Today’s real wedding is a BEAUTY and we LOVE all the stunning photos of gorgeous couple Lisa & Chris. They celebrated at Dodmoor House and chose one of our fave UK wedding photographers Hannah Hall to capture their day!

Keep reading for supplier reviews and recommendations, and to read all about this magical, colourful, bursting-with-joy wedding! (Lots more pics coming soon on our insta – follow @englishweddingblog)

Wedding photographer’s website

Hannah Hall Photography – https://hannahhallphotography.co.uk

Wedding photographer review

From the moment we found Hannah’s website we knew she was the photographer for us.

Her photographs and style were everything we were looking for, as we both hated overly posed photographs and wanted someone to be able to document the day for us to look back and remember the moments from. Hannah herself was the calming drive we needed on our wedding day.

She made us both feel at ease, and you could find her helping out with various things throughout the day. She had us in fits of laughter, and we felt so comfortable and confident around her.

Throughout the day she was fantastic at making things happen, getting our group shots, and incredible photos of our loved ones. She even managed to tame our feral 3-year-old daughter, and Hannah got fantastic photographs of her by sticking a stuffed hedgehog toy on her head… Our photographs were everything we hoped for, and more. We don’t know how Hannah did it, but she seemed to be everywhere at all points in our wedding, and she managed to capture everyone’s personality perfectly. As two socially awkward people who normally hate photographs, we absolutely love our photos and couldn’t have asked for a better photographer!

Your best moment or memory

Chris – Having both of our children there with us was really special. My son Reuben, aged 12, was one of my best men and gave us both our rings in the ceremony. Our daughter Ivy, aged 3, was a flower girl and seeing her walk down the aisle shouting ‘daddy!’ really made it special.

Lisa – The whole day was amazing, but one of my favourite memories from the day is being on the dancefloor at the end of the night with my niece Charlotte, aged 5, being the last two standing!

Tell us anything you did differently – we love hearing about NEW traditions (or none at all!)

We both wrote each other cards to open on the day of our wedding, and Lisa wrote one to both of the children and her bridesmaids and flower girls. It was lovely to watch everyone open their cards (and shed a tear or two) and reading the cards from each other really made us excited to get married. When it came to our bridal party, Lisa had two maids of honour, and Chris had three best men – one of which was his son. We didn’t feel like those roles just suited one person, as we both had a few people we felt were special to us and we wanted included. When it came to the speeches we didn’t follow the traditional order. Chris isn’t a confident public speaker, so we felt we would rather he enjoy the day than be nervous about making a speech, so instead Lisa decided that she would do the bride’s speech instead! We had the father of the bride, two of Chris’s best men, Lisa’s two maids of honour, and Lisa doing speeches.

Something else non-traditional we did was giving our cake maker and florist full creative control over the cake and flowers – we had no idea what they looked like until the day! We had full trust in our suppliers, and loved what they did, so wanted them to create us something unique.

Venue name + review

Dodmoor House

We couldn’t rave about Dodmoor House enough. From our inital viewing until the end of our wedding day they were absolutely fantastic, and couldn’t have been more helpful. Throughout our planning they were always on hand with friendly advice, and our coordinator on the day ensured everything ran smoothly. The venue itself was absolultely beautiful, with the rustic barns, the gardens, and courtyard – we just knew it was the venue for us.

Tell us a little about your outfits – both of you!

Lisa picked a dress from Confetti and Curves. Being plus-sized she was a little nervous about what styles would suit her, but she wanted something that fitted in with her alternative style and something ‘a little different’. She found a vintage-inspired dress with a beaded and pearl bodice, with a glitter tulle skirt that she fell in love with. Paired with a pair of silver glitter vans, and a pearl tulle bow. Chris wanted something a little more traditional, and opted for grey tails, with superhero cufflinks and socks. Both of our outfits were very us.

