Emily & Joe’s timeless and classic Lulworth Castle wedding, with Linus Moran Photography
There are pooches in every picture, pretty much… which makes Emily & Joe’s day as adorable as any I’ve ever seen. These guys had the most joyful wedding in Dorset, focusing on family, fun, food and booze – and it’s EPIC! Their fabulous images are by our wonderful friend, English Wedding member and Lulworth Castle wedding photographer Linus Moran Photography. Emily is stunning in her gown by Nicola Anne Bridal, and Joe is dashing in an M&S morning suit with navy and gold bowtie.
Enjoy! This wedding is an absolute beauty. With love,
Wedding photographer’s website:
https://www.linusmoranphotography.co.uk/
How did you choose your photographer?
We were very much looking for more natural photos of our day rather than posed and having looked at many different options thought Linus’ photos were beautiful and exactly the style we liked.
Were you pleased with your wedding photographer? Do tell… we love a brilliant review!
Absolutely! We love the photos that Linus took for us, and so do our family and friends. Linus was great in the planning process and we could always get in touch with any questions we had. On the day Linus was brilliant at capturing the most important and special moments but without even noticing he was there, however he was a lovely presence to have around and we would absolutely recommend Linus to any couple wanting natural wedding photos.
Tell us about the moment you saw your wedding photos for the first time?
When we first received our photos, my husband Joe and I opened a bottle of champagne left over from the wedding, put them on the TV and flicked through them just the two of us, chatting the whole way through about all of the amazing memories we made that day. Lots of laughing from us both and crying from me!
The following weekend had a little ‘viewing’ party at our house with our family and friends, we had the cocktails that we had at the wedding and the same wedding playlist was on whilst the photos were on loop on the TV as we all chatted about the wedding.
Wedding venue:
Lulworth Castle, Dorset. My absolute dream venue and couldn’t have been any more special.
Can you describe your wedding in fewer than 10 words?
Our dream day full of family, friends & so much love
Your wedding style or theme:
Traditional but relaxed and romantic & a lot of fun
Where did you find your suppliers? (Blogs, magazines, recommendations?)
Google search! I live in Spain and don’t have any relatives living in Dorset to do ground work for us so relied on lots of online research
What’s your top tip for saving money?
Prioritise the things that the guests will remember. For us, the key things to focus on were the food, booze and music.
I was given a great tip that that our guests weren’t going to remember the small things like what cutlery we used or what the invites looked like so we saved on the smaller details.
Also, we found an amazing band who performed 3 live sets but took it in turns to DJ in between sets as part of the fee so we didn’t need to have another DJ.
… and which elements of your wedding are you glad you spent more on?
The food, booze and music! 6 months later, our friends and family are still talking about how delicious our food was, from the canapes, the wedding breakfast to the evening munchies (pizzas and pasta).
For the white wine we had a taste test with our families at home and chose a nice Spanish white wine which we drove over and a good family friend of ours chose a delicious red wine. We bought a few kegs of Ringwood beer as Joes family are from Ringwood in Hampshire.
As we were driving from Spain we bought all of the spirits for the bar over and stopped off in France on route to pick up a car full of champagne.
Our band were absolutely incredible, we had a sing off, got the whole wedding party crammed onto the stage with the band and partied really really hard!
Where did you buy or source your wedding stationery – or was making it a labour of love?
We bought very basic personalised invites online in Spain and one of my bridesmaids helped me hand embellish each side with gold glitter. It took forever but looked really pretty and we saved on spending on fancy stationery.
Did you fall in love with your wedding dress?
Yes! I first went to look at dresses with my mum and mother-in-law when we were checking out wedding venues and found one that I thought was perfect (the mums did too!). I went back about 8 weeks later with my sister and two bridesmaids and the ladies at the dress shop suggested I have a browse and select a few to try on, having not put dress from before aside. As soon as I put the same dress on the second time I instantly knew it was the dress for me.
Wedding dress designer and bridal boutique:
Nicola Anne Bridal, Brides of Winchester
Tell us about your accessories: jewellery, shoes and anything else!
I don’t wear a lot of jewellery usually and as my dress had a V-neckline I chose not to wear a necklace. I borrowed my mums Chopard LOVE bracelet for the day.
