A Fun Festival Themed Wedding with Sparkly Surprises

So do get your­self comfy and pre­pare to enjoy some amaz­ing moments: from a bunny to a first kiss so good the vicar made them do it twice, all the way past the Mosh Pit table to the Fes­ti­val of Light, which was kept a secret until the end of the day. Beau­ti­ful images, won­der­ful mem­o­ries and a really lovely couple.

“Just be there for each other and embrace the unplanned because it will be some­thing you’ll remem­ber and smile about for the rest of your lives.”

A fun fes­ti­val themed wed­ding in Essex

The bride and groom: Clau­dine & Ian Webster

Who pro­posed, and how?

On hol­i­day 2 years ago Ian pro­posed to me whilst cel­e­brat­ing his 40th Birth­day at the restau­rant at the top of the famous Burj Al Arab, in Dubai. A won­der­ful unplanned moment and very special.

All pho­tos are by Tracy Morter at www.tracymorter.com
Clau­dine told me about one of her most mem­o­rable moments from the day, “Giv­ing my Nana Joyce a spe­cial cup­cake (a mini ver­sion of the wed­ding cake) as she couldn’t come to the cer­e­mony due to ill health. I gave it to her in the morn­ing of the wed­ding and her face lit up no end.“

Wed­ding pho­tog­ra­pher: Tracy Morter

Tracy is a fan­tas­tic pho­tog­ra­pher, with a reportage style. As part of our pack­age Tracy included a free engage­ment shoot, which helped us to relax to become com­fort­able in front of the cam­era on the big day! Tracy turned out to be a real suc­cess, with inter­mit sto­ry­telling and tremen­dous use of light­ing that cap­tured both the joy­ous atmos­phere and beau­ti­ful back­drops to our big day. www.tracymorter.com

Wed­ding venue: St Mary’s Church Wid­ford, Chelmsford

The Church cel­e­brated 150 years this year and is located next to Hylands Park, Chelms­ford home to V Fes­ti­val. The con­gre­ga­tion really are some­thing spe­cial as they engage the hun­dreds of thou­sands of fes­ti­val goers each year with friendly ban­ter and bev­er­ages which go a long way to lift­ing peo­ples’ spir­its prior to the fes­ti­val entrance. This sense of fun and adven­ture is what pri­mar­ily attracted us to this very spe­cial place.

www.chschelmsford.com/about-us/st-marys

Recep­tion venue: New­land Hall, Rox­well near Chelms­ford Essex.

We chose this venue as we liked that the mar­quee was set in a pri­vate gar­den with beau­ti­ful back­drop of the Tudor House and lake. www.newlandhall.co.uk

How would you describe your wed­ding style?

Tra­di­tional yet relaxed for the church ser­vice. A ‘Fun Fes­ti­val Theme’ for our recep­tion with sparkly sur­prises and fes­ti­val good­ies for our guests!

Wed­ding read­ings: A Walled Gar­den & Philip­pi­ans 4 v 4–9

Mem­o­rable wed­ding day moments

• See­ing Ian at the end of the aisle and when I reached him, he said “Hello you! You look beau­ti­ful!”
• Ian says our first kiss as man and wife, the Vicar said it was so good we had to do it again!
• Watch­ing every­one enjoy­ing them­selves, all wear­ing the lan­yards & flash­ing lights!
• My lit­tle cousin lay­ing down in the con­fetti and mak­ing angel shapes like a snow angel!
• Giv­ing Ian’s par­ents their spe­cial cake to cel­e­brate their 50th / Golden Wed­ding Anniver­sary on the same day!
• On the dance floor, Ian and I in the mid­dle with every­one danc­ing & singing around us to Chelsea Dag­ger totally unplanned but we will not for­get that magic moment.
• Hav­ing to smile for roman­tic pho­tos next to the lake, whilst those spend­ing the after­noon fish­ing, shouted across with good­will mes­sages and much humour!!

What did you wear?

Bride: An ivory strap­less A-line dress with train, and bead­ing at the top of the dress. The Dress and tiara came from Bridal Bou­tique in Southend on sea, Essex. The veil was my sister’s as my ‘some­thing bor­rowed’ and my shoes were by Rain­bow Club.

Groom: Dark Grey tails, ivory waist­coat with cham­pagne gold cra­vats. Two cream roses on his lapel. The Grooms­men also matched the Groom.

The Brides­maids wore Indigo Blue dresses by Alfred Angelo.

Wed­ding venue styling and details:

Invi­ta­tions: We chose Be Mine by www.specialdaydirect.com – these suited our sense of humor with the bride pulling the groom to the church.

Order of Ser­vice / Evening invites: We saved money and I designed these myself, very sim­ple design with a blue sin­gle flower as the theme for more for­mal sta­tionery. Also keen not to give the Fes­ti­val Theme away until the guests reached the venue.

Flow­ers: Blue and White, Cot­tage Gar­den style with blue hydrangeas as the promi­nent flower in the bouquet.

