Karen and Paddy’s Vintage Inspired Pub Wedding. By Nicola Thompson Photography

Happy Tuesday everyone and how are you all? I have a fabulous pub wedding for you today courtesy of Nicola Thompson Photography. It’s a gorgeous wedding that was planned in just 6 months, a non fussy day full of pretty decorations that didn’t break the bank. Karen and Paddy chose a pub for their wedding reception as they wanted to move away from what a traditional wedding offered and the results are great. A fun, relaxed day full of smiles and a laid back atmosphere. Both Karen and Paddy look super stylish, with the most amazing House of Nicolas 50s style dress and a great combo for the boys. This fab wedding is topped off perfectly with Nicola’s fabulous photography style, she has captured the day perfectly!

‘A meaningful and personal service followed by a relaxed, informal day at the pub with lots of drinks, food and dancing in the evening. A cracking day out.’

Karen and Paddy were married on 12th July 2014 at St Josephs Church Winsford, Cheshire followed by the reception at the Duke of Portland, Pennys Lane, Northwich Cheshire. ‘The Scanlan family have been associated with St Josephs for many years. Paddy and his 2 brothers and sister all went to the school attached to the church. Pad’s Nanna Rita and granddad Arthur were active members of the local church community getting involved in the social events and general maintenance of the church – the light fittings that are in the church were even installed by Arthur years ago so it seemed like the natural choice to want to get married there. Pad and I are not active church go-ers but obviously attended in the run up to the wedding – the priest (Father Simon) was amazing we were even dinner guests at each others respective houses. In terms of the reception venue, we knew straight away that we did not want a wedding in a fancy hotel. We love going to the pub and eating good grub so quite quickly we moved away from the traditional wedding venues and starting contacting local pubs in the area. Our friend and bridesmaid Andrea used to work at the Duke and had previously mentioned about a fab wedding she had waited on at so we enquired and immediately loved the place. The manager was very relaxed, and obviously experienced in running a good day so pretty quickly we decided it was the one for us. Plus, it was very reasonably priced – we did not want to get ripped off we had 80 guests in the day, 140 at night. We got engaged on Christmas day, had decided to actually get married about half way into January, found the Duke by the end of Feb and had pretty much planned it all by mid way into June…so 6 months all in all’

How they met
Pad and I have been together for 5 years….he is the brother of one of my best friends boyfriends. We were friends for a short period of time before we actually got together at Glastonbury after one too many organic ciders!

The Proposal
Pad proposed to me on Christmas Day 2013. I came downstairs to open my presents. He had bought me the Doc Martins that I so desperately wanted and I had them on with my pyjamas. He then pulled a little box out from the side of the couch that had a reel of cotton inside but the end of the cotton was attached to something. I pulled on the thread and it was attached to the top of the Christmas tree…when I pulled it the ring slid down into my hand and pad got down on one knee!

How did you allocate your budget
We didn’t really have a budget as such, we just knew that we didn’t want to get ripped off and didn’t want to spend the first couple of years of marriage paying off the wedding day so we kept everything reasonable. We didn’t splash out on anything really. We did quite a bit of haggling where we could on things. As I ended up ordering quite a bit online I made use of my www.topcashback.co.uk account – which I do for all internet purchases….you get cashback for virtually everything so its always worth having a look.

How did you choose your photographer
I searched online and shortlisted a number of photographers and contacted them to see who had availability at such short notice. Luckily our top choice could make the day www.nicolathompsonphotography.co.uk. I did not realise quite how much involvement the photographer would have on the day. To be honest Nicola helped us out soo much in terms of the organisation, order and timings on things that we would never even have thought of. My biggest recommendation to anybody selecting a photographer would be to make sure that you get on with them….i spoke to Nicola more than any other one person on the day so its really important that you select someone who you want to share some really special moments with. We hated the thought of posing for photographs too…Nicola just totally blended in with the day, you wouldn’t even know that she was there.

The Dress
My dress was by House of Nicolas and I bought it from Winsford Bridal Studio – it was the first one I tried on. I wanted a dress that I could dance in, that I wasn’t going to trip over and that I could relax in…plus I had to buy off hangar as there wasn’t enough time to have one made. This dress ticked all of the boxes! My birdcage veil was from www.lilybella.co.uk and jewellery was from Debenhams. I did wear my mums Tiffany diamond necklace – something borrowed! My shoes were also from Winsford Bridal Studio.

