Rowan & Neil were married at St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church, Renfrew followed by a Mad Men inspired reception at 29 Private Members Club in Glasgow. “The wedding ceremony was particularly special to us,” Rowan explained. “My Dad is an Episcopal minister and it was a great honour to have him conduct the service in his own church. My Mum walked me up the aisle – it was lovely to have them both involved in the duties of ‘giving the bride away’.”
The couple knew as soon as they got engaged that they didn’t want a traditional wedding. They met when working at a local hotel in fact so had seen a lot of what they didn’t want! The bride has also had a bit of experience planning a Rock n Roll wedding before as she helped her sister-in-law plan her wedding which was featured actually on Rock n Roll Bride last year! (You can see it here) “I had really enjoyed the creative aspects,” said Rowan, “so when I got engaged a few weeks after their wedding, I was soon sucked into the world of wedding blogs – checking Rock n Roll Bride everyday!”
The overall theme of the wedding was driven by the couple’s love of 50s and 60s music, fashion and design. “We are huge fans of Mad Men and we wanted the wedding to reflect something of the style of that period. We also thought that all guests, both young and old, could have fun planning outfits and throwing some groovy shapes on the dancefloor. One of our best memories is seeing Neil’s granny jiving under the discoball to Ray Charles, ‘Hit the Road Jack’.”
“I spent a looong time trawling the internet for retro style wedding invitations, most of which were either too expensive or a bit too cute and twee. Then I came across an amazing flyer for a 50’s/rockabilly club night in Glasgow and my ideas changed. We tracked down the designer and asked him if he would design us a wedding invitation is the style of a 50’s movie poster. We were delighted with the end result – as were our guests, many of have put them up on their kitchen wall! I designed a simple reply slip and Sean set us up with a wedding website, where guests could access more detailed information.”
To keep things personal, the couple wanted to DIY as much of their wedding (with help from their friends & families) as they could. “I jazzed up my shoes with a pair of DIY shoe clips. I made a bow with some ribbon, used a pair of earrings on the front of the bows and sewed them on to shoe clips bought from eBay. My mum even used her sewing machine to bind the order of services together. I stole the Mad-Lib idea from another blog and got pencils made with the words ‘Neil and Rowan get hitched’ on them.”
“My friend Brian had given me a badge maker for my birthday so I decided to make everyone a name badge, colour-coded to their table. The ladies’ favours were iced shortbread hearts, made by talented friend Laura. The guys’ favours were chocolate cigarettes, which were in keeping with the Mad Men influence and made for some great photos! Whilst browsing numerous wedding blogs, I came across the idea of the instant photo guestbook. I bought a blank album from Paperchase, a couple of cheap fujifilm instax cameras and film from eBay and my wonderful bridesmaid Sarah (who is rarely seen without a camera) snapped all of the guests in various poses and they each wrote a few words next to their photo.”
What a cool couple!
Be sure to check out the video too…
Thanks to Rowan & Neil and their photographers Gillian & Chris of Christopher Currie Photography for sharing this today.
