Sam and Amanda’s Awesome Cambridge Wedding

Awe­some also refers to the pho­tog­ra­phy — and in the Eng­lish use of the word: awe inspir­ing. I’ve started with a night time shot, so this blog fea­ture is all upside down and back­wards… but Chris Han­ley’s pho­tog­ra­phy is breath­tak­ing, is it not?! While I have your full atten­tion, let me intro­duce Amanda and Sam who’ve writ­ten their wed­ding story to share with you on the blog today. Con­grat­u­la­tions to you both, and thank you so much for mak­ing Eng­lish Wed­ding Blog so incred­i­bly gor­geous today!

Every­one else — enjoy. x

A beau­ti­ful Cam­bridge wed­ding: Sam & Amanda

The pro­posal…

Sam and Amanda had been dat­ing long-distance for over a year. Sam was liv­ing in Cam­bridge and Amanda was liv­ing in the United States in Cen­tral Illi­nois. Sam decided he was ready to make the next big step in the rela­tion­ship while vis­it­ing Amanda and bought a ring.

He was very wor­ried about not being able to keep the ring a secret, so he decided to pro­pose right away the next evening. Amanda came home from work to a huge bou­quet of flow­ers that Sam had bought for her. She went over to read the card that came with the flow­ers and when she turned back around, Sam was on the floor in front of her. She won­dered, “What is he doing on the floor?” She then real­ized he was down on one knee and that he was propos­ing. Poor Sam was so ner­vous he could barely get out what he was try­ing to say until he finally said, “Amanda, will you marry me?” Of course, Amanda instantly said, “Yes!”

Sam moved to the United States later that year and the cou­ple started plan­ning their wed­ding to be held in Cam­bridge the next autumn.

The cer­e­mony was at Great St. Mary’s Church located in beau­ti­ful Cen­tral Cam­bridge amongst the col­leges of the Uni­ver­sity. The recep­tion was held at The Rec­tory Farm, an old Georgian-style house with scenic gar­dens located in Cambridge.

We chose Chris Han­ley Pho­tog­ra­phy to doc­u­ment our wed­ding day. Chris and his wife, Claire, did a fab­u­lous job pho­tograph­ing our day and pro­vid­ing us with artis­tic and dra­matic images. See­ing the beau­ti­ful pho­tos they took dur­ing helps us relive our per­fect day.

Our wed­ding style was tra­di­tional with a few rus­tic accents. Sam wore a tra­di­tional morn­ing suit with an ivory cra­vat and sil­ver waist­coat. Amanda wore a white tulle ball­gown by Made­line Gard­ner.

We had a tra­di­tional Angli­can cer­e­mony led by the Revd Canon John Binns. John was a won­der­ful vicar and he made the mood of the cer­e­mony very warm and light-hearted. Dur­ing the ser­mon, he gave us a lit­tle hazel­nut. He com­pared the hazel­nut to our love for each other and reminded us to nur­ture our love, like we would a lit­tle hazel­nut grow­ing in the ground, so that our love may grow through­out our mar­riage. The cer­e­mony was very heart­felt and mem­o­rable and was a great start to the rest of our lives together.

Wed­ding read­ing: John 15: 9–17

“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my com­mand­ments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s com­mand­ments and abide in his love. These things I have spo­ken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. This is my com­mand­ment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that some­one lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I com­mand you. No longer do I call you ser­vants, for the ser­vant does not know what his mas­ter is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that what­ever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you. These things I com­mand you, so that you will love one another.”

The cer­e­mony was held at Great St. Mary’s which is located in the cen­tre of Cam­bridge and is usu­ally very crowded with both locals and vis­i­tors who are out shop­ping or view­ing the col­leges of the Uni­ver­sity. As Amanda drove through town towards the church in a clas­sic Rolls Royce, the crowds cleared a path for the car and waved at Amanda as she passed. The peo­ple gath­ered around the church and greeted Amanda with applause as the she arrived, help­ing Amanda build con­fi­dence before walk­ing down the aisle. After the cer­e­mony, tourists crowded around to take pho­tos and some even jumped into the pho­tos with us! We won­der how many Face­book pages we are on now! It was great fun and we felt like the whole City of Cam­bridge was there to cel­e­brate with us.

After the cer­e­mony, the guests made their way to the Rec­tory Farm. They were greeted at the gate of the gar­den and were served Pimms. Shortly after we arrived, every­one was led to the mar­quee in the back of the gar­den. Upon enter­ing the mar­quee, guests found a table cov­ered with mini tealight lanterns. Each lantern had a tag with a name and a table num­ber, guid­ing each guest to his or her seat.

