Harry and Hollie’s ‘Rustic Bohemian’ Beautiful Blush Preston Court Wedding by Chris Blackledge Photography 

Today I bring you a delightful wedding from one of my favourite wedding venues in the UK, Preston Court. Preston Court is a stunning barn wedding venue in Kent that comes complete with it’s own Carousel and out door area. the possibilities are endless, I have featured weddings there on a number of occasions, and I have loved all of them. Today’s wedding of Harry and Hollie is no exception. With a blush colour scheme and a day filled with so many personal details put together by Hollie it really is pure perfection. Big thanks to Chris Blackledge Photography  for the gorgeous photos.

I do today, I do forever and I do always. The vows we both wrote and promised each other for eternity. 

Harry and Hollie were married on 8th September 2023 at Preston Court, Canterbury, Kent. ‘We always knew we wanted a unique, memorable and fun wedding surrounded by our family and friends, so when we discovered Preston Court, it was the first and last venue we looked at. From the bohemian barnyard, unique carousel, vintage mechanical organs, steam engines, the magical moated island and its gorgeous surroundings, it was full of character and for us, love at first sight, so we booked it there and then! We had 118 day guests and 40 evening guests and it took 18 months to plan.’

How they met
We met on April 15^th 2018, via Tinder, and it really was love at first swipe! Despite having mutual friends, we’d never actually met or spoken, but this evening was a little different, when we matched and the message of holssssss, with lots of s’s, you absolute sort, appeared on my screen! From the get-go, I was drawn in by Harry’s kind heart, fun personality and his cheeky sense of humour. We spent the evening discussing, our families, our ambitions and dreams for the future, and I will never forget the hopeless romantic proudly declaring to my dad the next evening: ‘dad, I’ve found the person I am going to marry.’ Nearly six years later, how right was I! 

The proposal
My best friend Tej, and I, had always dreamed of flying in a hot air balloon across the beautiful landscape of Cappadocia, so as a surprise, Harry and Tej booked us a girl’s trip to visit the magical region in Turkey for my 28^th birthday. We stayed in one of their unique cave suites and was lucky enough to experience seeing the gorgeous views from above in one of their many hot air balloons. It truly was the most breath-taking experience! On the last day of our stay, they had both organised a surprise photoshoot for us to remember the trip by and during some of the solo photographs which were taken, the photographer directed me to gaze into the distance as he took some back shots of me looking out to the majestically scenery. When he directed me to turn around, Harry had flown out to Cappadocia as a surprise, and was in front of me on one knee, asking me to marry him! He’d been planning this proposal with Tej for months, and the trip wasn’t a girl’s holiday at all, it was all part of a bigger plan to propose! To this day, I do not know how they managed to pull off such an incredible surprise as I am normally very receptive, but they planned it so perfectly, I genuinely had no idea. It truly was one of the best, most memorable and most astonishing moments, of my life!

How did you allocate your budget? 
We agreed an overall budget and did some research to work out average prices of wedding suppliers, and basically went from there. 

How did you choose your photographer? 
The lovely Chris Blackledge was the photographer at my dad and step-mums wedding, ten years before mine, and I remember when they received their wedding photos back, looking through the album and being so amazed at how many beautiful moments he had captured. Whilst some images were posed, the majority of the photographs were natural, candid shots, and I absolutely loved them! I was very lucky that he shot a beautiful photograph of me with sadly, my now late nan, which I have cherished since the day I received it and to this day, it is still my phone screen saver and printed pride of place in our home. To capture such beautiful, in the moment emotions that get passed down the generations is such a unique talent, and it felt sentimental to have him capture the next generation wedding in our family. There was no one else I wanted to capture these beautifully raw moments on our special day than Chris, so it really was like having an old family friend photograph our wedding.

The dress
My dress was Rebel Without A Cause by Dando London, sourced and altered by the wonderful team at Confetti and Lace. I worked closely with the incredibly talented Unveiled by Sophie who bought my vision to life and created the bespoke veil of my dreams for our big day! My accessories were minimal, wearing my day-to-day jewellery and wedding rings designed by the lovely team at Allure Jewellers in Hatton Garden, and my shoes were the comfiest pair of heels from River Island, which I lasted all day and night in! My hair was styled in a messy low bun, by the wonderfully skilled Sarah Louise Bridal Hair, and my make up applied naturally, by the beautifully gifted Nermz Arif. I had some personal, traditional touches added in the form of my garter, and a Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed and Something Blue pin, attached to the inside of my dress. 

The suit and bridesmaids
Harry’s suit was from Reiss and his groomsmen suits were from M&S, tailored to size by the talented team at Sidcup Dry Cleaners. I wanted my bridesmaids to feel both beautiful and comfortable on the day, so my only request was to have a blush dress in their own choice of style. We decided on a range from ASOS and a range from Style Cheat, both of which came in the same blush shade, but offered a large range of varying styles to suit different body types.

