If you’re thinking of end of summer – early autumn as the time of year you’d like to get married, this beautiful late summer sustainable wedding shoot is full of inspiration to get you started.
A great team of local (to Essex) wedding suppliers, all with a passion to run their businesses more sustainably, got together to inspire couples with their creativity, skills and offerings. Set at Barnfield wedding venue in the Essex countryside, the shoot showcases stunning seasonal florals, a spectacular ceremony backdrop, eco wedding dresses, plantable stationery, a sand ceremony, and more.
You’ll find a full list of suppliers and links at the bottom of the feature, as well as a photo gallery.
Choose seasonal British flowers for your Summer Wedding
It’s British Flowers Week 2024 and I am hoping to inspire you throughout this week to choose seasonal British flowers for your wedding – whatever the season (yes, even Winter!).
Yesterday I featured Seasonal British Spring Wedding Flowers, and today I’ll be showcasing the best of British flowers for a Summer Wedding. For the purpose of this feature, Summer is consider June, July and August.
All of the wedding bouquets and floral arrangements you see created from British flowers. They come in all shades of colour, and lots of different styles. There’s loads of choice of blooms, plus beautiful grasses and foliage.
Don’t forget to check out the Wedding Flowers category of our eco wedding directory to find our recommended suppliers.
Why should you choose seasonal British summer wedding flowers?
Tread lightly on the planet – flowers are grown mainly outdoors without need for additional light and heat; no chemicals needed to extend the flowers life once cut; and the flower farmers care and enrich the soil and land they grow on.
Reduce flower miles – flowers grown in the UK travel much shorter distances than those coming from abroad by boat or plane, some coming from as far as South America, Africa and Asia.
Character and charm – British flower farmers grow small quantities of lots of different varieties, and sometimes that aren’t uniformly straight, but this gives interest and uniqueness to the arrangements they create.
Buy local – support your local economy and community!
Bring the outdoors in – seasonal flowers really capture a moment in the British seasonal year and for a wedding I think that’s pretty special.
Because you’re a flower lover – this is about a love for flowers that look AND smell divine, something you will struggle to find in the commercial flower supply chain.
Important things to remember about seasonal British summer wedding flowers
Each of the bouquets and arrangements featured comes from a flower farmer or florist from all over the UK. It’s important to remember that different places will have different flowers available in season – what’s growing in Cornwall in summer will be different to what’s growing in Scotland.
There are also seasonal variations year to year depending on the weather. When choosing British flowers you need to release some of your expectations and be open to going with whatever is blooming best when you get married.
When is comes to sustainable, eco-friendly weddings I always look to the seasons and the place where a wedding is to take place. This beautiful wild Welsh wedding shoot organised by Ness of TogetherNess Weddings does exactly that – she was inspired by the hedgerows and meadows in June for this wild Welsh summer wedding inspiration shoot.
“With local and seasonal in mind, I took my inspiration from hedgerows in June hoping to create a sense of hazy summer moments mixed with the bright pinks of our native flowers at this time of year. I hoped to highlight the simple yet exceptional beauty that can be created by combining the talent of local artisan business’s with what our doorstep nature has to offer.”
This wild Welsh summer wedding inspiration shoot is full of foxgloves, ferns, and natural fabrics set against a backdrop of a whitewashed chapel and a meal in a meadow.
Ness used her expert styling skills and collaborated with a small team of talented Welsh wedding suppliers and artisans to create this beautiful wedding shoot. I hope it encourages you to look to the place and season in which you are getting married for inspiration.
TogetherNess Weddings is a Recommended Supplier of The Natural Wedding Company directory. Find out more about them here.
A beautiful garden tipi wedding to end the year with, complete with a bride who rode in on her horse. It was my childhood wedding dream, to ride to my wedding on a grey horse, so it seems fitting to finish the year like this.
This year has been a bit all over the place, mainly due to the arrival of my second daughter in the summer. Any mums running their own business will know the challenges a new baby brings. Next year our family has exciting, possibly life changing, plans, which I will share when the time is right. I am looking forward to what the new year will bring, both personally and for The Natural Wedding Company.
I hope you have had a wonderful Christmas and all our best wishes for next year. Snuggle up with a festive drink and some chocolate and enjoy this beautiful garden tipi wedding. Over to Katie to tell us all about their wedding…
Today we are looking at our Favourite Natural Seasonal Weddings in the sixth part of our Real Wedding Favourites series. You can find all the previous posts here or individual links at the bottom of this post – they are full of wedding inspiration!
