December 2, 2011
For this week's wedding note I thought I'd blog some money saving ideas relating to the wedding dress. Although, yes, your wedding dress may well be the most expensive dress you'll ever own, I'm well aware that the average price of somewhere between £1000 - £2000, is going to be out of a lot of bride's budgets.Read more...
December 1, 2011
Wooooooooooooooooooooooo! Happy December y'all! Am I allowed to get excited for Christmas now please? This week has been a fan-tabi-locious one in this little wedding blogging world of mine, not least because one of my utter favourite (non wedding) bloggers La Carmina, who runs the most incredible Japanese fashion and lifestyle blog, ran a massive feature on Rock n Roll Bride and gothic weddings, both on her blog and on Lip Service, a lifestyle webzine that she writes for. I am honoured. Thank you La Carmina!Read more...
December 1, 2011
Nicola & David were married on Halloween weekend in The Hospitium in York (England's most haunted city apparently!) The venue is in the middle of the Museum Gardens and in the shadow of the ruins of St. Mary’s Abbey. The unusual setting was the perfect backdrop for their Rolling Stone Circus wedding. Nicola explained, "We’re both massive Rolling Stones fans so we wanted to have the same type of feel as The Rolling Stones Rock n Roll Circus. Slightly carnival like with a serious nod to music. We drew the line at stilt walkers, jugglers and such, though I did very much want a peacock and an elephant. Surprisingly there are no ‘hire a peacock’ websites. Even less chance with the elephant."Read more...
December 1, 2011
Cecilia & Robert's pretty London wedding took place at Union Chapel and Union Hall, Islington. "At first we had to decide where to have our wedding as I'm from Italy and Robert London," Cecilia wrote to me. "We soon realised that London was the perfect place, as it’s where we've chosen to live and where we definitely wanted to start our life as a family. We started looking at a few venues, but they all looked a bit impersonal and soulless to us, we definitely wanted somewhere that would have a meaning for us and our relationship. And so that’s how we “stumbled” upon the Union Chapel. Rob had been there several times to see gigs, and we had been together to see a very special acoustic performance by Editors. Many people think it’s not an actual church, but it actually is – and it made perfect sense to us to get married there!" "We were also delighted to find out that – apart from the main auditorium - they have several spaces for hire that can be used for all sorts of events. The Upper Hall fitted the bill perfectly, as it’s a completely blank canvas that we would be able to personalize according to our own taste."Read more...
November 30, 2011
Kim & Phil were the lucky couple who won an engagement and video shoot with Assassynation, Sassy n Frank and Elbie Van Eeden. Their idea for a crazy shoot was a food fight as Kim explained in her entry, "We got engaged on 1st April 2011, yes you heard right, April Fool's Day, and with this in mind we would like to continue our personalities and character traits in an engagement shoot. The theme I see is a food fight, with bright and colourful food such as cupcakes, hotdogs, condiments (almost American food style) between myself and my fiancé."Read more...
November 30, 2011
Tara & Oleg were married at Wentworth Falls School of Arts, NSW, Australia. The bride wore a beautiful 1950's debutante gown made of white taffeta with black flocked trim which she found on eBay! "They met at Acting College in Sydney and have been together for the last 6 years," their wedding photographer Jemima Richards told me. "The easiest way to describe these two as madly in love. Their wedding was a really beautiful reflection of that. The entire wedding had a distinct DIY theme, but with all of their personality in every single element. Oleg is from Croatia, so his family members made the special journey over, with his two sisters travelling from opposite ends of the planet just to be there. As a wedding gift, Tara also flew in Oleg's very best friend from London as a surprise!"Read more...
November 30, 2011
Just a quick reminder to let you all know that I'll be on BBC 2 today at 1pm in their See Hear special programme about deaf people in the arts. Gareth & I took part in this shoot with deaf wedding photographer Ashton Jean-Pierre who they are profiling for the show. I hope we make the cut!Read more...
November 29, 2011
Britten is an independent bag and accessory company based in Bath. Owner and designer Sarah specialises in creating unique and one-of-a-kind pieces for her clients, many of which are perfect for weddings. Her new feather fan range is a fantastically unique idea for a bride who doesn't want to carry a traditional bouquet, and as well as that the feather fans are something you can keep forever.Read more...
November 29, 2011
Marcie & Rich's Nerdy DIY wedding was inspired by the things they love. The couple love to hang out at home with cat and dog playing video or board games and reading so the wedding theme kind of stemmed from these ideas. "I think our inspiration for doing things the way we did was that we didn't want the same old same old", Marcie told me. "We've both been to tons of weddings where the details were essentially the same but for a few differences. People tend to do the long church ceremony with the long gown that you would never want to wear again and make a bunch of stuff for the guests that they will never use or even want just because you saw that tiny beer stein in a craft store and thought it was perfect cause you like beer. We wanted people to have fun all the way through, including ourselves! We would much rather have a swinging party and get married in the middle of it than the other way around."Read more...
