Real Bride - Beth & Chris

The Ivory Room bride Beth married Chris at the beautiful Hall Farm in Ashby-Cum-Fenby nestled on the edge of the Lincolnshire Wolds. Beth looked amazing in her Essense Of Australia gown which was customised to make it her dream dress. Here is their story…..

THE PROPOSAL

Chris and I had been going out for 10 years before he proposed (we got introduced by a mutual friend on MSN whilst at school, Chris was the year above me). Then on 3rd July 2019 whilst on holiday with my family we were heading out for dinner and posing for a picture (but my sister was secretly recording!) Chris got down on one knee and asked me to marry him! It was so perfect and as my family knew what was going to happen they had packed cards, presents and even some bits to decorate the villa for when we woke up the following morning.

THE WEDDING DRESS

I had no idea what I was looking for in my wedding dress! Like most people I have body insecurities and knew that I wanted sleeves on my dress so when I fell in love with a sleeveless Essense of Australia gown I didn’t know what to do! Victoria was so helpful and added some temporary sleeves to the dress, there and then and I knew it was the one! Victoria was absolutely amazing and made me feel so comfortable during the whole dress shopping experience, I can’t thank her enough!

THE WEDDING

We had a blush pink and sage green theme with hints of gold in there too. Our table names were named after the different flowers in my bouquet which was really lovely. We did a lot of DIY for the day too, including doing up old pallets, bureaus and ladders we had bought on eBay. I also made our wedding favours which were iced biscuits that had “Mr &Mrs Lovely” and our wedding date on them.

YOUR SPECIAL MEMORY

Seeing family that we hadn’t been able to see them in over a year due to lockdown etc!

Are you looking for the perfect wedding dress? Make your appointment at The Ivory Room today!

Real Bride - Chloe & Dean

Throughout the last year it has been really hard to see so many weddings being postponed so when Chloe collected her dress ready for her intimate wedding in Scotland I was thrilled to see how excited she was. Chloe had seen an Essense of Australia dress online that she loved and I managed to get it on loan for her to try, it was perfect! Here is her story…..

THE PROPOSAL

My proposal happened in Glasgow in my husbands family home on the 5th January 2019! He was due to go away on a four month deployment with the RAF in February so we planned a mini going away party/birthday party as he’d miss his whilst he was away, little did I know that out came a proposal in front of his family and our closest family friends. I think he got a bit overwhelmed and waffled a little but it was so special to have our loved ones around us.

THE WEDDING DRESS

I knew from the start I wanted to look classic, elegant and timeless, I always knew I wanted either a ballgown or A-line dress as those shapes suit me. The Ivory Room was the second bridal boutique I visited and I didn’t have the best experience at the first boutique so it was an absolute breath of fresh air to be greeted by Victoria. I did a little research on the brands Victoria stocked and saw a dress online which I was dying to try on but unfortunately she didn’t have the sample. We tried a few dresses on but we quickly realised that all we were trying to do was make each dress into the dress I had seen online..I even ended up with two dresses on at the same time at one point!! Victoria kindly offered to see if she could get the dress I’d seen online in to the boutique for me to try which I was completely over the moon with, we managed to book an appointment in four weeks time for me to come back in to try it on. Fast forward four weeks, I arrived for my appointment so excited about the dress I’d been having dreams about for the last month, and low and behold it was the one! I told Victoria I’d like some sort of lace top that I could remove just so I had two different looks without having to have two dresses and she found me the most beautiful lace jacket from Ivory & Co to go with it, along with a sparkly belt and veil!

I absolutely cannot recommend Victoria and The Ivory Room enough, Victoria was always at the end of an email even during lockdowns and was always so helpful, never pushy and was just an absolute delight!

THE WEDDING

Colour wise, as we were getting married in Autumn I went for burgundy, blush, rose gold and hints of navy (our groomsmen wore blue/navy kilts and my husband, Dean, wore his RAF uniform). I thought those colours would compliment the season perfectly! I actually DIY’d a lot of our wedding, I love making and crafting and after seeing so many beautiful handmade things on pinterest (as you do!) I decided I wanted to make all of the little bits of decor for our wedding, from our invitiations to place settings and a giant flower archway, it was lovely seeing it all come together.

SPECIAL MOMENTS

For me the most special part was actually being able to have our wedding and seeing our friends and family all in one place, we were extremely lucky to have been able to have our wedding in 2020 amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, we hadn’t really seen anyone for a good six months so it was a lovely feeling to see everyone’s smiling faces and to finally see all of the planning come together!