The Suit and Bridesmaids
We wanted a relaxed feel for the groomsmen so we opted for chinos, linen jackets and smart waistcoats they all came from Debenhams. It took a while to select the girls dresses – I wanted them all to wear something they liked, that they might wear again and that they would be comfy in for the full day, so once we’d decided on the colour it was finding the right styles. I think we ordered altogether about 30 dresses! Each dress was different and a slightly different shade of pink – and they all looked fabulous together. One was from Coast, and 3 from Debenhams

Theme or Colour Scheme
Not really a colour scheme – more of a vintage inspired theme, with lots of whites, pinks and browns

Flowers
My bouquet was gorgeous vintage roses, the bridesmaids had bouquets of gyp and on the tables there was vases of roses and gyp. The flowers were provided by Christies Flowers in Winsford

Decoration
I saved up Lloyd Grossman jars for months and decorated them with ribbons and material for the tables, I decorated some basic tealight holders and placed them around the venue, plus lots of bunting and wicker hearts that I’d bought from various shops including Store 21, B&M’s and Quality Save – you don’t need to spend lots of money to make a venue look amazing; just look around to find things that work together. I also bought quite a few candle holders from Inspirations wholesalers in Bromborough (that place is amazing). My name cards on the table were luggage labels that I holepunched with a heart shape and clipped onto the side of each wine glass…they also couple as the favours, as on the back it couple as a free drinks voucher. We bought all the children a gift, so they didn’t get bored over dinner. There were also some props on each table to ensure that some fun photos could be taken.

Food
We had substantial canapes on arrival which consisted of goats cheese tartlets, mini fish and chips, belly work and bruschetta. We then had tarragon chicken with Cheshire new potatoes with vegetables and freshly made mint sauce on the tables. For dessert there was chocolate fudge brownie with ice cream. In the evening there was a great buffet of sandwiches, chips and things – but to be honest I didn’t have any – I was still full from the wedding breakfast…I was also having too much fun dancing to eat!

Wedding Cake
The amazing wedding cake was a 4 tiered Victoria sponge made by Paddy’s cousin Sophie and Auntie Ange. We’re not big fans of icing and we had seen a picture of a similar cake in a wedding mag which looked perfect. Apparently due to the amount of practice runs that were taking place, cake had been the only thing on the menu for weeks before – much to the delight of Uncle Dave!

Entertainment
We hired a photobooth from www.specialeventsphotobooths.co.uk and hired a DJ from www.cheshiredjs.co.uk. Jon from Cheshire DJ’s was absolutely amazing…we love so many different types of music…we had a list in mind of music we wanted, and we certainly knew what we didn’t want; and he picked up all the ideas and made by the best music list ever. You literally had to drag us off the dancefloor

Buy or DIY your Stationery
We bought the invites and thank you cards off www.feelgoodinvites.com – excellent company to use, really easy to deal with and Ger (who we were corresponding with) was fab at coming back with options.

Special Moments
We hired a big red bus from Routemaster travel – that was great fun for everybody who got on. We didn’t as we were whisked away in a Bentley driven by one of my best friends mums
The speeches – genuinely the best mans (pads brother Lee) speech was the funniest I have ever heard, paying testament to pads love of the Game of Thrones, my dads was emotional and I was proud of pads too. And then how much everyone enjoyed themselves….the evening was like a massive party – loads of old school dance tunes

Advice to other couples
Make sure that you do what you want to do….if you find yourself going down a route that doesn’t feel right, or you’re only doing it to please somebody else then don’t do it. Also, a piece of advice that I was given, that I wish I had taken more heed of…try and step back each hour and look around you….take in everything that is going on.

Biggest surprise
How quickly the day went and how much of a great time I had. I was not expecting it to be that amazing

Supplier Shout Outs

• Venue – www.dukeofportland.com
• Photographer – www.nicolathompsonphotography.co.uk
• Dress – www.ww38.winsfordbridalstudio.co.uk
• Veil – www.lilybella.co.uk
• Suits – www.debenhams.com
• DJ – www.cheshiredjs.co.uk
• Photo Booth – www.specialeventsphotobooths.co.uk

For more information on Nicola’s work go to

www.nicolathompsonphotography.co.uk
FACEBOOK
PINTEREST
@nicthomphoto