The food was pro­vided by Chim­neys Cater­ing. Guests were pro­vided an option of either a tian of oak-smoked salmon or a tart­let of capel mush­rooms for the starter. For the main course, the guests were given the choice of either roasted chicken or a spinach and wild mush­room puff pas­try. Cheese­cake with sum­mer berry com­pote was served for dessert. The food was not only incred­i­bly deli­cious, but was also visu­ally stunning.

After din­ner, we cut into the cake, which was 4-tiers of both fruit­cake and sponge cake with white choco­late ganache and rasp­berry fill­ing. The cake was dec­o­rated with sil­ver rib­bons, crys­tals, and rhine­stones and was topped with an “A” and an “S”. To fol­low Amer­i­can tra­di­tion, after cut­ting the cake, we fed each other lit­tle pieces and smashed the cake in each other’s faces. After cut­ting the cake, we had our first dance to “Can’t Help Falling in Love” by Elvis.

Wed­ding day highlights

The food and ser­vice was above and beyond our expectations.

Sam stayed up until 3am the night before the wed­ding writ­ing his speech. Every­one sus­pected that it would just be a stan­dard, bland speech. Instead, the speech had every­one roar­ing with laugh­ter. There were also a few heart­felt moments, which made his speech a def­i­nite high­light of the evening.

The Boo­gie Men, a blues band for which Sam’s dad plays the bass, played for the recep­tion which was not only very per­sonal for us, but was also great enter­tain­ment for the guests. Every­one really enjoyed them­selves.

Venue styling and details:

Cars enter­ing the venue drove down a long path cov­ered by the canopies of trees before reach­ing the house. Behind the house was a large open field where guests could min­gle and even play a lit­tle bit of cro­quet. The weather was beau­ti­ful and sunny, mak­ing it a great time to spend in the outdoors.

The mar­quee was dec­o­rated in all white, with white linens and flow­ers, giv­ing a very bridal feel. We sat at the top table with the bridal party and fam­ily and friends sat at round tables through­out the mar­quee. Above our heads, the mar­quee was lit with beau­ti­ful crys­tal chan­de­liers. The chan­de­liers, tealights, and sun­light com­ing through the mar­quee gave the venue a very warm feeling.

We also set up a wish­ing tree that served as a guest book where guests could fill out well wishes and mar­riage advice on lit­tle tags and hang them on dec­o­rated branches in a vase. We will be read­ing the well wishes on our first anniver­sary.

More mem­o­rable moments

The day before the wed­ding, the weather was hor­ri­bly cold and rainy. The morn­ing of the wed­ding, we woke up to com­pletely clear skies and a warm, sunny day. We couldn’t believe how lucky we were to have such won­der­ful weather. The sun­shine made the events of the day absolutely perfect.

Sam’s favorite moment was watch­ing Amanda walk down the aisle. Amanda’s favorite moment was watch­ing Sam smil­ing at her as she walked down the aisle.

Wed­ding day advice

Try to relax and enjoy every moment of your day or it will pass by too quickly. Take men­tal pho­tos and try to absorb each moment fully.

Wed­ding music and entertainment

Sam’s dad’s band, The Boo­gie Men, played blues music for every­one to dance to. The band played two sets, so between sets, the guests were enter­tained with the toss­ing of the bou­quet (which was acci­den­tally thrown clear over all of the ladies’ heads) and the toss­ing of the garter (a risqué Amer­i­can tra­di­tion). We also played The Shoe Game. For the Shoe Game, the two of us sat back to back hold­ing onto one of each oth­ers’ shoes. The best man then asked us ran­dom ques­tions like, “Who said, ‘I love you’ first?” and “Who is the bet­ter dresser?” If the groom is the right answer, then each per­son holds up one of the groom’s shoes and vice versa. We, of course, couldn’t see what the other person’s answer was, so it was enter­tain­ing when we had dif­fer­ing answers. Every­one was then served fish and chips so that they had the energy to keep danc­ing.

Rec­om­mended wed­ding suppliers:

The Pho­tog­ra­pher: Chris Han­ley Pho­tog­ra­phy, Comp­stall

The Caterer: Chim­neys Cater­ing, Long Melford

The Florist: Stu­dio Flow­ers, Fulbourn

The Cake: Deesigns for Lov­ing, Duxford

Recep­tion Venue: Rec­tory Farm B&B, Cambridge