SUMMER RAIN

SUMMER rainREAL WEDDINGS Speeches, toasts, cocktails and love is what made Clare and Jess’s day so special

Images courtesy of Roshni Photography

Many of us were grateful for the short gap between Covid lockdowns, when we could finally leave the house and socialise but Clare and Jess were even more so as this was their chance to meet.

They got talking through dating app Hinge and arranged their first date at a gin bar in Walthamstow where Jess lives. Here they both tell us more…

“We met at 8pm, but because of Covid the bar shut at 9pm. In the first hour we’d made an immediate connection and neither of us wanted it to end, so we walked around under Clare’s tiny umbrella in the summer rain drinking gin out of takeaway coffee cups!” says Jess. “Clare’s ability to see through all the noise in life to the important things attracted me to her. She’s beautiful and she took my breath away.”

Clare adds, “I just loved Jess’s company straight away, she’s so interesting and smart, but also soulful and thoughtful. I loved that combination. I remember thinking she was really hot when I walked into the bar too!”

The duo knew they wanted to get married pretty fast and ended up living together because of the pandemic after two months of dating. “Clare booked a mini break at Mallinson’s Treehouse in Dorset. We went the day before Clare’s birthday which really threw me off thinking it could be a proposal,” says Jess. “On arrival we went to use our treetop sauna and hot tub and whilst Jess was in the hot tub, I went inside and got three cards of poetry that I’d had hand-printed from a print press in LA,” Clare says. “I made a treasure hunt around the treehouse and told Jess to find each poem, searching in a specific order as the last card had ‘Will you marry me?’ on it,” she says. When Jess found the card, Clare got down on one knee and proposed. “Jess was very emotional and said yes! We then had more champagne in the hot tub and gazed up at the trees above us,” says Clare.

Jess wore an ivory Reiss suit with a Dolce & Gabbana shirt, beautiful brogues from Churches and a silk ivory cummerbund, that was made by her mum.

Clare wore a dress by Savannah Miller and her shoes were Vintage YSL, rented from Gigi’s Dressing Room.

We designed our rings together with the help of Rachel Boston and her team. She did both our engagement and wedding rings and we love them. We had ‘Best People’ and they all had corsages or buttonholes but otherwise did their own thing when it came to outfits. We had the ceremony and party at Core Clapton. It’s a stunning white space that we knew we could decorate beautifully and really make it our own.

We created a wedding arch that was put together with perspex and structural plants alongside soft white roses. We chose lots of large structural tropical plants and colourful flowers to bring a modern and stylish vibe to the room.

We wanted fun and colour in the food, so we had a Mexican family feast with snacks like tacos and spicy prawns for canapes.

Jess’s mum painted the table plan and created all the place names too. Eloise at Garage Florals did the flowers and decorated the room with our wedding planner Martha from Anemone Style Weddings, it looked exceptional.

Clare’s mum helped us style the muslin for the tables and Jess’s step mum helped with shaping the overall look. Jess’s friend made the cake. It was a lemon sponge with mascarpone icing and floral decoration.

We had a brilliant bar that definitely helped entertain everyone. They designed cocktails for us and came to shake them all night. They were wonderful and had some great marriage advice for us too!

We danced all night to the incredible mixes our friend Roger put together. DJ Belmont looked sharp, and his set was even sharper. Saying our vows was most important to me. We wrote them ourselves and each one felt so important. – Jess

Getting to marry my favourite person in the world and making a speech about how special she is to me was amazing. As soon as I saw Jess, I felt happy and calm and then the rest of the day flew by, in a blur of speeches, toasts, cocktails and love. – Clare The first look in Stoke Newington Common was hilarious. Jess had to walk quite a long way once the set up was done and our best people got the giggles because they could see. When we both saw each other we both felt so happy from then on.

Two of our best people Lucy and Charlie did a speech that we loved and made everyone really laugh – they’re a great double act!

CLARE AND JESS’S LITTLE WHITE BOOK Venue, Core Clapton, www.coreclapton.org | Photographer, Roshni Photography, www.roshniphotography.com | Clare’s dress, The Wedding Club, www.thewedding-club.co.uk | Jess’s suit, Reiss, www.reiss.com | Jewellery and accessories, Rachel Boston, www.rachelboston.co.uk | Hair stylists, Phoebe HairSlayer, https://phoebehairslayer.co.uk | Harness & Mane, www.harnessandmane.com Flowers, Garage Florals, www.garageflorals.com | Catering, Taco Dave, www.tacodave.co.uk | Wedding planner and stylist, Anemone Style, www.anemone-style.com

From Miss to Mrs

County Wedding Magazines’ senior editor Melissa Barker shares her wedding planning journey

It’s finally here, my last bride’s diary entry before I become a married woman! When we first got engaged nearly 18 months ago, the wedding seemed so far away that it almost didn’t feel real, and yet here we are about to walk down the aisle. The last few weeks of planning have been a bit manic with all of our suppliers getting in touch asking for lastminute details, and although it can feel a little overwhelming, it’s also really exciting! This issue is all about my dress alterations, hair and make-up trial and keeping positive as the big day approaches...

FITS LIKE A GLOVE

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t incredibly nervous for my first dress fitting. I purchased my gown over a year ago, and I’ve gone through phases during that time where I’ve loved it and also doubted it. It was a size too big when I bought it, so looking back at the pictures it was hard to imagine what it would look like fitting properly. I think my main worry was ‘what if it doesn’t look like I imagined or even worse, what if the seamstress makes it too small or too short!?’ As someone who likes to micromanage everything, this situation was certainly out of my comfort zone.