I had some custom Jimmy Choo Romy 85s made in gold glitter with my new initials and a little love heart on the soles.
I also chose a simple but super long veil with tiny swarovski crystals dotted over it for a little extra bling
And what did the groom wear?
Joe, his groomsmen and his dad all wore the same dark navy M&S morning suit. The boys all had the same navy bow tie except for Joe who had a navy and gold bow tie. They looked perfect
Beautiful bridesmaids: what did your best girls wear?
The girls all had the same dress from JJs house, it was a strappy blush pink full length gown with a side split and sequined embellished bodice. Even though all the girls had different styles, shapes etc they all looked absolutely beautiful.
Hair and make-up – did you DIY or hire a professional?
We had an excellent hair and make up artist called Shelley Gordon. I loved her style and she delivered amazing, relaxed and natural looking results.
Describe your wedding flowers. Who arranged them for you? (florist details would be lovely please)
Christine at Floral Arts Dorset arranged the most beautiful flowers for our wedding. We had another florist booked who let us down really last minute but it must have happened for a reason as Christine was so lovely and really bought our dream flowers to life. We had big blowsy displays with pale pinks, whites and pale green foliage like eucalyptus. We had David Austin roses, spray roses, lots of gyp and lots of other beautiful flowers (that I can’t remember the names of).
General styling – did your venue need much decoration?
The castle was so beautiful that we really didn’t feel it needed a lot of added decoration. I was sure that I wanted candles absolutely everywhere and as many flowers as we could afford in our budget but that was about it for decorations.
Crafts and makes – tell us about any homemade elements of your wedding… did you enjoy them?
We spent quite a lot of time on crafty home made bits to make the wedding a little more personal.
We asked all of our family and friends to save all jam jars etc that they had in the year leading up the wedding. We had hundreds by the time of the wedding, decorated them with glitter and used them as candle holders that covered the castle.
We made personalised name places by collecting stones from our dog walks on our local beach, putting a bit of gold glitter on one end and hand writing their names onto them.
We also ‘pimped up’ flip flops for the ladies so they could dance all night. We bought plain white flip flops and covered the Y bit in (you guessed it) gold glitter and adding a little pink bow to each of them.
The save the dates, wedding invites and thank you cards were all crafted.
The wedding cake: what kind of cake did you choose and why?
Joes’ Aunty is an incredible cake maker and for our wedding present made our wedding cake.
We chose to have a 3 tier caked with Victoria sponge, chocolate and coffee and walnut layers. Joe is the bigger cake fan out of the two of us and these are his favourites.
Entertainment: any musical recommendations, surprises or treats?
We had a beautiful pianist to play before and through our wedding service and reception. His name was Joe Pike and the music he played was absolutely perfect for setting the mood.
We had a chosen playlist on the PA for the first half of our wedding breakfast and an acoustic guitar and singer for the second half of the meal (they were part of the band), these guys were fantastic and got the whole wedding party dancing and singing by the time desert was served.
In the evening we had the most incredible band called Gentlemen of the Road who played a variety of different styles of music and the dance floor was never empty.
We also had an open wedding photo booth which we hired from One Booth through our photographer Linus and it was such a massive hit. There was always a queue!!
Words of wisdom: share your best piece of advice for other couples:
Always try and remember what is important to you as a couple and focus on that! This is most likely the only day in your lives you will have all of your family and closest friends under one roof so make the most of enjoying every moment of that. Also, don’t sweat the small stuff on the day of the wedding, no one will notice the little details that weren’t exactly as you wanted them.
What’s the best thing about being married?
The feeling that both of our families are one big family.
Favourite supplier web links for other brides and grooms:
https://bridesofwinchester.co.uk
https://www.linusmoranphotography.co.uk
http://www.makeupbyshelley.co.uk
https://www.floral-arts.org
https://www.bealesgourmet.com
https://www.gentlemenoftheroadband.co.uk
https://www.ringwoodbrewery.co.uk
https://www.joepikemusic.com
https://www.lulworth.com/weddings-home
1 Comment
Marc · May 22, 2020 at 3:20 pm
Simply exquisite!