Peak District wedding handcrafted by family and friends

I am thrilled to be sharing with you another real wedding and one that took place at the beautiful Beechenhill Farm who are one of the wedding venues you can find listed in The Natural Wedding Company directory.

I must say a huge thank you to Timm and Sam at Timm Cleasby Photography who have been incredibly patient with me and for sharing this lovely wedding with us.

Lucy and Jon got married in July at Beechenhill Farm in the Peak District National Park.  With the help of their family and friends they created a beautiful and personal weekend-long wedding amongst this rather special rural setting.

Lucy says, “We wanted a venue that was unique, intimate and rural.  We both love being out in the countryside, and so when we visited the venue we both knew straight away that it felt so ‘us’!”

“As a little girl my parents used to take my sister and I for long walks in Dovedale, and we passed the farm many times.  Although it happened to be coincidence that I came across this amazing venue after hours of searching online, it brought back many memories.  The views from the farm were truly outstanding!”

“A lot of our wedding was done with the help of family and friends. We wanted the day to be personal to us, and making the most of people’s talents seemed one of the best ways of doing that. Plus, it also saved us a lot of pennies!”

Lucy and Jon had help creating all kinds of details for their wedding day, like the wooden sign at the entrance to the farm that was made my Lucy’s mum and step-dad.

Lucy did her own make-up after having a lesson, and her sister-in-law did her hair.  She wore a stunning Jenny Packham gown that she bought from a bridal shop in Cheshire.

Don’t you just love Lucy’s elegant Jenny Packham gown with the beautiful jewelled detailing in the centre?

I really like the deep berry red ties and cufflinks worn by Jon and his best man.  Jon even changed into a pair of red Converse later in the day.

Lucy chosen locally sourced flowers for her bouquets and buttonholes, “they were done by a lovely lady based only a few miles from the venue, all her flowers are locally sourced and she captured the look and colours we wanted brilliantly.”

The sweet flowergirl held a wooden heart that Lucy had decorated with silk flowers from a local market, that she superglued on and finished with ribbon.  “I was really pleased with how it turned out and it is now hanging in my niece’s bedroom as a memento of the day.”

Lucy and Jon’s wedding ceremony took place in the top part of the barn at Beechenhill Farm, a beautiful space of exposed brick, wooden floors and beams.

For the wedding ceremony, Lucy walked in to Here, There and Everywhere by the Beatles, and a good friend of theirs played the piano during the ceremony.  “As husband and wife we walked away to All My Love by Led Zeppelin!”

In the afternoon they had giant lawn games, like Jenga, Connect 4 and chess.  Don’t they make for such fun pictures of your guests – especially loving the giant Jenga photos!

What an incredible view there is from Beechenhill Farm – a backdrop like none other!

To decorate the rest of the venue, Lucy and Jon bought buckets of locally grown flowers from Freedom Flowers, a flower farm just a couple of miles from Beechenhill Farm.  Lucy then used vases sourced from her family, and her mum and sister arranged the flowers.

Lucy also used twine and small wooden pegs to decorate the barn with photographs of her and Jon over the five years they had been together.  They also displayed a large blackboard for their table plan.

Lucy and Jon chose to name their tables after places they’d visited in Canada – a country they’d spent several weeks travelling around and fell in love with.

“My mum spent many hours hand sewing the bunting and hessian table runners which set the theme for the day brilliantly.  I also bought some plain wooden hearts and handpainted them in red with white polka dots, and used these as place settings.”

“The teapot was used as a novel guestbook – I provided guests with porcelain pens to write messages on the teapot.  Now every time we have a pot of tea on a Sunday morning we’re reminded of our special day!”

The buckets of flowers on the tables had blackboard hearts for the table names, which were a second hand purchase from Ebay.  I love this idea – so simple but really pretty and fun with the mini  blackboards.

Their wedding meal was an incredible feast of locally sourced lamb served at banquet style tables.  “Our caterer was Colin from LoveFood, he was amazing and created food that was all locally sourced – the lamb was from a farm in the next village!  He provides a service where the food is served to the table in large sharing platters so people can take what they like, and it encourages guests to interact over food.  The food was delicious!”

In each person’s place was a jar of homemade jam.  “I handmade all the favours, which were individual jars of jam using strawberries and rhubarb from our allotment.”  So dinky and how lovely that they are from fruit from their allotment.

In the evening they had a ceilidh band and munched on an incredible looking Malteser wedding cake!  “My step-father made our fantastic chocolate Malteser cake, and with the help of my sister and sister-in-law I produced the cupcakes.”

“It was a brilliant day and we owe it all to the help and support of our family and friends.”

What a wonderful day Lucy and Jon had, and with such incredible support and input from family and friends – I do so love weddings like this where the people you care about the most have helped create this most special of days.  Wishing Lucy and Jon every happiness in the future, and huge thank you to Timm Cleasby Photography who shared the photos with us.

Timm Cleasby Photography is husband and wife duo Timm and Sam based in Sheffield.  Timm is an international photographer with a creative, original style blending the emotions and honesty of reportage photography with a creative, thoughtful and modern edge.

{ Suppliers }

Photography: Timm Cleasby Photography
Wedding Venue: Beechenhill Farm
Wedding Dress: Jenny Packham from Amy Louise Bridal Gowns
Catering: LoveFood
Bouquets, buttonholes and table buckets: Nadia di Tulio
Venue flowers: Freedom Flowers
Ceilidh band: Roger the Badger