We like to champion seasonal weddings so it’s been fun looking back through our archives for some spectacular seasonal weddings to share. There are so many we could have chosen, but we’ve chosen six of our favourites to feature here. You’ll notice we haven’t featured any winter weddings in this post as we haven’t really featured any yet.
Caroline and Gareth’s spring wedding on their farm holds a soft spot for me because they got married at the end of May, just like I did. This time of year is one of my favourites, and their wedding captures spring in the countryside, with cow parsley and a lovely palette of pastels pinks and purples.
They used seasonal flowers for the bouquets, aisle decorations, and I love the little pots of cowslips displaying the table names – all named after cows as they live on a working dairy farm. The whole feel of their wedding is so reflective of an English spring, making it my favourite spring wedding that we’ve featured.
Charlie’s favourite spring wedding is Caroline and Gareth’s spring wedding on their farm (part one and part two). Photography by Milestones Photography.
What a lovely treat we have for you today – the elegant eco garden wedding of our colleague Joanna. She’s been busy writing up the beautiful real weddings we get sent to be featured, but today we are taking a look at her own stunning wedding.
Think bouquets of coral peonies and blue delphiniums, a riverside marquee, and a steel pan band for this elegant eco garden wedding. Lots of thought went into taking care of their guests, from an ice cream van to wood-fired pizzas in the evening. Together with their family and friends, Joanna and Dan put lots of love into their wedding, keeping it eco-friendly in the most elegant way.
Over to Joanna to tell us more about their beautiful and elegant eco garden wedding…
It certainly feels as though Spring has sprung, and what better way to celebrate but with a gloriously sunny, cheerful and laid back village wedding.
Charli and Sam’s special day has an authentically wholesome vibe to it. Just looking at these beautiful photographs by Freckle Photography you get the sense that their day was true to them. While their ‘official’ nuptials took place in the edifying surrounds of historical Bath, their outdoor ceremony and marquee celebrations were set in the village Charli grew up in.
The couple’s decisions typify the quintessential natural English wedding: hay bales, locally sourced wildflowers and homemade bunting, and it really is lovely. Emma of Freckle Photography, one of our recommended suppliers, has captured the happiness of their day perfectly. Let’s chat to bride Charli to find out more…
This week’s Real Wedding is delicately rustic, pretty and full of pastel florals and sprigs of gypsophila. Set on a beautifully sunny July day at Pimhill Barn in the fields of rural Shropshire, Nikki and Ben focused their plans around their extraordinary venue. They chose handmade signage and cut log decor to complement the 16th Century vaulted ceilings of the barn.
Nikki and Ben decided upon Amy Taylor Imaging Photography to capture the best day of their lives, a photographer from our eco wedding directory whose photographs we always enjoy. You can see other weddings from photographer Amy that we’ve featured here.
Bride Nikki caught up with us to give us the inside knowledge on the couple’s planning and ideas for their rustic Pimhill Barn wedding…
Poppy and Mark’s colourful meadow festival wedding in Wales is not only full of inspiration and pretty details, but it just oozes love and fun. It’s a beautiful example of a British summer wedding at it’s best, with hay bale seating, sunflower yellow bridesmaid dresses, and romantic meadow photos.
“We met our wonderful photographers, Michael and Andrea of Bohemian Weddings, at a friend’s wedding the previous year (Lizzy and Graeme had found them by contacting The Natural Wedding Company after being let down last minute).
We wanted to capture the feel of the day rather than have hours of posed photographs, and as we’d seen them previously we knew they would be perfect. It felt like having friends take our photos rather than official photographers, and their friendliness and ease spread to all the guests throughout the day.”
Over to Poppy to tell us more about their colourful meadow festival wedding…
Raw brick walls and cobbled floors are brought to life and serve as a rustic backdrop in this week’s real wedding. Vickie and Liam’s beautiful rustic country barn wedding is simple, elegant and stylish.
With twinkling fairy lights, jam jar candles and shining glassware, the burlap table runners and bunches of dried lavender help marry together the rustic surroundings and elegance of the wedding.
Vickie and Liam got married at the beautiful Halstead House, which is set in the grounds of a working farm, and chose Sarah Brittain Edwards, a TNWC recommended supplier, to capture their day. We caught up with Vickie who told us all about how they found the venue and what inspired their plans…
Charlie
