Lily and Rob’s Slick, Stylish and Modern ‘Big Fat Greek Wedding’ By SixFour 

Well hello Friday! What a welcome sight you are! How has the first full week of 2019 been for you so far? I am finishing off the week on a high as I have the most exquisite wedding for you. Filled with so much style and an abundance of drop dead gorgeous decor. This stunning wedding has been sent in by Raea from S I X F O UR  wedding planners and stylists. I actually featured Raea on the blog back in 2013 with her own wedding. Since then she has gone on to set up her own very successful wedding planning company, the results of which can be seen in today’s truly stunning wedding.

My Big Fat Greek Wedding

Rob and Lily were married on 30th May 2018 at Galu Seaside, Larnaca, Cyprus. ‘Although I grew up in London, I am from Cyprus and I have been visiting every year since I was a child to see family and spend time in our bungalow. When I met Rob, he started coming and it soon became his favourite place too.  The weather is always fabulous in May, the food is great and it gives everyone a chance to have a little holiday! Our actual venue, Galu Seaside, is a short walk from our bungalow, so I actually walked from my house to our ceremony. We had around 160 guests, we started planning from as soon as we got engaged, but realised that it would be a lot easier to plan a wedding abroad with a planner. We found S I X F O UR and preparations with them started around 1 year before.’

How they met 
We actually lived a few roads away from each other growing up and shared quite a lot of mutual friends. However, we didn’t meet properly until around 4 years ago during Christmas time in a local pub – by New Year I was his girlfriend and by the following year we were engaged!

The proposal
For my birthday, Rob surprised me with tickets to New York (my fave place!) so when we were there we decided to go on a tandem bike ride around Central Park on one of the hottest days of the year. Not only did I have to take off my black jeans and ride around in just an oversized white shirt, but I fell off the bike several times and we decided to give up and find a spot to eat our lunch. Sweating, trouserless and massively jetlagged I decided to have a quick snooze. Then after a few minutes, just as I was nodding off Rob nudged me and looked like he’d seen a ghost. I truly thought someone had stolen our hired bike and we wouldn’t get our passports back as deposit and then we’d just have to live in New York forever. Then he pulled out a ring from his pocket and asked if I’d be his wife! After about 45 minutes of ugly crying I said yes, and then he took me to Sephora to buy back all of the make up I’d cried off.

How did you allocate your budget?
I left this to the wonderful S I X F O U R. When we first started talking, they asked us what our top three priorities were, to know where best to spend our money. We chose photography, styling and my dress.

Where did you splurge and where did you save?
Splurged on the photographer and videographer by flying them out from the UK, but made an absolute saving on all things hair and make-up. Luckily, we have a family full of hairdressers and I am a semi-permanent make-up artist by day so I was able to do my family and my own make up on the day.

How did you choose your photographer?
We chose Emma Lawson, because we absolutely adored her style. You only have to look through a few of her shots to realise how beautifully she captures the emotions of your guests and all the parts of the day that you would usually miss. In the end, Emma herself could not make it but she sent Hayley Palmquist and Liana Mihaela Mitrea. They were amazing, and I am endlessly grateful for how beautifully they captured the day! We even managed to squeeze in a post-wedding day shoot on the salt flats nearby, and the photos from that were incredible.

The dress 
My dress was Jesus Piero, the headpiece was from Luna Bea and my shoes were actually from ASOS.

The suit and bridesmaids
The bridesmaids’ dresses were all from ASOS too. Raea from S I X F O U R handled all of my bridesmaids and their styling. She found low budget, but beautiful dresses for the bridesmaids to choose with a styling brief of ‘structured lace’.

Theme or colour scheme
No, I didn’t have a theme as such but worked more towards a ‘vibe’ as tacky as it sounds. I wanted the wedding to look slick and stylish but also high impact if that makes sense. Everything I had in my mind was brought to life by S I X F O U R, and Raea gave me so much inspiration. She approached it like a high couture fashion show – she’s truly gifted!

Flowers
We had quite muted greenery – eucalyptus, olive & Italian ruscus and mostly white flowers – delphinium, roses, lisianthus, hydrangea, wax flowers, eryngium & peonies. I didn’t like the idea of lots of garishly bright colours for flowers, as they don’t grow naturally in Cyprus due to the heat.

Decoration
S I X F O U R had the idea of using grids partitions for both the ceremony area and the seating plan. We did not want to block the view of the sea, but we still wanted to create a structural and intimate space. Our ceremony canopy seconded as a lounging area and glitter bar station in the evening. For the head table S I X F O U R designed three backdrop panels using the spaces between the gazebos along with dramatic multi-level festoon lighting above our heads. Along with another lounging area we had loads of vases with large arrangements, candles in clear lanterns and low light festoons.

Food 
We had a self-serve style meal with over 13 different choices for starters mains and desserts. We had traditional Cypriot dishes like village salads, halloumi, souvlaki and more!

Wedding cake
Our cake was small and simply iced with a vanilla sponge. We had so many desserts we didn’t need the traditional large cake to feed all of our guests!

Entertainment
The bridal ceremony and walk to the venue started with a violinist. Then we had some traditional Greek dancers alongside a Greek band and ended the night with a DJ.

Who supplied the stationery?
S I X F O U R suggested the very talented Jinny from Vine in the Wild. She did our favour tags, order of service and the stickers for our personalised confetti poppers & traditional Cypriot favours.

Personal touches
Rob bought me the most gorgeous necklace as a pre-wedding gift that said ‘Agapi Mou’ which means ‘my love’ in Greek.
We also had ‘zomata’, which is a traditional getting-ready ceremony where my bridesmaids and family all came to the bungalow to partake in a fertility ritual.
Frances & Raea made us our own ceramic name cards for the top table, as well as the table numbers and ‘reserved’ seating tags. They were such a personal touch and we still have them in our room today. Raea’s Mum also made me my own garter in the style of my dress with a little evil eye on it. It was such an honour to wear it on the day!

Special moments
Seeing Rob at the end of the aisle was my favourite part of the day. He promised he wouldn’t cry when he saw me, but he did!

Advice for other couples
TAKE A BREATH AND TAKE IT IN! You spend so long planning the day, then it goes by in what feels like an hour. Don’t get caught up in the small things because at the end of the day, your guests probably won’t notice.

Biggest surprise
I was so surprised when one of the traditional Greek dancers started getting guests to balance what looked like over 25 glasses on his head. Surprisingly, they stayed there too!

Supplier Shout Outs 

• PLANNERS: S I X F O UR 
• FLORIST & PROPS: Fresh Events
• LIGHTING: C.S Lighting by Christos Soleas 
• STATIONERY: Vine in the Wild
• PHOTOBOOTH: Inside the Box
• GLITTER BAR: Glitterbugs
• DJ: Definitive Disco 
• PHOTOGRAPHY: Hayley and Liana under Emma Lawson Photography 
• VIDEOGRAPHY: Lawson Films UK

For more information on SIXFOUR Planning go to

www.sixfour.co  / [email protected] / Raea 07944506699 Frances 07736032217 / FACEBOOK / INSTAGRAM / PINTEREST

DESIGNED BY US. DEFINED BY YOU.
We are event designers based in the U.K. that love to style and plan weddings both here and abroad. S I X F O U R stands for playful, unique, modern and culturally aware weddings that truly reflect the bride and groom. We endeavour to guide hearts ‘outside the box’, to create an event that leaves guests immersed in the experience and in awe of the detail.