November 29, 2011
Last Friday was my first School of Rock (n Roll Bride), organised by Cherry Sorbet. I was asked if I'd take part in their Cyber Savvy series and host a workshop all about blogging. So, still slightly full of flu, I got myself to the gorgeous Drink, Shop & Do in Kings Cross with photographer Shell de Mar in tow to document the event for me.Read more...
November 28, 2011
So where do I begin trying to explain the awesomeness of Renee & Ian's undead steampunk wedding? I think maybe the title gives away just how amazing this wedding is going to be doesn't it? The couple were married at Catalyst, a private live/work artist community in Chicago. "We actually had to 'audition' for the space," Renee told me. "The members have a delicate relationship with the community and can't risk any trouble. We had to prove to them over several months that we talented and responsible enough to be able to use their space. We had to foster a personal relationship with them before they would even consider us. It was tedious, but worth it in the end. We gained some more wonderful friends for our already stellar collection, and the space allowed us freedom that traditional venues could not (like staying until 6am and coming back later in the week to help clean up)."Read more...
November 28, 2011
Something I am always keen to promote through Rock n Roll Bride is the importance of hiring a professional wedding photographer to document your wedding (the photos are the only thing - well except the marriage of course - that lasts after the wedding day etc etc) However not only that, I also think it is crucial to hire a professional wedding photographer that gets you. It may be all well and good that a photographer has won a gazillion awards or has shot some fantastic weddings that have been featured in magazines and on wedding blogs, but if you don't like them as a person or they don't understand your vision for your wedding... well they aren't the guy/gal for you.Read more...
November 28, 2011
Many of you will know who Elbie van Eeden is. She's my hair & make up artist of choice, I utterly love her and use her for pretty much all my shoots now! Elbie was married earlier this year in South Africa (I featured the wedding here) and when she returned to the UK, photographer Natalie J Watts asked her if she'd like to do a bridal shoot with her.Read more...
November 27, 2011
My friend and designer extraordinaire Tobi Hannah is just about to launch her Lara Hannah 2012 bridal collection and I've got the exclusive first showing of it on my blog. How cool? Although she's become well known for her short wedding dress collections, I am so thrilled that Tobi's also now doing a longer length range under the Lara Hannah name. A "vintage inspired collection for the modern bride" as she puts it. Aren't they stunning?Read more...
November 26, 2011
Just a quickie to let say thank you to everyone that came to my first School of Rock (n Roll Bride)* yesterday. I had a great time talking to possibly the nicest bunch of girls (and one token guy - there's always one poor bloke at these things!) that I could have asked for for my first workshop. I'm now more excited than nervous for the next one! I'll have a few more photos to share with you soon, but here's one Shell took on her phone yesterday. This month I contradicted myself a bit by profiling someone who doesn't have her own blog but makes her business work without one. I wanted to show how Assassynation makes social media, in particular Facebook, work for her and her business.Read more...
November 25, 2011
Did you know that after blogging for just over a year I somehow managed to delete the whole blog? Seriously... To cut a long story short, I had been secretly blogging using Blogger since just before our wedding. I used the blog to post my own wedding ideas and after the wedding to share other people's alternative wedding ideas and weddings that I'd found and liked around the internet. The reason for the blog certainly wasn't to make it into a business, I'd simply fallen in love with wedding blogs during my wedding planning and started my own for fun.Read more...
November 25, 2011
After the success of last week's 'average spend' post it note, a number of you messaged me to say you'd love to here some ideas of how to save the pennies on certain areas. So, over the next few weeks I plan to do just that. Starting this week with wedding flowers.Read more...
November 24, 2011
Just a quick reminder to let you know that the Rock n Roll Bride Christmas cards are still available for purchase! Thank you to everyone who's bought some so far. I personally can't wait to give these out with my Chirstmas gifts this year! Oh and Happy Thanksgiving to my American readers!Read more...
November 24, 2011
**Warning before we begin, some of these photos may not be safe for work, so don't say I didn't warn you. There are boobs...nice boobs...but boobs none the less...** Most of you will have noticed that I don't feature a whole load of boudoir on Rock n Roll Bride. It's not that I don't like it, but I guess my opinion is the same as that on engagement shoots - the photos are amazing for the people involved (show me a man who wouldn't want to see his bride to be all sexified-up for him pre-wedding?) but for us non-involved people, once you've see one hot lady in sexy undies jumping around on a bed you've seen 'em all...Read more...
November 24, 2011
Beautiful Autumn touches were the theme for Joe & Carrie's New England wedding. Although it rained on the day, there were no damp spirits, with the couple embracing the location in every way they could.Read more...