Our Fes­ti­val Themed Wed­ding Reception

• Welly boot Vases Flow­ers of White & blue in cot­tage gar­den theme on the tables.
• Favours – Tents filled with smar­ties (hand­made by my sister)
• Gift box – Big­ger ver­sion of the Tents (hand­made by my mum)
• Lan­yards with a run­down of the day and tim­ings for the dif­fer­ent types of music to fea­ture dur­ing the night (designed by me on the home pc).
• Musi­cal notes dec­o­rated the table name places. (we ordered these via Ebay)
• Tables were named after Stages & Areas you would find at a fes­ti­val with a per­sonal twist i.e. Main Stage for top table, Fes­ti­val Fun Fair and Cham­pagne Tent etc.
• Table plan was also designed on my PC based on a Fes­ti­val map
• Cake was white with iced blue hydrangea flow­ers sprin­kled down the 4 tears to match the bou­quet. We had Fruit, Choco­late, Lemon Sponge and Vanilla Sponge. They added an iced copy of my pet bunny rab­bit at the bottom!
• We also had Photo I spy on the tables for the chil­dren with dis­posal cam­eras for them to click away.

Wed­ding day advice:

• In choos­ing your venue or church; ensure you feel it’s the right place for you and ask lots of ques­tions based upon how you want your big day to be special.
• Ask if the venue will be exclu­sive to your party on the day, or whether you’ll be shar­ing the venue with other wed­ding parties.
• Don’t be afraid to try some­thing dif­fer­ent and be brave!
• Not every­thing will go 100% accord­ing to plan on the day, just be there for each other and embrace the unplanned because it will be some­thing you’ll remem­ber and smile about for the rest of your lives.
• Pop some tis­sues in the Groom’s pocket for emo­tional moments for both of you remem­ber, most brides don’t have pockets.
• On the day take a step back for 5 min­utes when pos­si­ble and embrace the moment
• Don’t for­get to thank those that have helped you along the way and pos­si­bly back this up with a list so that no one feels that they’ve been overlooked.

What were your wed­ding highlights?

• Ian arrived at the Church in a Party Bus with all his friends.
• The last jour­ney as sin­gle lady in the car with my Uncle and Brides­maids, one of which was my sis­ter, all chat­ting away just lovely.
• Exit­ing the wed­ding ser­vice to rau­cous tune from “Ski Sun­day” and everyone’s reac­tion, all laugh­ing, bob­bing up and down & clapping!
• A sur­prise Horse and Car­riage booked by my mother, which waited in a nearby farm as our vin­tage wed­ding car took an unex­pected detour. With the jour­ney to the recep­tion slowed to a more tra­di­tional pace, we took in the beau­ti­ful coun­try side, chat­ted, laughed and soaked up all the atten­tion from passersby and local folk. What a way to start your mar­ried life together!!
• Our First Dance, we had a few lessons but were still ner­vous as any­thing as we had adopted the “up beat” and sen­sa­tional “What a life” by Noel Gallagher’s High Fly­ing Birds. The gasps and smiles from the crowd were just what we needed and with much cheer­ing and clap­ping of hands, we man­aged to carry out the rou­tine with our best per­for­mance to date. Dif­fi­cult, but so pleased we held our nerve and did it!
• Our Fes­ti­val of Light. We’d cre­ated fes­ti­val lan­yards for every­one to know what type of music was on and when. How­ever, we kept a lit­tle up our sleeves as the “Fes­ti­val of Lights” sec­tion remained some­what of a mys­tery. At 10.30, the lights went out, pump­ing house filled the mar­quee and box after box of flash­ing wands, tiaras, Bunny ears, Glasses, rings, and glow sticks were handed out to every­one. The roof prac­ti­cally came off the mar­quee as young and old alike danced around with the bril­liant colours flash­ing and twin­kling across the unlit room. A bril­liant a moment with every­one join­ing in!!

Wed­ding music and entertainment:

• Bridal Entrance: Johan Pachelbel’s Canon in D
• Hymns:
  • One more step along the world I go
  • To God be the glory, great things He hath done
  • Give me Oil in my Lamp (Sing Hosanna)
• Reces­sional music Pop Goes Bach the Ski Sun­day Theme Tune.
• Our Vicar Rev. Dave Robins had every­one bob­bing up and down just before we played the music. The Vicar was very accom­mo­dat­ing and open to ideas, we even sang Happy Birth­day to my friend!
• As it was a Fes­ti­val Theme all our guest had Lan­yards with a guide to dif­fer­ent types of music to be played.
• First Dance – AKA What a Life by Noel Gallagher’s High Fly­ing Birds
• Farewell cir­cle, Music from the Open­ing Cer­e­mony from the Olympics
• We left the venue to Extreme Ways by Moby, the theme music to Bourne Films, Ian said it was our way of sign­ing off the evening.

Ian and Claudine’s rec­om­mended wed­ding suppliers:

• Cake – Fancy Nancy http://www.fancynancy.info/
• Rings – Hand made with spe­cial care & design by Mar­tin Reade at Michael Clarks Designs, Raleigh http://michaelclarkdesigns.co.uk/
• Dress – Ellis, sup­plied by Bridal Bou­tique, Southend on sea — http://www.bridal-boutique.co.uk/
• Flow­ers & Welly Boot Vases – The Wed­ding Stores, Fay Bar­well. Leigh on sea http://www.theweddingstores.co.uk
• Car – Aris­to­cars http://www.aristocars.co.uk/
• Horse & Car­riage – The Ostler — http://www.theostler.org.uk/

See more: Pop Looks Bach Down The Aisle by Tracy Morter Photography.