Theme or colour scheme
Our theme was rustic bohemian, and our colour scheme blush. 

Flowers 
Like many brides, I had made a Pinterest board of different wedding ideas over the years, so I was extremely excited to see all these elements come to life, especially in the form of our beautiful flowers. I worked closely with the incredibly talented Helen at BluBell Creative to create bouquets, buttonholes, aisle meadows and table arrangements consisting of beautiful fresh blush roses, pampas and foliage. They all looked and smelt, absolutely gorgeous, and completed our outfits and venue! 

Decoration 
I am a creative person at heart, so working to bring the varying decorative aspects of the vision I had for our wedding to life, was one of my favourite parts of the wedding planning process! I wanted personal, handmade touches which reflected both Harry and I, as well as our relationship, to be interweaved throughout the day, so I handmade various elements to achieve this:

• I sourced a wooden pallet from Facebook Marketplace and painted this with some leftover paint we had at home, before attaching string and pegs to display some of the incredible memories, moments and milestones we’ve been lucky enough to experience throughout our relationship, in the form of vintage, polaroid photos.
• I sourced a vintage ladder to create an ‘In Memory’ photo display and decorated this with angels, flowers and a bespoke quote, so our loved ones who had sadly passed, could be remembered and a part of our day.
• As I work in PR and Harry works for London Underground, we both wanted elements incorporated within the décor, that reflected our careers. I created a Wedding Post newspaper given to guests as they entered the ceremony, filled with wedding related news, and our table plan was in the form of a London Underground map, created by the talented team at By Blossom Wedding Stationery.
• I decorated the cans on our vintage car by the wonderful team at Quirky Weddings Cars, using photos of Harry and I, drawings by our little page boys and flower girls, as well as milestone dates and quotes that are meaningful to our relationship.
• Our table numbers were designed by myself using Canva, showing both Harry and I at each specific age of the table number.
• I created a Tinder themed mirror, with a vinyl message which read: All Because Two People Swiped Right!
• As the décor of the venue was so naturally stunning, we didn’t want to add too much décor to the barn, so we worked with the incredible Abby at Last Little Details, who helped bring all the design elements together, and is such a talented Stylist, and a must-have for anyone planning a wedding! As we got engaged in a region known for its hot air balloons, we added some paper versions of these to the wooden beams of the barn, created by the lovely Salty Carnival Kisses, as a subtle reminder of the beautiful destination that this all started!

Food  
We wanted out food choices to reflect both the fun nature of the venue, as well as some of our own favourite foods. We selected canapes in the form of Mini Fish & Chips, Mini Burgers and Chips as well as Mini Hot Dogs and Chips, to mirror the subtle funfair theme we interweaved throughout our venue, entertainment, décor and personal touches. For our wedding breakfast, our guests enjoyed a sharing platter of Turkish Meze, a personal nod to where we got engaged, and our main was a mouth-watering roast dinner with all the trimmings, Harry and I’s favourite dinner, all lovingly created by the incredible team at Andersons Caterers. We enjoyed our wedding cake for dessert, and our evening snack was a selection of well-received pizzas by the Wilfie’s team at Preston Court. Our wedding day was also one of the hottest days of the year last year, and as Harry and I have such a sweet tooth, we had the wonderful vintage ice cream bike from the lovely team at Treats On A Tricycle and the vintage candy floss bike from the lovely team at Vintage Candy Floss, providing deliciously cool sweet treat for our loved ones! 

Wedding cake
We had seen so many wonderful wedding cakes that we loved, we decided to work with our incredibly talented local and family-run bakery, Worths Bakery, to incorporate all these elements into one dream cake! It was three layers of lemon and vanilla filled sponge, beautifully decorated with our names, flowers and pampas, personalised with a little topper of our beautiful Labradoodle Max, cheekily eating some of the cake! Worths Bakery have created so many sweet creations for our celebrations over the years, so we were so excited when they created a cake for another of our special milestones which looked as incredible as it tasted! 

Entertainment
As well as the unique carousel which guests of all ages enjoyed throughout the day, we wanted to subtly add to the funfair theme, and included a selection of vintage games such as a Hook A Duck, High Striker and Beat The Buzzer from Salty Carnival Kisses. The children were given a personalised party bags at dinner to keep them entertained during the speeches, and we were treated to an incredible set by SoulTown DJ, Rob Crouch, accompanied by the Saxophone and Bongo players from Alex Pitman Music, in the evening.

Who supplied the stationery? 
I am a massive fan of shopping local and shopping small, so I created some of the designs myself using Canva and printed them at a local printer. I also worked with the fantastically creative team at By Bloom Stationery to create our fun-filled fairground themed invites, and the incredibly talented Lucy March Designs to create our menus and bespoke vows. 

