While planning their colourful and DIY heavy wedding for May this year, disaster struck. Stu and Lisi’s flat burnt down, bringing with it nearly all of the things they’d collected for their wedding so far! Starting over must have been massively stressful, but they were still able to pull off the DIY wedding of their dreams in a relatively short time frame!
“Our theme was colourful boho, with a little vintage inspiration”, wrote the bride. “We love boho décor, and we needed to have loads of colour to match our personalities. There are a lot of boho themed weddings recently, but very few that incorporate so much colour and vibrancy. We aimed for fuss free décor, and we had to have flowers, flowers and more flowers. The more colour the better, and you can see from our wedding cake that we carried through that notion from décor to food!”
The wedding was held at Umtamvuna River Lodge in Port Edward, south Africa. “The venue was the most expensive part of our wedding, but we managed to stick within our budget”, she continued. “We did splash out on the honeymoon, which was a total surprise for me! I left the planning and decision making to Stu, and he did so good. He surprised me at the airport the morning after our wedding by taking us to the Mauritius Air check in counter, where I proceeded to jump with excitement and that still hasn’t stopped.”
In terms of the DIY for this wedding, the couple did whatever they could themselves, with help from their wedding party of course! “One of my bridesmaids and I made the ribbon backdrops for the ceremony arch and behind the bridal table. The day that we decided to make them, we gave ourselves strict instructions that no wine consumption would happen until we were at least 70% of the way through the task. After much cutting, tie-ing, chatting and headbutting, we decided that it was definitely time for that glass of wine. From the first sip to the last, all we did was giggle and giggle from exhaustion and elation at how we had accomplished such a feat wine free, but also within our 24 hour deadline. We managed to make both backdrops in about 9 hours, with minimal breaks but loads of memories and laughter, and again, headbutts for days!”
“We managed to save money on a few things”, she explained. “I do events in my job, so am quite clued up on all the bullshit that goes on behind pricing. I was able to haggle quite a bit, as you do, but I also used great suppliers who either made décor from recycled items, or handmade them with love from their hearts and a passion to please people. Our table frames were made from cereal boxes and crochet borders, our table bottles and vases are recycled bottles and vases with a rad hardened moulded clay, and my mom made all the chair bunting from left over material and scraps at home.”
“There is absolutely nothing we would have done differently”, she concluded. “It was perfect. With its flaws and imperfections, it was us, it was boho, and it was sublime. Aint nothing wrong with being a Mrs, it’s just the best.”