Photos by Stacey Macleod Photography (SM Photography)

Are you looking for the perfect wedding dress? Make your appointment at The Ivory Room today!

Real Bride - Caitlin & Tom

When bride Caitlin came into The Ivory Room with her sister Charlotte I knew she would find her perfect dress, the only problem was she looked fantastic in all of them so it took a while to narrow it down! After choosing a stunning all lace gown from the fabulous designer Essense of Australia, this girl was ready to walk down the aisle to groom Tom. Here is their story…..

THE PROPOSAL

My proposal was beautiful – it was in the London sky gardens and ended up gathering a bit of a crowd!

THE WEDDING DRESS

I went into The Ivory Room unsure about what I was looked for in terms of dress style. Victoria was so helpful and kind and let me try on loads of dresses until we found the style that suited me – slight fish tail with sparkle! We then narrowed it down until I found my absolute dream dress. My dress was absolutely magical and more than I could have wished for – I had so many compliments on my special day. It was also very comfortable and easy to move in. Most importantly Tom loved the dress too and had a little tear when he saw me walking down the aisle in it. I didn’t want to take it off at the end of the day!

THE WEDDING

Our wedding had a ‘brights’ theme as we wanted it to reflect our happiness. I wore my mum’s wedding veil, which meant a lot to both her and my Grandma. The day was relaxed, fun and full of laughter. It was everything we could have wished for. 

A perfect day with friends and family, plus dogs! Everything went according to plan – from beautiful weather for the orangery reception to fantastic evening sparklers, hog roast and drunken dancing, we couldn’t believe our luck! Definitely the most special day of our lives.

Photos by Louise Spence

Are you looking for the perfect wedding dress? Make your appointment at The Ivory Room today!

Real Bride - Helen & John

The Ivory Room bride Helen married John on the luxurious Mount Falcon Estate in County Mayo, Ireland. Helen looked amazing in her Essense Of Australiagown. Her bridesmaids wore their Eliza & Ethan multi-way dresses with style. Here is their story…..

THE PROPOSAL

I live in Australia with my husband who is Irish and we had planned a sightseeing day in London on a return visit to the UK for Christmas. Later in the day we received a text from his sister to say she had bought us drinks over looking London for a present. I didn’t want to go because it would mess up my plans up for the day. Luckily I changed my mind because as I walked out of the lift of a building in westminister John had decorated the most beautiful room with an amazing view of London. After I walked in hearing our favourite song I turned round and he was on one knee!

THE WEDDING DRESS

I’m usually a very fussy person with clothes and make up. However, when I walked into my first dress shop, The Ivory Room, I tried on the first dress and loved it. This was an Essence of Australia dress, Victoria persuaded me to try another which I also loved. I spent the hour going between the two dresses. I did try other styles but I truly fell in love with the Essence of Australia styles D2205 and D2322. That day I purchased D2205 and cancelled all the other dress shops we had booked. Victoria made the experience so perfect and memorable. The Ivory Room is so lovely and Victoria has all her attention on getting everything right for you.

THE WEDDING

Our wedding was a traditional Irish wedding. John and I wanted a beautiful classic day and a big party in the evening. We achieved just that…we hired an estate for the weekend, so it was only our guests at the venue which made it very personal.

One of the most special memories was seeing my father’s face when he walked into the hotel room and I was in my wedding dress. It was also so magical to have all our friends and family together from Australia, New Zealand, England and Ireland for our wedding day.

Romance by the Sea - Part 1

On a stunning day in May I had the pleasure of working with a very fun yet professional team on a one day photoshoot, headed by Mel from Mel Brown Weddings. We had a blast and managed to get two very different looks from the shoot. Here is Mel’s blog on how the first part of the day went……..

The story behind this style shoot has been a funny and adventurous one, putting many of my hard-learned skills, developed over years of mistakes and wrong turns as a producer and photographer, to very good use!

So that we don’t get distracted by all the curve balls, solutions, adaptations and series of events that were both in and out of my control, I’ll save all the juicy details of lessons learned for a separate blog on mindset approach, where we can really pick our decisions apart and work out why some things work and others don’t and how to keep things working and moving forward. 

So here, we will just gloss over the, now funny, twists and turns this shoot took and focus on the story itself. 

My vision was clear in my head, I wanted to create a certain type of quintessentially English image well, my understanding of what that means visually, and needed a top secret, dream team to help me get there. I am lucky enough to be surrounded by fantastic suppliers of all things wedding, but I was really keen to work with a different group of people, satisfy my need to give other people opportunities and see how a fresh set of eyes added to the project. 