Where did you go on your honeymoon? 
We were lucky enough to visit the beautiful resort of The Standard in the Maldives, and it truly was a once in a lifetime trip that we both felt so grateful to experience! 

Personal touches
I pride myself on my attention to detail, so it really did mean a lot when loved ones complimented our personal touches, because I had spent so much time ensuring our big day was personal to us, and reflective of both of our interests, memories and achievements as individual people, and as a couple. From the décor to the vows, the food to the entertainment, one way or another, every aspect of our wedding, no matter how big or small, had a personal meaning. I think for both of us, our vows we had written to each other, and the speeches from our wedding party, were our favourite personal touches. We also ensured we had keepsakes we could cherish from the day in the form of a fingerprint guestbook, a polaroid guestbook and disposable cameras doted around the venues, on the tables and even in the toilets! We really did have fun post-wedding, getting these developed and seeing the day from different perspectives! We were gifted a beautiful personalised wooden memory box, as my bridesmaids know how sentimental I am, so we loved collecting all the personal touches and décor we’d made, and keeping these in a special keepsake time capsule that we can pass down for generations to come!

Special moments 
As cliché as this may sound, from waking up that morning to going to sleep that night, we both said it truly was the best day of our lives. To be able to make a lifelong promise to each other, and spending the day celebrating this with the family and friends we love dearly who have each individually become a part of the beautiful life we have built together, truly was one of the most special moments we will ever get to share together.   

Advice for other couples
Embrace every moment from being engaged to getting married, because every memory from dress fittings to food tasting to stags and hens to saying I do, will be some of the best memories of your life, and enjoy every single second, because when people say it goes so quick, it truly does! A few loved ones told us throughout the day to step back and truly soak up the atmosphere of this incredible milestone, and our venue was great at bringing us both together at different points throughout the day to enjoy these first intimate memories with our loved ones as husband and wife. We both really did cherish and embrace these simple memories, moments where time felt like time stood still, and we watched from afar as parents danced, grandparents reminisced, aunties and uncles laughed, and siblings and cousins celebrated our love. Don’t sweat the small stuff, things may not go 100% to plan, but you will be so busy having the time of your life, you won’t even notice if they do! 

Biggest surprise 
You spend so much time planning your special day, and having so many moments of imagining what your big day will be like, but I don’t think you truly realise just how much of an incredible a day it is until you reminisce afterwards and think: ‘WOW, that really was the best day of our lives!’ We’d both relive it again in a heartbeat if we could!

Supplier Shout Outs

• Venue: Preston Court – www.prestoncourt.co.uk
• Photographer: Chris Blackledge Photography – www.chrisblackledgephotography.co.uk
• Bridal Hair: Sarah Louise Bridal Hair – www.sarahlouisebridalhairkent.co.uk
• Bridal MUA: Nermz Arif
• Bridal Party Hair & MUA: Jade Farmiloe – www.instagram.com/jadefarmiloemua/
• Cake: Worth’s Bakery – https://worthsbakery.co.uk
• Daytime Caterers: Andersons Caterers – www.andersonscaterers.co.uk/
• DJ: Rob Crouch – https://soultownfestival.co.uk/
• Dress: Confetti & Lace – www.confettiandlace.com
• Evening Caterers:  Wilfies Woodfire Pizza Wagon – www.wilfies.com
• Florist: Blubell Creative – www.blubellecreative.co.uk
• Rings: Allure Jewellers – www.allurejewellers.co.uk
• Saxophone/Bongo Player: Alec Pitman – https://alecpitman.com/
• Styling: Last Little Details – www.instagram.com/last_little_details/
• Transport: Quirky Wedding Cars – www.quirkyweddingcars.co.uk
• Veil: Unveiled by Sophie – www.sophieraval.com
• Videographer: Third Reel Films – https://thirdreelfilms.co.uk
• Vintage Candy Floss Bike: Vintage Candy Floss – https://vintagecandyfloss.co.uk
• Vintage Games: Salty Carnival Kisses – www.instagram.com/saltycarnivalkiss/
• Vintage Ice Cream Bike: Treats On A Tricycle – https://treatsonatricycle.co.uk
• Wedding Stationery: By Blossom Wedding Stationery –www.byblossomweddingstationery.co.uk
• Wedding Stationery: Lucy March Design –  www.lucymarchdesign.com

CHRIS BLACKLEDGE KENT WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHER

www.chrisblackledgephotography.co.uk / [email protected] / 07912851540 / FACEBOOK / INSTAGRAM 

Based in Kent but happily capturing wedding stories across the UK and Worldwide. Established in 2010 with the aim of making memories and capturing awesome wedding stories naturally, truthful and creatively.