I took two of my bridesmaids with me for my first appointment for moral support, and the seamstress, Danielle, was wonderful. She made us feel really at ease and like nothing was too much trouble. She knew right away how to alter my dress and was able to do it within a quick timeframe. I left the appointment feeling much calmer but also a little apprehensive about how the dress would eventually turn out.

Fast forward a month, it was time for my second fitting and for the bridesmaids’ dresses to be altered. After a morning of panicking and worrying, I can’t put into words how relieved I felt when I tried on my dress and it fit like a glove. It still needed a few tweaks here and there, but overall I felt much happier as I was no longer drowning in a sea of fabric and worrying that my boobs might fall out at a moment’s notice! Danielle was also very reassuring to the bridesmaids who were worried about parts of their dresses and, within a week, we had all three back looking perfect.

Having had several meltdowns over this, my advice to any nearlyweds-to-be is to try not to panic and trust your suppliers. As long as they have good reviews and are confident in their capabilities, then leave it to them – they’re the experts after all! FACING FACTS

As someone who has only worn make-up once for prom night many years ago, I was unsure of what I wanted when it came to my bridal make-up. Make-up is not my forte and, much to my friends’ amusement, I can’t tell you the difference between highlighter, foundation and concealer – and that’s just for starters!

For this reason, I chose a hair stylist and make-up artist with great reviews, who are familiar with my venue and whole-heartedly put my trust in them.

During my trial, she sat me down and asked what I wanted, and I was honest and said ‘no idea’. She laughed and reassured me that I’m not the only woman in the world who doesn’t wear make-up (even though it feels like it sometimes). She went for a very natural look and talked me through the process. Even though my make-up looked great and was very subtle, it was still a shock to see myself with it on. It took me the whole day to get used to it, but I was really pleased with the result, and felt like a princess.

When it comes to hair (you’ll be pleased to hear I’m not as clueless), I had a rough idea of what style I wanted but was torn between a half up and half down look or an up do. My hair stylist was wonderful! She created both looks for me, took loads of pictures and made sure I was happy with both styles. After a lot of deliberation I’ve decided on an up do, as my dress has dramatic front and back detailing that I didn’t want anything to detract from. I left my hair and make-up in place, like they suggested, for the whole day and it still looked wonderful by 11pm.

I was really pleased with the whole experience and being dressed up made me feel so excited to finally marry my best friend.

Thank you all for sticking with me throughout my wedding journey. I hope you enjoy planning your own day and everything turns out perfectly!

Hindsight is a marvellous thing

Melissa’s hubby-to-be opens a window into the wedding planning journey from the groom’s perspective

Hello readers, as I’m sure you’re all well aware, my beautiful Melissa has been detailing our journey from our couch-based lockdown proposal to the wedding altar, and what a journey it has been! Thankfully Melissa is the most organised person on the planet, so my involvement in this process has been minimal at best, however that being said, I’ve picked up one or two things along the way that Melissa has generously given me this space to share...

GUEST LIST

Being the social beast I am, I found putting together a finalised wedding guest list quite difficult. Much to Melissa’s dismay I wanted to invite everyone I’d ever met and their postman. However, (thankfully) the capacity of our venue and overall budget (I don’t think I appreciated how expensive day guests are) put the brakes on my invite rampage and forced me to reign in my expectations somewhat. I found that I felt quite guilty about not inviting everyone I’ve ever spoken to, but you definitely do need to draw the line somewhere. My advice to anyone planning a wedding is don’t lose any sleep over not inviting someone, chances are they probably weren’t going to invite you to their wedding anyway!

CHOOSING YOUR GROOMSMEN

Thankfully this was quite an easy one for me. My best man has been my closest ally and confident for 15 years now, so there was no hesitation in my mind when asking him. My biggest concern was that having four groomsmen might be too many, but I couldn’t imagine any of them not being next to me for support, so the thought of losing one of them from the party would have been like removing oxygen. Another thing I’m grateful for is that they all get along brilliantly. I’ve heard some real horror stories about infighting between people’s bridesmaids and groomsmen, so this is definitely something to consider when selecting your party. You might love them all, but do they like each other? You’d think that people would pull together for their friend’s biggest day, but you never know.

PLANNING YOUR STAG DO

I’ll be honest, I never really saw the purpose of a stag do. Admittedly in my mind, I had this warped perception of the event being a trip to a dubious location to take part in nefarious activities. I’m not a particularly good drinker, and as I creep onto the darker side of my 30s, I’m even worse at handling a hangover, so the prospect of this seemed less than appealing. Sitting down to discuss with my (similarly worldweary) best man, we came to the reassuring realisation that a stag do can be whatever you want it to be. In my instance, I like Centre Parcs, and the thought of a trip there (and many, many barbecues) seemed like a slice of heaven, so this was a bit of a no-brainer. Ultimately my advice to any groom-to-be is don’t be afraid to book something that will make you happy. If your groomsmen deserve their place in your party, they won’t challenge your choices.

THE SPEECH

This is a big one, probably the biggest responsibility of the groom. The wedding day is such a big event in a person’s life, and the speeches really stick with attendees – good or bad! My first piece of advice would be not to leave it to the last minute. It’s certainly one of those things that can be put off, but I promise it won’t be worth the anxiety! There are thousands of great speech templates online that you can use as a starting point. Once I got started, I found writing about my loved ones and the significance of the day was easy, as it’s your opportunity to be honest, and just gush about everything. You proposed for a reason and this is your chance to share it with everyone, including your bride. Write from your heart, speak from the bottom of your lungs and try not to stare at your feet the whole time! Oh, and practicing the speech once or twice before the big day probably isn’t a bad idea!