I contacted a range of bridal shops and florists near to Louth in Lincolnshire, near to where I spent a good chunk of my school years, reaching out to old friends to see if there happened to be any connections there. As an Island girl (Jersey), working with word of mouth recommendations is really important to me and is a fundamental part of the way that I work and connect with people.

Although the ‘vision’ was, let’s just say… a little different to what we ended up shooting, I wanted to talk about all the elements of the bridal shots that our brides think about and answer them in a neat bit of visual story telling. 

As you do! 

I planned out a way to communicate the idea of a very English beachside wedding, hopefully a bit windswept, maybe a bit of random rain and definitely some clouds that fill every well styled head of hair with fear, and nothing like the fantasy sold in the mags, to my potential team. So, I started pulling images together of each element and visual conversation, and then reached out to my desired suppliers. One of which, happened to be the Ivory Room in Woodhall spa, owned and run by Victoria Evans (the niece of a close family friend, which to me, makes it extra-super-sun-dance special) We agreed to meet in her shop, which was like entering a dream land and I immediately had that tingle of excitement when you know you’ve ‘found a good’un’. Victoria loved the idea and was totally onboard form the off. 

Wow! Good Lord! It’s happening! 

Victoria kindly recommended a florist, who she had seen the work of, and thought would be a good fit to the team. So off to Horncastle I trot to meet Fran Smith of Limewood Flowers a very modern and fresh style of flower arranging that brings the sustainable element into her work picking the best seasonal British flowers from small businesses across Lincolnshire. 

The Lincolnshire team had assembled! Now to find the right models. Again, keeping it local to the area (as much as possible), I got in touch with two talent agencies, Caroline at DK models and Julia of Stanley Model Management who were extremely prompt in replying and wonderfully helpful, delivering a package of models that fitted the criteria. 

In my mind’s eye, I was longing for a Lilly Cole with long flowing hair, kissed by fire, but when I saw Paige’s smile and her portfolio, I couldn’t say no! Her look worked really well with our chosen Groom, Michael and it was a unanimous ‘whoop’ from the team. The pieces were falling into place and all that was left to do was the styling and prop shopping… and the rest. 

Oh Crap! I forgot the rings!

A wonderful, authentic and very couture jewellery shop (more of an experience) I have worked with before; The Hirst Collection, on Portobello Market is run by a friend of mine, Amanda. As we have talked a million times of doing a shoot in which I could showcase her wonderful rings, we had arranged months back that I could pop in and she could suggest a few options for me to take for the day. As it was organised in my head … it obviously slipped my mind! Doh! No worries – A quick pedal up to Notting hill solved that glitch.

On the day, the crew call was a 07:30 so we could get a cuppa’ on the go and talk through the styling, props and how we were going to adapt to any last minute, inevitable curveballs on the day. 

There were a few! My blustery, windy beach day with a few nice stormy clouds in the sky turned into a beautiful almost Caribbean summer’s day with not a cloud in the sky! Thanks!

Ok, we can adapt! 

Fran’s flowers had taken a turn, still sublimely beautiful, her chosen favs had not arrived so she had adapted seamlessly, the night before and created something that now as it happened, went perfectly with our new, weather adapted shoot plan. 

Our chief tea supplier (Victoria) didn’t have any matches (we shan’t go into detail on how she solved this issue) so tea was delayed, and we all know how catastrophic that can be! 

And our wonderful groom rolled up 30 mins late… Lucky for him, he’s a charmer so we quickly forgave him.

We spent the morning on the beach, enjoying the unusually pastel colours for the location, of the sand and flowers and sky looking for that floating timeless feeling of light-hearted fun, one I whole-heartedly associate with the beach. 

Although, the story we ended up with, is a very different aesthetic and visual to the one we set out to tell, I am really happy with the images and the story they do tell. One that is honest and full of moments, giggles and a lot of sunshine. 

As always, we learnt so much, both as a team, and as suppliers, I got to really explore and experiment with communicating to the models and transferring the images in my mind to the images on camera, which is a golden opportunity when it comes around. 

One of the best lessons I have learned from my time as a creative, is that you rarely get exactly what you set out to achieve. Sometimes as a result of the process, what you end up with is different; better. You just have to be able to take stock of the lessons learnt and see the ‘good’ in front of you, for its own merits.

As always, we are nothing without the team we stand with, so I would like to say a special thank you to my team, their suppliers and all those who kindly contributed to make this all happen :

Contributors and special thanks to local suppliers: 
Dress by @ivoryandco
Rings from @thehirstcollection 
Flowers grown and sourced locally from @evolveflowers and @oldfarmhouseflowers 
Ribbons by @bertieandfred