The Village Hall - a hidden gem.

Neil and I have photographed weddings in all sorts of locations, hotels large and small, marquees and village halls.

Out of these, the most versatile and budget friendly has to be the village or civic hall. One of our HWP brides for 2017 was recently dismayed to receive the total cost for her chosen venue, and asked me if I knew of anywhere that might be more within her budget. I began to think about village hall receptions we have photographed, and thought about the Civic Hall at Uppermill, Saddleworth. http://saddleworthparishcouncil.org.uk/civic-hall/

These type of venues are a great option for the cost- savvy bride - the fee tends to be much cheaper than a hotel, you can put your own stamp on the venue with customised table and room decorations, get your own caterers in, and even provide your own booze. In addition to this, in halls where there is a bar, the prices tend to be very reasonable.

As you can see from our HWP photos, our bride Joanne did a fabulous job of customising the room at Saddleworth with so many beautiful personal touches. Gorgeous!

Mad Hatter's Tea Party Wedding theme.

So, as promised, here are some pictures from the amazingly creative Vix's wedding - www.accidentalvix.co.uk - with her Mad Hatter's Tea Party theme. Felt teapot flowers, personalised cups and saucers, tea bags, felt biscuits and the fabulous table plan. Tres magnifique !

Where there is tea there is hope.

Ok, so this post is entirely and unashamedly inspired by one of our brides-to-be, Hayley (from across t'road.)  Indeed, the title of this post comes from a recent tatoo of Hayley's (and before that from Pinero, I think, Hayley?)

The quote got me thinking about a wedding which we were guests at a few years ago. The bride, Vix had such a fantastic and original idea for her decorations. The theme was Mad Hatter's Tea Party, and she decided to name her tables after different types of tea (Earl Grey, Darjeeling etc).

As centre pieces Vix customised tea pots with felt flowers, and for favours she customised mugs with handmade teabags to put mints in. The labels on the tea bags served as name places and also came with felt magnet biscuits (www.accidentalvix.co.uk). Just fabulous. (Photos to follow)

Oh my goodness, it has actually been 10 months since I last blogged! Soooo many things to write about.

My neighbour Hayley has recently got engaged and is currently planning the wedding. This has inspired me to get the ol' wedding planner file out and, together with the oodles of fantastic ideas I have observed when photographing weddings with the very talented Neil Herke, inspire brides on a budget.

As a wedding photographer (one half of Herke Wedding Photography), I am in a position to see so many lovely ideas for weddings, and I would love to share some of them with you brides to be. I often wish I was getting married again, just so I could carry out some of the lovely ideas I have seen at my own wedding all over again.

Next best thing is to live vicariously through all you gorgeous brides to be and try and impart some of my vast knowledge and experience of wedding planning on a budget.

Lucy and Nigel's lovely room.

Well, it's been a while since I last had time to blog. As promised, I was going to share with you some of our May bride, Lucy's fabulous decoration ideas.

For wedding favours, Lucy had filled glass jars with sweets. The jars also contained a reminder of the guest's menu choice (fabulous idea, I can never remember what I've chosen!) There were also wine glass charms in different designs for the guests to take home.

The whole room just looked like a fairytale, from the cake, to the tall glass vases on the tables, the bird cage for the cards and the table plan. Officially the prettiest room I've ever seen!

The bouquets were designed and made by the bride's mother-in-law and were absolutely stunning. I loved the button detail, gorgeous.

There are so many great ideas around for table decorations and wedding favours at the moment. Jaime and Charlie used the very popular vintage theme for their table decorations, incorporating Beatrix Potter's Peter Rabbit for the place cards (well, we were in the lakes!). The wedding favours were little chocolate pebbles wrapped in tule and sitting in lovely hand crocheted baskets (made by Gaby). The groom's father made some beautiful jams for wedding favours which really tied in well with the whole countryside/ vintage theme. The table was dotted with origami swans which were a big hit with the children.

Each table's name was a song or song lyric special to the couple (great idea!) and etched into a wooden sign (etsy.com I think.)

The flowers for the centrepieces were so creative and were a mixture of fresh and paper flowers, something I've never come across before but which really did look stunning.
The whole room just looked so lovely, and there were some really thoughtful personal touches such as bunting made by the very talented chief bridesmaid.

Finishing the room off was the cake (by Lenka at Skrumptious Cakes) which looked absolutely stunning and tasted amazing too.