Real Life Bride #2: Introducing Megan!

Written by: louise

This morning I'm super excited to introduce you to our second Real Life Bride for 2014! Regular readers might recognise bride-to-be Megan and her fiancé Olly from their West End engagement shoot with photographer Anneli Marinovich that I featured just over a year ago. Taking their time with their wedding planning, this gorgeous couple have finally set a date and are looking forward to their Autumn wedding at Syon Park! As Olly is a chef, and they both ooze style, so I'm pretty sure this is one wedding planning journey you're going to want to follow!

Ladies, meet Megan!

Olly and I met when I was a grad student and took a waitressing job at a pop-up restaurant in The Old Vic Tunnels underneath Waterloo station. Olly was working as a guest chef. I was immediately drawn to him. Though he is really very reserved, he is the type of person everyone notices, magnetic in every way. We were just friendly until I coaxed him into going out after a 16-hour workday. He returned to Frankfurt days later, but we both knew we had to see each other again. Olly is a chef, whose specialty is sushi. He owns a catering company called Kokoro and is currently head chef of The Magazine restaurant at the Serpentine Sackler Gallery. I recently finished two Master's degrees in Media Communications and International Relations. After spending a year working as the marketing and events director for Kokoro, I'm now searching for a new career in London! Almost exactly four months after we met, Olly proposed to me in Kitzbühel, Austria on his birthday. A friend let us use his brand new chalet with the most incredible view of the mountains. It was meant to be a skiing holiday for Olly's birthday, so I had no suspicions. With the snow falling, I was cozied up next to the fireplace when we came over, knelt down next to me, and asked me to be his wife. When beginning this post I took a look at the first one I wrote for b.loved, which accompanied our engagement photos {which you can see here} I smiled thinking of how much we've experienced together since that day. We started new lives in new countries (twice), began new jobs and left others behind, struggled adapting to new cultures and learned new languages. He came to respect and embrace the importance of religion in my life, and I learned to equally respect the fact that religion is not a part of his. We learned so much more about each other and own own selves, had our first big arguments, learned how to forgive and fight fair. We travelled, worked alongside each other, and supported each other through countless amazing moments and some very difficult ones. And all of it was driven by our love for each other. As I write these things down, I feel really proud of us both. Making a lifelong commitment is as complex and serious as it gets; there are times it feels effortless when you're so in love, but we both know marriage requires serious daily effort. I am just so grateful that I have found the most loving, supportive, selfless person to walk through life with. Being a b.loved bride is such a wonderful part of this amazing, crazy puzzle we're putting together. Wedding planning can be so demanding that many of us forget to enjoy the process. As every bride knows, the things most of us have fantasised about since we were little girls (The invitations! The flowers! THE DRESS!) are, in reality, things which require massive time commitments amidst already busy lives. When Louise asked me to be a b.loved bride, I knew this would be a great opportunity for us to enjoy and document not just the big important day, but all the steps along the way. Just writing this first post gave me a little reality check, realising that I need to chill out about things like bridesmaid dresses and china patterns. I need to keep the balance, remembering that it's going to be a beautiful day no matter what, and nothing can top the fact that I have the incredible privilege of becoming this man's wife. However - moving away from the introspection- it's also an amazing opportunity for me to share every challenge, setback, accomplishment and milestone of this whole journey with other brides. We will all run a gamut of emotions in the planning process- who better to look to for inspiration and advice than other people on the same journey? I can't wait to share our adventure with all of you. Follow Megan's monthly updates here

Categories: real weddings · Tags: megan, real life bride, real life bride 2, wedding planning