Pretty English Summer Garden Wedding | Whimsical Wonderland Weddings

Pretty English Summer Garden Wedding | Whimsical Wonderland Weddings

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This morning may well leave you dreaming of sunny summer days spent at the seaside.

Jenny and Ben married in Kent, with a Church service followed by a marquee reception at Glen Hill, Deal. I think Jenny and Ben created one of the prettiest marquee receptions ever, with wild flowers, long tables, lanterns, lavender and a gorgeous looking cake table.

Jenny looked so beautiful in her exquisite Johanna Hehir dress and veil, with pretty flowers and blackberries in her hair, while Ben donned a bespoke blue suit with fun polka dot tie. So much style... eekk.

Thanks so very much to the amazing We Heart Pictures for sharing their photographs with us.

The Venue... We had decided quite early on that we wanted to get married in Kent, we lived in London at the time but we both met in Canterbury whilst at university .

I spent hours trawling the internet for venues and weekends driving around Kent but nothing seemed to quite fit the bill. I knew I wanted something very laid back where I could create my wedding from scratch, not having to be tied to any hotel decor/menu. It just so happened that whilst I was looking for somewhere for my family who are from Birmingham to stay in Kent the week of the wedding, I came across a holiday cottage in Walmer, near Deal where Ben grew up. The house overlooked Walmer castle and the sea and was huge so could fit all my family during wedding week and the grounds were so beautiful I decided I would try to see if I could hire the house for the week and put marquees in the gardens to have our reception on the day. And we did! It was perfect for our laid back approach and meant that my family and friends could make a little holiday of our wedding spending time together in the run up to it.

The Dress + Accessories... The designer of my dress was Johanna Hehir. I spent 3 months trying on different dresses at bridal boutiques across London but couldn't quite find the style i was looking for. I knew I wanted lace which a lot of the dresses had but most seemed to be strapless, and I knew i wanted something a little different. I tried on a bias cut all over corded lace dress and I loved it! I especially loved the high boat neckline which had a sheer lace overlay.

Being surrounded by the natural beauty of the trees and the flowers in our reception venue, I wanted to continue this theme throughout the day, and knew I wanted flowers in my hair in some way shape or form. That's where the lovely Vicki Lord worked her magic! She saw my dress and instantly knew with its boat neckline that an up do was the way to go. With that in mind, I knew I didn't want anything to formal but something relaxed and natural. Vicki created a mood board with images which reflected this online and we decided on a loose up do with a braid plated across the top of my head, with flowers from my bouquet pinned in across the braid. With my makeup all I knew is that I wanted to look natural and after a trial with Lucy Jayne she helped me to focus my look and suggested a Bridget Bardot style cat eye-liner smokey eye, which I loved!

I'm 5ft 9 inches tall so I knew that I would be most comfortable in flats, and when i found a pair of rose gold peep toes in topshop i was over the moon! They were a little different and really comfortable. I spent ages looking for the perfect veil but couldn't find anything I thought complimented my dress. However, the lovely girls from Johanna Hehir suggested a finger tip lace edged veil and luckily had one left in stock when i went to collect my dress, and it was perfect.

The Readings + Music... Our ceremony was held at Kingsdown Village Church, which is a small church overlooking the sea in Walmer. I wanted to keep every element of the service as personal to us both as possible and with us both being music obsessives our song choices were really important to us. So i walked down the aisle to The Smiths 'Please, please, please let me get what I want' played on the violin by my brilliant and talented sister Sophie, with her friend James on acoustic guitar, and we sang along to the Beach Boys 'God only knows' for our hymm. We found classical versions of all our favourite songs and chose a few by the smiths, the pixies and radiohead to play in the background whilst we signed the register (which meant I could sneak in a version of the smiths comically titled 'some girls are bigger than others' without displeasing our vicar!). We chose the velveteen rabbit for our reading which was read by my best girl Fiona.

Beautiful Bridesmaids... We didn't have bridesmaids and groomsman as we wanted to keep the ceremony to be simple. With this is mind, we simply had a best man, who was actually Ben's sister Holly and I had a best girl, one of my closest friends Fiona. We didn't want anything to match a particular theme; we just wanted everyone to look like themselves and be relaxed and enjoy it!

The Cake... We didn't have a wedding cake but asked our friends and family to bake their signature bake for our desert table! We had a huge selection from a brilliant carrot cake, pear and frangipane tart, white chocolate and amaretto cupcakes, Victoria sponge and delicious peanut butter chocolate squares in little bags and chocolate biscuit hearts. They went down a storm!

The Details + Decor.... I wanted the marquee to have a village fete feel to it, so we picked wooden folding chairs and long trestle tables with the wild flowers picked the day before forming the centrepieces. I wanted to bring nature into the marquee, so we had dried lavender tied bouquets on each table setting, floral paper napkins i found from ebay, white paper lanterns and homemade floral bunting. We wanted to pick our own music so we came up with a set list of over 300 songs we both loved and our friends Steve and Lindsay helped us out and D.J'd for us in the evening.

We served Champaign on arrival to Glen Hill from the conservatory in the garden, and a sparkling elderflower presse, which could be enjoyed with views of the sea!

Instead of canapes, we served a selection of cured meats and cheese on chopping boards arranged on a bed of fresh herbs which we created ourselves and served as part of our centre pieces.

We had a BBQ in the garden with locally sourced ingredients, from BBQ Spare ribs, Charcoaled summer chicken, monkfish and salmon kebabs, halloumi and sweet potato kebabs, corn on the cob with lots of salads and homemade coleslaw.

Photography | We Heart Pictures

Dress | Johanna Hehir

Groom | King and Allen Bespoke Tailoring

Makeup | L ucy Jayne Make Up

Hair | Vicki Lord Bridal Hair

Florist | Merrygardens

Shoes | Topshop

Marquee | Chelmer Marquees

Venue | Glen Hill, Walmer, Deal, Kent.

Oh such a pretty and delightful wedding day. I can just taste summer now :-)

Thanks so so much to Jenny and Ben for sharing their utterly beautiful wedding with us XOXO Lou

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