Blog

Izzy

‘Grow the Love’ with these beautiful ideas for incorporating living flowers and plants into your wedding from Wedding in a Teacup

Izzy

Today Hester from Wedding in a Teacup tells us about how to use living potted plants and greenery in weddings, rather than cut flowers. With some super helpful tips, it’s a must-read for any brides-to-be looking for quirky eco-chic ideas.

Over to Hester…

We love the idea of living flowers and greenery at a wedding. They look natural and informal and are a great way to add practical decoration, but more than that – there’s something about having something living on your day that is so wholly positive!

We like tables named after love-in-the-mist or sage, with pots and gardeners labels to mark them; tiny flower pots doubling as place markers and favours (check out our personalised labels created with these in mind); and an apple crate of herbs or flowers as a luscious table plan holder.

Izzy

A stunning jewel toned wedding cake with edible flowers, petals and berries for a rustic autumn wedding

Izzy

Today we have a mouth-watering guest post from P-J Parker of Emily Harmston Cakes, with a gorgeous autumn inspired wedding cake that features such beautiful rich purple colours. When we first saw these cakes we fell in-love with the use of edible flowers and petals – why not take a look for yourself?

Don’t forget we have a regular feature on wedding cakes called Cake Love, so do check out the link if you are after more wedding cake inspiration.

Over to P-J to tell us more about these stunning creations…

We have just seen the end of a glorious English summer but it brings an abundance of our beautiful berries that rival any array of the fruits that are imported. The colours and choice are breath-taking; it’s almost as if all summer long the sun has become concentrated to give the sumptuous jewel colours inside our blackberries, blueberries, redcurrants, blackcurrants and damsons.

I really wanted to capture the beauty of this season. The three tiered cake I made here incorporates two white chocolate and raspberry cake tiers at the top and bottom with a double layer of blackberry and raspberry cheesecake in the middle. All topped off with fresh edible Dahlias and handcrafted blackcurrants lollipops.

Izzy

Make your own edible flower wedding favours from flowerpot muffins to floral marshmallows and petal studded chocolates

Izzy

Today we have a great post from Jan of Maddocks Farm Organics with some great tips on how to create your own wedding favours using edible flowers. There are some truly beautiful ideas that are sure to inspire you to create some fab homemade wedding favours.

Over to Jan to tell us how to create these beauties…

Whilst increasingly popular, wedding favours are yet another expense and can be very pricey if they are not to look cheap and tacky.

An easy way around this is to make your own. Not only do they look much nicer but they also add a personal touch and can be a fraction of the price of commercial alternatives. Here are a few suggestions which are all very straight forward to make so it is job that could be delegate to the future mother-in-law or chief bridesmaid!

Flowerpot Muffins

These are a sweet idea for a rustic themed garden wedding. I used a classic Mary Berry recipe (you can’t improve on Mary perfection!) but any good quality chocolate cake recipe will do or you could use a rich chocolate mousse if you prefer. The mini silicone flower pots are available from Lakeland and other online retailers.

The choice of edible flower is important if you want the ‘plants’ to hold well. Tagetes and Dianthus are particularly good for this but cornflowers also work if you add them at the last minute. We also used springs of rosemary to add to the foliage.

Floral Marshmallows

Marshmallows make a lovely wedding favour and running some edible flower petals through the mix ensures that they are as individual as your wedding.

Izzy

Alison and Rama’s back garden Bedouin tent wedding with a dash of English country charm and a bohemian bride

Izzy

Back garden bedouin tent wedding

What a treat we have for you today with another beautiful real wedding – this time with a bit of twist. Usually weddings are submitted to us by the bride or her wedding photographer, but today’s pretty Somerset wedding was sent to us by wedding stylist Kirsten who runs The Little Wedding Helper.

The bride and groom – Alison and Rama – had a down-to-earth wedding held in their garden full of bohemian styling, Moroccan lanterns, and a dash of English country charm. The couple decided not to have a wedding photographer, but lucky for us they allowed Kirsten to bring along her own photographer to capture some of their day and gorgeous details.

One of my favourite parts of Alison and Rama’s wedding is that guests were invited to bring flowers rather than gifts, which were then used to create the table decorations – what a lovely idea and one that created a vibrant palette of colour that really complements the Bohemian feel of their wedding.

So it’s over to Kirsten to tell you about Alison and Rama’s wedding and how she helped style it…

Izzy

Win wedding prizes worth over £1000 with the White Memoirs Vintage Wedding Fayre competition!

Izzy

*This competition is now closed 12:00 04/10/13*

Earlier this month we shared details of the fabulous upcoming White Memoirs Vintage Wedding Fayre that is being held in Cheshire on Sunday 6th October 2013. With entry to the fayre free, if you’re a bride-to-be and planning to go then make sure you enter to win one of 25 goody bags we’ve got to give away.

Today we’ve got an incredible competition in which you could win a bundle of fantastic wedding prizes worth over £1,000! Read on to find out what you could win and how to enter…

A free engagement shoot from Dotmoxee Photography is just one of the fab prizes!

