoroughly recommend it!

Liberty fabric | Shaukat

Venue | Quinnettes Barn

Venue | Churt Village Hall

Caterer | Monica's Country Kitchen

Church | St John's Church, Churt

Invitations | Lovat Press

Flowers | Lavender Hill Florist

Dress | Monsoon

Shoes | Shoes of Prey

Etsy floral crown |T he Honey Comb

Photographer | Sophie Duckworth Photography

Band | The Encore Band Warble Entertainment