Fiona and David’s Kent wedding was influenced by the style of the 1940s through to the 1960s. “I think the whole day was defined by it really being a reflection of us as a couple”, Fiona said. “We really didn’t want an identikit, faceless, corporate feel. Also, we wanted it to be as relaxed as possible. We didn’t want anyone to stand on ceremony or feel uncomfortable. We just wanted all the people closest to us there and to eat, drink, dance and have a lot of fun.”
The day was held at Kent Life, a heritage farm in Maidstone. The space was decorated from top to toe by the couple themselves. “I’d always imagined a street party type feel for our wedding but that proved to be quite difficult to organise so we were really pleased when we found this original 1940s village hall at Kent Life”, she continued. “The fact that we could decorate it ourselves was a massive incentive for choosing the venue. Neither of us are fans of doing things as tradition dictates and the idea of having chair covers and white tablecloths foisted upon us made me very anxious! The venue was great and the fact that the village hall is surrounded by farmyard animals somehow made the whole idea of a wedding seem less pretentious and not too grand.”
“I felt very much at home there and not intimidated as I’d felt when visiting other venues We definitely didn’t want a themed wedding, just a few touches here and there of the things we love. Books and music are really important to us both so we had old books dotted around and the table names were named after our favourite albums. We hired vintage china because I love old things and knew it would work perfectly in that setting.”
“I decided to make 60 metres of bunting for the wedding and all of the tablecloths It was a lot of work but I loved doing it and was really happy with the end result. I kept having new ideas and images pop into my head and it was great that I could just add on all of the little details as I went, such as lace edging on all of the table cloths. I’m sure lots of people didn’t even notice but it made me smile every time I looked at the decorations and it was a really great excuse to do something creative.”
“We saved money on items like place names and the seating chart as we made these ourselves. For the seating chart, we stuck pictures of our favourite album covers onto fabric and covered it all in a large frame. We particularly loved having a Kate Bush and Scott Walker tables at our wedding! For the individual place names, I bought some really cheap luggage tags from Etsy and borrowed a beautiful stamp set from a friend. There were letter stamps and cute birds and birdcages It took a while to make everything but I think they would have cost a lot of money had we bought similar items ready-made.”
