25

Jul

2018

Lois and Paul’s Homespun Seaside Themed Wedding with Plenty of Beer by Christine Wehrmeier

Today I am taking you to Margate courtesy of Christine Wehrmeier who sent me in this lovely wedding. Lois and Paul wanted a small intimate wedding that took in their love of beer and the seaside. With a guest count of just 36 they were able to book one of their favourite venues, the Bottleshop in Margate. They filled it with homemade details, DIY decorations and lots of personal touches. Their love of the sea was reflected in the decoration, as well as their love of cycling. A fun-filled wedding with some pretty quirky details.

It was simple, relaxed and completely reflected what we both wanted from the day – our close friends and family having fun together in a good pub!

Lois and Paul were married on 26th October 2017 at Salmestone Grange in Margate, with the reception at The Bottleshop, Margate. ‘We wanted a small, intimate venue and somewhere with a great beer selection. We had been to the Bottleshop earlier that year on a trip to Margate for my birthday and decided then it would be a great reception venue. We then found nearby Salmestone Grange for the ceremony and loved how beautiful the setting was. We had 36 guests and it took 6 months to plan.

How they met 
We met via work and have been together 6 years

The proposal
It was in a local micro pub over a beer. Paul randomly took off his trainer and presented it to me with a ring inside, asking if he could annoy me for the rest of our lives. How could I say no…?

How did you allocate your budget?
A third went on fees for venue hire, photographer, make up etc. A third went on food and drink and the last third on clothing, accessories, accommodation and decorations.

Where did you splurge and where did you save?
There wasn’t really any splurging as we were happy with the price we got on everything. Mainly saved a lot on stationary, decorations and flowers as I did all that myself.

How did you choose your photographer?
Christine had photographed our friend’s wedding and we loved her style.

The dress 
Dress was by RenzRags via Etsy. Shoes by Kurt Geiger and accessories were vintage.

Suit and bridesmaids
Suit from Next. Bridesmaids dresses via Etsy and flower girls John Lewis.

Theme or colour scheme 
The theme was a bit of a mixture; royal blue and copper colour scheme and a seaside, shabby chic style – with some nods to cycling and beer!

Flowers 
I made my bouquet from buttons, vintage jewellery and trinkets that had sentimental value. Included in it were buttons from items of clothing I had as a baby, earrings from my grandmothers and  some new charms I had picked up to reflect the seaside theme.
The bridesmaids carried simple hand tied arrangements of white roses, gypsophila and gladioli. The flower girls had lanterns rather than flowers.

Decoration 
The chapel simply had candles, lanterns and some bride and groom wreaths for our chairs, which I made with rope from the local dockyard.
The reception venue had centrepieces I made from wine bottles, beer cans and candles with sprigs of gypsophila. We had some rustic style bunting hung up and cork boards for the table plan.

Food
Sour dough pizza. Pudding was either salted caramel tart, chocolate brownie or ice cream/sorbet.

Wedding cake
The bottom layer was an apple and cinnamon cake made by my mum. The top layer was a vegan ginger cake made by Paul.

Entertainment
The speeches were pretty entertaining – we had a bridesmaid speech instead of a best man one and they chose to dress up as men for part of it to represent a best man.
In the evening we created a play list split into sections of our favourite music, such as our school years, a 90s throw back section and even some K-POP which Paul and I listen to together. I made a cork board with a timeline of the musical sections throughout the evening, so guests could be on the dance floor for their favourite bits.
There was a snug upstairs where we had laid out board games, cards, dominos etc for anyone that wanted to escape the noise and relax.

Who supplied the stationery?
I did all this myself. The invites I designed and printed then mounted onto pages from an old black and white guidebook of Margate. I then rolled them up and put them inside beer bottles which I recapped and added customised labels to.
The order of service and running order for the day were printed in the same style as the invites and then put into hessian pouches along with confetti, tissues and bubbles.
Food choices were printed onto labels and tied with ribbon to the glasses at each place setting.

Personal touches
Pretty much everything! Along with the things mentioned above we also had a hand made guestbook, which was a box of postcards we had collected from trips and exhibitions over the years. We laid them out with some pens and pegs and hung some string up for them to be pegged to.
I also made the place settings which were clam shells I filled with wax to make candles out of and then wrote guests names onto them.

Special moments 
My Uncle is a minister and agreed to do the service for us, which made it far more personal.
Paul’s daughter, Isobel, did a reading in the service from one of our favourite family story books.
We did a joint speech based around the Tour de France and gave out cycling caps to guests that had ‘won’ certain awards. It was so nice to do this part of the day together rather than being the ‘traditional bride’ just listening to the speeches.

Advice for other couples
Put as much of yourselves into the day as possible, rather than doing/having what you think you are supposed to. We broke with a lot of traditional, even if it got some raised eyebrows, and were so glad we did.

Biggest surprise
That it all went to plan! 

 

Supplier Shout Outs 

 

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON CHRISTINE’S WORK GO TO

www.christinewehrmeier.com  www.christinewehrmeier.com/blog [email protected] /  FACEBOOK / INSTAGRAM /

Destination Weddings & Elopements. Contemporary & relaxed wedding photography. Based in London 

 

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