Wedding: Dress, Suits + Bridesmaids

In today’s blog post I wanted to quickly run through all of the clothing on our wedding day! From my dress, to grooms suits, to bridesmaids outfits and accesories!

Dress: In June 2021 I had a day dedicated to wedding dress shopping with my mum and I had four appointments booked around London (see this video and reel to see the dresses I tried on!). Our final appointment of the day was at Catherine Deane’s London Showroom in Wapping, which happened to be a minute’s walk from mine and G’s first home together in an area of London we both adore. Catherine Deane specialise in very simple but beautiful dresses and separates so you can mix and match to really find something to suit you. What ended up being my wedding dress was on a mannequin at the front of the store and as soon as I walked in and saw it I ‘wow-ed’ and had to try it on. As soon as I put it on with a veil I knew it was the one. I felt so beautiful and feminine with it’s beading, sequins, glitter and champagne colouring. It needed a lot of altering – mainly the length and straps, and so Catherine Deane recommended the Alterations Boutique in Fitzrovia that I visited over three appointments to get it altered!

Evening Dress: After deciding that we wanted to do a Lindy hop routine for our first dance three months before the wedding, I realised I needed to find a shorter dress for the evening. I had so many sleepless nights over this as I couldn’t find anything suitable that I felt confident in! I had seen this gorgeous Mademoiselle dress from Bronx and Banco on Pinterest in my search and originally put it off because it was over my budget and also not easily available in the UK being an Australian brand. But I took a whim and ordered it from Neiman Marcus and it arrived a month before the big day. It was perfect and despite a problem with the alterers a couple of weeks before (they cut the dress instead of taking it up at the seams leaving it far too short), I still wore it and just had to buy some shorts to wear underneath.

My Shoes: I had such a specific criteria for my wedding shoes that I really struggled to find (platforms weren’t ‘in’ back in 2021 when I was looking for them), but I knew I wanted a gold or red platform shoe (to give me height and comfort) with a bow on the toe in homage to my mum’s wedding shoes! I couldn’t get my dress altered until I had found my shoe so it was important to find them with lots of time before the wedding, but I stumbled upon the brand Loeffler Randall, found their Natalia Pleated Bow Heel and fell in love! They were over my budget at around £400, but I reasoned I wouldn’t need to buy another pair of heels again as they’re my dream party shoes! They were so comfy throughout the day and gave me that much needed height against my 6’3” husband!

In the evening I swapped into white converse to do our first dance, and was having so much fun on the dance floor that I forgot to put my heels back on! Something I do regret but I didn’t want to leave the party to change them!

Jewellery: I decided to wear no jewellery on the day apart from Helix and Conch earrings and my engagement ring. Helix and Conch is one of my favourite brands and small businesses to support and their owner Abbie, offers an ‘ear design service’ where you can give her a brief, pictures of your ears, your budget and favourite styles and she will put together an ‘ear piercing styling’ design for you! She was SO helpful in helping me choose which of her styles to wear for my big day and so I wore entirely rose gold earrings to match my wedding + engagement ring and I couldn’t have been happier with how sparkly and gorgeous my ears looked on the day!

Bridesmaids Dresses:

I had 7 bridesmaids + a bridesman – consisting of my sister and my closest, oldest friends and I wanted them all to feel beautiful, comfortable and confident on the day. I decided on a colour theme of dusky blues and navy’s for their outfits and hosted a dress try on day at my house back in November where we drank Prosecco and they tried on all the dresses in a little catwalk and chose the dress they liked most! Some of the girls wanted to wear suits but couldn’t find any on the highstreet that suited them so dresses it was! I also gifted them a pair of Helix and Conch or Estella Bartlett earrings on the morning of the wedding that some of them wore on the day!

Grooms Suits:

We struggled with finding the groomsmen’s suits; we had a couple of different appointments at a small business suit makers in Carnaby Street and also some more high-street suit makers (Moss Bro’s – in which the service wasn’t fab!) we ended up booking an appointment at Jack Bunnies in Upminster. This proved a success and G found his suit and the outfits for the grooms party too. His suit was a 1920’s checked navy with champagne accents which, whilst out of his usual comfort zone, he felt great in! The groomsmen wore a waistcoat with the same print and the Dads wore a tie with the same print, so they all had hints of G’s suit in theirs. G bought them all a little tie pin and a pocket watch to wear on the day too as gifts!