Dress or suit shop name + review

Wedding dress: Confetti & Curves – Being plus sized I was so nervous about buying a wedding dress and thought nothing would fit or suit me. I found Confetti and Curves, and was absolutely blown away with the amount of choice and various different styles available. The team were absoultely fantastic in helping me to find a dress that fitted my style, and suggested dresses based on what I was looking for. Suits: Victor Boss – Very friendly and helpful, suits fitted perfectly and were in great condition. They were always on hand to answer any queries and questions, and Chris and his groomsmen were very happy with their choice.

Florist name + review

Boho Blooms – our florist Lucy from Boho Blooms was incredible. We decided we wanted dried flowers for our wedding day, and gave Lucy the brief of bright and colourful. Lucy completely excelled herself with our flowers, creating bouqets for the bridesmaids and Lisa, button holes for the men, wands for the flower girls, as well as decoratations around the venue including an arch for the ceremony, and vases on the tables. All of the flowers were bright and colourful, and exactly what we were looking for.

Cake maker name + review

J Bakes Cakes.

Jodie created our cake for us, and it was incredible. We picked a three tier semi-naked cake, with three different flavours – raspberry and white chocolate, blueberry and lemon, and lemon and elderflower. The cake itself looked beautiful, and Jodie decorated it with coloruful dried flowers to match the rest. We then topped the wedding cake with a cake topper reading ‘I love you 3000’ to fit in with our Marvel theme.

Stationery maker’s name + review

Our friend Andy is a very talented graphic designer, and created all of our stationery for us. We wanted something different that fitted in with our superhero comic book theme, and he created us the most stunning stationery – everyone raved about it!

Any crafty projects or homemade styling touches?

Our wedding was a Marvel superhero theme, and so throughout the styling, we incorporated different superhero touches.

Lisa hand embroidered the table names with Marvel superhero names and designs.

On each table, Lisa also had designed quotes from Marvel films about love.

She also created a comic book for our guests to read when they entered the ceremony about the day, complete with a quiz to see how well our guests knew us!

Lisa’s mum designed and made the flower girls’ dresses. She found fabric to match Lisa’s dress.

Lisa’s mum also decorated jars around the venue to hold tealights and flowers, as well as glass bottles with lights inside for the tables for the wedding breakfast.

We had a few children at our wedding, including our two children and our nine nieces and nephews, so to help keep them entertained Lisa created activity packs for them during the wedding breakfast.

On one of the windowsills in the bar, we had a couple of photos of our loved ones that were no longer with us, it was a lovely tribute to them and felt special to us both.

Wedding readings?

We had two readings, one from Lisa’s mum, Sue, and one from one of Chris’s best men, Jamie. Jamie read All I Ever Really Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten by Robert Fulgham.

First dance song? Playlist recommendations?

Our first dance was Sea of Love by Cat Power. We wanted a song that wasn’t overly mushy, and we both adored the film Juno so used this song from the soundtrack!

Throughout the day we also had a few other songs from the Juno soundtrack playing, and when we walked back down the aisle we played ‘Come and Get Your Love’ by Redbone, from the Guardians of the Galaxy soundtrack to fit in with our Marvel superhero theme.

Hair + makeup name + review

Makeup: Makeup By Juliet – Juliet was fantastic on our wedding day. I don’t usually wear much makeup so was a little nervous how I would look, and didn’t want it to feel too heavy. Juliet listened to me, and then suggested colours she felt would suit me and my bridesmaids. We were all so happy with our makeup, and Juliet herself was so much fun to have on the morning of the wedding with us!

Hair: Elizabeth Jane Wedding Hair – Elizabeth was incredible on our wedding day. She did myself, my mums, my four bridesmaids and my four flower girls hair – and nothing was too much trouble! We all loved our hair, and it looked so beautiful.

Ice cream van hire

We had a pink vintage ice cream van – Vintage Wonder Ice Cream during the evening which everyone loved! The ice cream was fantastic, and everyone loved the beautiful vintage van – we of course had to get inside for photos!