St Elizabeth House Wedding in Devon
Today we feature a lovely festive red wedding shot by Alexa Poppe in October of this year. Over to Alexa to talk us through the day and about the couple.
Robin and Elaine had a delightfully intimate wedding with fifty of their closest friends and family. The wedding was held in the beautiful light of a sunny autumn day, on the 12th October at St Elizabeth House in Devon.
I always feel blessed to shoot weddings in Devon and Cornwall due to the myriad of exceptional venues and beautiful scenery. St Elizabeth house is no exception. This luxurious boutique hotel still retains the historic charm of a Georgian Manor house and is surrounded by five acres of it’s very own Devon countryside. On my drive to the venue the weather was quite poor with heavy skies and dampening drizzle, but once I arrived at this exciting location, the sun shone and I knew this was going to be a good day for photographing.
I met the bride to be and her bridesmaid in the Bridal suite for preparation photos. It’s always fun to shoot the preparation as the bride and her maids are always brimming with fun as they get ready for the big day and are often having a pre-wedding tipple.
Elaine the bride loves Christmas and Robin made the most of this by making his proposal on Christmas Day. So, in keeping with this, red was the colour of choice for the bride. Twenty bold red roses were painstakingly hand tied into a perfect bouquet for the bride, which stood out against her smooth ivory dress. Juxtaposed to this were the bridesmaids in there striking red dresses with ivory roses.
The whole day went perfect and was a delight to shoot. The celebrations went on with drinking and dancing into the night. When the couple and their guests are this happy and this relaxed, it gives great opportunity for lots of unplanned documentary style shots, that tell a great story. This is the kind of a wedding photography I specialise in and I love to shoot weddings when I am able to blend in to capture the special moments that happen when you least expect it.
Suppliers:
Locaion: St Elizabeth House, Plympton st Maurice.
Style Rite Hairdressers (Oreston, Plymouth) styled the brides and the 5 bridesmaids hair.
Maiyas Beauticians did the brides make up at the venue.
The bold red bridesmaids dresses were from Debenhams and the 2 best men, father of the bride and grooms charcoal suits & ivory waistcoats were from Moss Bros.
The rings are from Drakes jewellers.
Chairs were covered in white with ‘Christmas red’ satin bows by South West Chair Covers.
Six rose bouquets, stands of Lilly’s and roses, rose buttons holes and the rose petals were supplied by Watts Florist (Oreston, Plymouth).
Table names and reading cards were made by Paper Baker.co.uk and the wedding favours were from Cancer Research (give in celebration.cancer research uk.org/wedding-favours).
The beautiful cake and cupcakes were lovingly made by bridesmaid; Rachel Furner.
DJ Mackie supplied the lighting and music for the evening (mackie-entertainment.co.uk).
Close family and friends stayed in the 15 boutique hotel rooms at St Elizabeth House
Robin proposed on Christmas day 2012. Ten months to plan the wedding was perfect. It all took place 12th October at St Elizabeth’s House with a plenty of time for hair, make up and photos with the ceremony at 3:30pm. There were two readings – one called ‘The Hands’ read by Jeff the registrar and one called ‘The promise’ read by Bridesmaid Rachel. Pimms were served after the ceremony and the sun came out just in time for the photo shoot in the beautiful grounds. The speeches from the brides father, the groom, maid of honour Jo and Best men Brady and Bailey were very entertaining and brought the bride close to tears numerous times. The wedding breakfast took place in the main dining room with 50 close family and friends.
The ivory cake – a large rich chocolate fudge cake with red and ivory cupcakes surrounding was made by Bridesmaid Rachel . The party began with Yellow, by Cold play, as the wonderful first dance and the celebrations continued until midnight.
The brides loves Christmas time and with the grooms Christmas day proposal red was the colour of choice. Twenty bold red roses were carefully hand tied into a neat bouquet which stood out against the Ivory dress. The five bridesmaids carried ivory roses against their bold red dresses. Lilies were mixed with red roses for the ceremony centre pieces as the mother of the brides favourite flower.
When the couple and their guests are this happy and this relaxed the day runs so smoothly and everyone is enjoying themselves, which gives great opportunity for lots of casual shots to tell a great story.
Music: The Beatles; ‘All You Need is Love’ played during the signing of the register.
If you would like to feature a wedding then do get in touch.