Rebecca and Ryan’s Nice and Simple Pub Wedding By Matt Parry Photography

Happy Monday to you all and welcome along to another fun packed week on the Blog, how was your weekend? Mine was good, nice and chilled so I feel revived and ready for what ever this week has to throw at me. Todays wedding is brought to you courtesy of the incredibly talented Matt Parry Photography. It’s gorgeous to look at but simple in detail and a great example that you don’t need loads of fuss and decor to have a really special day. Rebecca and Ryan concentrated on the three things that mattered most to them when they were wedding planning; booze, band and the photographer and with this in mind managed to keep the planning fuss free and within budget. A perfect example of wedding planning done right!

‘A beautiful day spent with great family and friends’

Rebecca and Ryan were married on 21st March 2015 just a short walk from their home, at Henley on Thames Town Hall, followed by a party at the local pub The Little Angel. ‘We can see the Town Hall from our back door, and it is such an iconic building for Henley locals – it felt really exciting transforming our everyday surroundings into something so special! We also wanted the day to be as fuss free as possible for our guests, and this ticked all the boxes. We had 150 guests in total for the ceremony and party and the wedding took 6 months to plan.’

How they met
We met at work in 2007, and in 2009 we started dating. Shortly after this in September 2010 we set off on our bikes and cycled to New Zealand from Henley on Thames, covering 27,034km by bike. After 20 months living in a tent and cycling together every day, I feel certain we can weather most things our relationship might throw at us…

The Proposal
Despite several romantic opportunities where I suspected Ryan might propose, he actually did it on a plain old Sunday evening. I dragged myself off the sofa to go for an evening stroll along the river (just throwing on a jacket over my PJs) under a pretence that Ryan wanted to take some photos of the evening sun. Ryan was snapping away on his camera, but then suddenly he was on one knee proposing! I was so shocked I couldn’t actually speak! We then went on a mini champagne bar crawl in Henley (me still in my PJs!).… It was absolutely perfect for me, and a better proposal than I could possibly have imagined.

How did you allocate your budget
Once we decided not elope, we agreed that the things most important to us were; booze, band and photographer. Everything else had to fit around those, and if we couldn’t afford it we didn’t mind. It was really nice having the top three things to fall back on, when we couldn’t fit something into our budget and it started to get out of hand we could just looked back on that conversation and could honestly say ‘it just doesn’t really matter’

How did you choose your photographer
We wanted to have photos that captured the vibe of the day, and not just portraits of us looking like a perfume advert (although we did get a few of those, and loved them!). We hoped to have pieces of art that we can display on walls, that captured our beautiful home town and friends on our memorable day.
Matt Parry was the photographer at some close friends wedding and so we had seen his work and knew it fitted our style. Ryan is an amateur photographer, and I was guided by him and felt 100% relaxed knowing he would select someone excellent. We didn’t give any direction on the day and just went with the flow – I hardly even noticed he was there so I was completely bowled over when I got the photos (how can one person be in so many places at once!!?).

The Dress
awww I so loved my dress! I had a very particular idea of the dress I would enjoy wearing, and after just one experience in a wedding dress shop I knew that I wanted to make my own. I designed the dress, and then worked with a dressmaker called Elaine Closs to help me make it. My Dad and I hand painted individual flowers with fabric paint which were sewn down the back by hand. I can recognise each flower and when they were painted. One of the things I love about painting is how you can get completely transported back to the place and time you created the piece, and I remember everything from the music playing to the smell of the paint and exactly how my Dad looked during those little painting evenings. I forgot about jewellery (and knickers!) completely, and had to buy some the day before from Accessorise. I wore simple pearl earrings and loved them.

The Suit and Bridesmaids
My bridesmaids all wore their own dresses and each one chose a completely unique style. We had a maxi dress, a suit dress, a traditional gown and my maid of honour had her vintage 50s style dress made by Get Cutie. They looked amazing and I loved that their personalities all shone through their dresses. Ryan got a woollen blue suit from House of Fraiser, and the groomsmen wore their own suits.

Theme or Colour Scheme
We really didn’t want to go down the matching route, we had a bit of a blue theme in groomsmen and bridesmaids, but that is as far as it went. My dress was pretty bright and the reception was eclectic.

Flowers
We decided not to have flowers (booze, band, photographer! Remember!), but one of my amazing friends organised bouquets for all the girls as a wedding present. Ryans mum and sister decorated the town hall with petals and some flowers, of which I didn’t see until I walked down the aisle. It was totally breath-taking. I recommend letting other people own something and just not worrying about it.

Decoration
We kept it simple in the town hall, with just a few flowers and tea lights. We didn’t decorate the pub, it is so eclectic and interesting as it is and we wanted out party to be in a pub so didn’t want to try and change it.

Food
Sausages and mash! A sharing platter to start.

Wedding Cake
All my girlfriends made a cake, and we had a table full of random of things from cup cakes to carrot cake (some looked more appetising than others!)

Entertainment
The most amazing band, pulled together for our wedding by one of our friends.

Buy or DIY your Stationery
We made all our invites, using a film strip and some luggage tags. For place names we collected stones and wrote people’s names on them.

Special Moments
It was a really blustery day, and our photographer took us outside just before our meal – Ryan wrapped his arms around me to shelter me from the wind (it was bloody freezing!), and it was a nice moment to just be close to each other and realise that we were now husband and wife! That felt very special.

Advice to other couples
Unless you love the drama of wedding planning – have a short engagement. Six months was enough for me!

Biggest surprise
Not feeling nervous.

Supplier Shout Outs

• Town Hall – www.henleytowncouncil.gov.uk
• Reception Venue – www.thelittleangel.co.uk
• Photographer – www.mattparryphotography.co.uk

For more information on Matt’s work please go to:

Buckinghamshire Wedding Photographer – www.mattparryphotography.co.uk
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