Real Wedding at Nooitgedacht {Kirsty & Ian}

Today’s wedding is just what I’m in the mood for. It’s full to the brim of prettiness and thoughtful vintage details that make me feel like I’m unwrapping a box of chocolates. Kirsty and Ian created a sense of warmth and romance with elements like lace, roses and candlelight, and made sure they added plenty of personal touches. I think the results are gorgeous, and Nikki Meyer’s beautiful pictures are just the right mix of classic and contemporary. I’m also really impressed at how versatile Nooitgedacht is (just look at how different it looked for the last wedding we showcased from this venue!). Thanks to Kirsty and Ian for sharing their wedding with us, and congratulations again!

From Kirsty:
Ian and I met working together in Cape Town. He already had plans to relocate to the UK, but by the time it came for him to leave we were inseparable and it was no longer an easy decision! I eventually joined him, and a few months later he proposed in Bath. We were on a walk, and when we arrived at a beautiful gothic bridge, Ian took my hand, got down on his knee and asked me to marry him! One of the happiest moments of our lives! We both love spending time together, and know that we are truly blessed to have one another in our lives. 

We wanted our wedding day to be a timeless affair, filled with old romance, and with a very vintage look and feel. When thinking up ideas to fit the theme the following words came to mind: lace, roses, soft colours, candelabras, porcelain teacups, pearls, birdcages and vintage suitcases – our ideas for the day evolved from here.

For our colour scheme, we opted to use soft colours to enhance the romantic vintage feel. Our final colour palette was baby pink, ivory, mocha and gold. Our bridesmaids wore mocha coloured dresses, with the groomsmen wearing vintage braces, black suits and mocha ties (to match the bridesmaids’ dresses). My wedding dress was ivory with a mocha lace. The accents of pink were brought in with the flower arrangements, and the gold was brought in with the décor pieces – gold candelabras on the table, plus gold containers for the flower arrangements. The tablecloths were a gorgeous mocha and ivory with a vintage pattern. The venue itself had a lot of wood in the ceiling which fitted beautifully, and was a perfect backdrop for the mocha and crystal chandelier. To go with the vintage theme we decided to give all of the ladies a brooch as a little thank-you gift. These were packaged in ivory coloured gift boxes, and decorated with a mocha/chocolate colour rose and feathers. For the guys we got Montecristo cigars, which we tied with ribbon. 

My maid of honour is a graphic designer, and she designed all our wedding stationery. The front of our invitation said ‘Love Story’ – the idea was to design the invite as an old book. Our ‘bookmark’ within the invitation contained the directions to the venue. This concept was also followed through to our order of service.

We tried to include lots of fun, vintage touches. After the ceremony, we served home-made ginger beer in little bottles with different coloured pink straws, which were tied with vintage ribbon. We used vintage suitcases as our gift table, with an old wrought iron bird cage for any gift envelopes. We also hung family wedding photos in sepia for guests to look at whilst having snacks and drinks. For our guestbook, we used an old typewriter and asked friends and family to leave messages of love and advice for us, on a table at the back of the wedding reception. Behind this table we created a photo display with sepia photos of Ian and I over the years.

The best part of our wedding for us was being surrounded by so many of our special family and friends, who came from all over the globe. A real honour! We loved our wedding ceremony; from walking down the aisle seeing all the smiling faces of our friends and family, to the sincere and beautiful ceremony conducted by our minster. We also loved our fabulous DJ, fantastic food provided by Nooitgedacht, and all our party-loving friends and family who made it a night to remember! Even playing Britney Spears couldn’t get everyone off the dance floor at the end of the evening!

Kirsty’s advice for future brides:

• Choose your service providers wisely! Everyone we worked with was great, which made pulling the day together a success despite planning everything from overseas. Phew ;) 
• Choose your venue as soon as possible, as it is much easier to start conceptualising everything for the big day once this is done.
• Take many moments to enjoy this once in a lifetime experience!

Service providers:

Venue & catering: Nooitgedacht
Décor and flowers: Leipzig
Photography: Nikki Meyer
Stationery: Annie Klintworth
Cake: Wade’s Cakes
Makeup: Iza Cloete
Music: Musaic
DJ: Capricorn Music