The wonderful White Memoirs Vintage Wedding Fayre exhibitors have put together a fantastic giveaway of prizes worth over £1,000 for one lucky bride to win! If the date is in your diary or you were thinking about visiting this lovely wedding fair, then don’t miss this opportunity to win all of the following – yes, just one lucky bride will walk away with all of this…

Izzy

Get a free goody bag at White Memoirs Vintage Wedding Fair in Cheshire on Sunday 6th October 2013

Izzy

Here at The Natural Wedding Company we are delighted to tell all you brides-to-be that White Memoirs Vintage Wedding Fair is returning to Cheshire on October 6th 2013. This autumn wedding fair promises to be a ‘whimsical wedding wonderland designed for the vintage inspired modern bride’, and we’ve got the opportunity for you to win one of 25 goody bags – more details below!

Held at the beautiful “Festival Hall” a 1920’s ballroom in Alderley Edge, this new venue for White Memoirs Vintage Wedding Fair will host host 25 independent bridal suppliers from across Manchester and Cheshire, who specialise in providing services and products with a twist on tradition.

Coming up later in the month we will be hosting the White Memoirs Vintage Wedding Fair competition (here’s details of the last one we ran), where one lucky bride-to-be will win a bundle of fab wedding prizes – so put Wednesday 25th September in your diary and be sure to check the blog that day to find out how you can enter.

Today though, White Memoirs Vintage Wedding Fair has 25 goody bags to give away to 25 lucky readers of The Natural Wedding Company blog. Find out how you could win one below.

Izzy

Jaime and Dave’s relaxed spring wedding with lawn games, a seasonal bouquet and Scottish kilts

Izzy

Relaxed spring wedding

Today we are sharing Jaime and Dave’s gorgeous spring wedding in Hampshire. Fans of the outdoors, Jaime and Dave wanted their wedding to reflect the natural beauty of the gardens at Taplins Place in Hartley Wintney where they held their ceremony and reception.

Guests were entertained with giant lawn games, a coconut shy, a ‘hook-a-duck’ stall and homemade ‘Fruits of the Forest’ gin. With a wedding cake made of cheese and the relaxed ‘fete’ feel to the wedding, Jaime and Dave were able to make their wedding truly about them – nature and garden lovers.

– Izzy x

Now over to Jaime to share their beautiful wedding day with you…

Jaime and Dave got married in May this year, I love the reason why Jaime and Dave chose May for their wedding and honeymoon, “As we grow our own veg, we knew that we didn’t want to leave too much work to Dave’s Dad and his wife, who were looking after the house, our dogs and our garden. So I guess you can say that our vegetable dictated when we got married!”

Izzy

Sarah and Sam’s old fashioned country village wedding with a pretty garden party reception on a shoestring

Izzy

Old fashioned country village wedding

I’m thrilled to be sharing another exclusive real wedding with you on the blog today – a gorgeous June wedding set amongst stunning North Yorkshire countryside. The bride Sarah, was one of the lovely girls who joined me for my TNWC 5th Birthday Party last April, so it’s especially lovely to share her wedding after hearing about their plans last spring.

For anyone planning a wedding on a ‘shoestring’ then this wedding is for you – as Sarah mentions later on, they took ideas they saw and worked out how they make it themselves. It’s a real DIY wedding on a budget, but a totally beautiful one.

Over to Sarah to tell you all about her beautiful wedding to Sam…

Sarah and her husband Sam chose the 23rd June 2012 to get married, “because it was the Saturday closest to the midsummer solstice and there’s an old English tradition of weddings on that day. We wanted an old-fashioned country wedding with an informal feel, and we tried to make everything homemade if it possibly could be.”

“The week before the wedding was a crazy whirl of preparations because it was such a DIY affair. Luckily we had a fantastic team of family, friends and neighbours who worked tirelessly to finish preparing the food and decorations.”

Izzy

Holly and Laurie’s English picnic wedding in Shropshire with country garden flowers and handmade details

Izzy

English picnic wedding

I have got some truly lovely exclusive real weddings coming up for you on the blog, so I do hope you’ll check back over the coming weeks to soak up all the wonderful inspiration these brides and grooms have to share.

Today’s real wedding is beautiful. I feel like I’ve got to know bride Holly over the past year or so as she emailed me a couple of times in the lead up to her wedding – not only was she inspired by my own wedding stationery, but she also won her wedding photography via a competition that I’d promoted on the blog!

Holly and Laurie got married in Shropshire on the 15th of September 2012 with a wedding ceremony held at Ludlow Castle, and followed up by a picnic wedding reception at Henley Farmhouse on the Acton Scott Estate.

Over to Holly to tell us all about their wonderful day…

“We both just wanted a really relaxed wedding where all our guests could just have fun. We wanted a day that was personal to us – we didn’t have a huge budget so we knew from the start that we would probably be doing lots of the work ourselves – with the help of our friends and family.”

“We actually found searching for a venue one of the most stressful parts of planning, we were looking for a blank canvas without lists of suppliers we had to use and we didn’t have lots of money to spend so we struggled to find somewhere. I grew up in Shropshire and loved the idea of a Shropshire country wedding.”

Author: Izzy

Blog

Flowerpot Muffins

Floral Marshmallows

Back garden bedouin tent wedding

Relaxed spring wedding

Old fashioned country village wedding

English picnic wedding