I'm
starting to type this as we fly to St Lucia on the final leg of our epic
honeymoon. With a mere 8 hours 15
minutes to kill (not including the delay caused by late boarding passenger Alex
Fruger, who they had the courtesy to name and shame) it's probably a good time
to address mine and Kate's wedding, which took place on 27th April. I'm now in the position where I feel we've
banged on about this for long enough and that we're probably boring people, but
in time honoured Jonablog tradition there's probably a blog left to wring out
of it before we wrap this one up!
Long-term
readers will remember me writing about our engagement nearly two years ago. We
knew from the start we'd probably be getting married in Spring 2013, due to
needing to save up and us both being quite keen on a Spring wedding. Despite this I think we both found that first
ten months or so a bit of a struggle, and the finger of blame for this can be
pointed at Islington Council. Since she
moved to London in August 2005 Kate had always said she wanted to get married
at Islington Town Hall, after moving into a flat in the local area and seeing
couples emerging from the building when going past on the number 30 bus on a
Saturday morning. Unfortunately for us,
the council operates a strict "year in advance policy" which means it
is literally impossible to book your ceremony until there is a year or less to
go, which in the world of wedding planning is a little restrictive as it means
you then can't book anything else for the day until the venue is confirmed. So we had the best part of a year of being
asked "how's the wedding planning going?" with the answer being that
it wasn't really going anywhere.
Luckily
Kate managed to fill the time with heavily researching anything and everything
to do with the wedding. I was very lucky
to have a fiancée who not only had a pretty
good idea of what she wanted from the ceremony but also had rather excellent ideas
that chimed with my own! I think there must be a gene in women that is
unleashed the moment they are proposed to (or in some cases, before...) that
contains all this vital information. Put
it this way: I wasn't much use when it came to choosing the "wedding
colours". She also became absorbed
into the world of wedding blogs, the modern equivalent of those whacking great
glossy bridal magazines, so much so I believe she has now read them all. There are none left.
By the
time our preferred date had rolled around (minus a year), we were ready to
pounce on Islington and then to book all our suppliers in turn. Luckily 27th April 2013 at 1pm was free, but
I was amazed to find out that when I rang up on 28th April 2012 - ie. one day into the booking
window - the midday and 5pm slots had been taken on our chosen day already! So we weren't the
only ones. Now the real prep could begin
- and save-the-date cards were sent out at the start of September accordingly,
accompanied by some superb artwork by Kate's brother Lee depicting us in the
style of Lichenstein. Full invites
followed in January, and I have to give credit to Kate again for creating wonderful
innovative fold-out invites that were so incredible they are hard to describe. So here are a couple of pictures.
The
buildup to the wedding itself was a bit of a blur. After the first 18 months
feeling like a small ice age, the final furlong from January flew by. At the start of March we had a
"pre-wedding shoot", a service offered by our photographer (the
peerless Eliza Claire), which by fluke took place on a rare dry and sunny
day. We held the shoot on the Parkland
Walk, a former railway line-turned-nature reserve local to us which we're lucky
enough to be able to walk part of our daily journey to work on. Eliza produced some really impressive shots,
although one was unplanned - local gigantic-bear-dog Winston out for a walk
trying to get in on the action, nose-to-nose with me!
Two weeks
prior to the ceremony, on the same day were our stag and hen nights. I think both of us were touched by quite how
many people turned up, many of whom travelled to London especially. Credit is due to my Best Man Tom who
masterminded a brilliant afternoon of the Thames Clipper, followed by the
British Music Experience and then climbing the O2 in the pouring rain - which
felt like one hell of an achievement! After a curry we then went onto a club in
Angel, later being joined by the hen party, which was a fantastic end to the
day given we don't really split our friends down gender lines in any case. It was also just down the road from where
we'd be getting married a fortnight later...!
Although
Kate can rightly take credit for the vast majority of the wedding ideas, I was
quite proud of one of mine. We'd talked
for some time about themed table plans at the Wedding Breakfast but not quite
nailed something right for us.
Eventually I suggested: why not numbers 1 singles from various points in
our lives? There were bound to be some
duds in there but they would undoubtedly make great talking points as well as
confirming my chart nerd status. We
decided to have tables themed around Kate's birthday (Only You by The Flying
Pickets), my birthday (Hello by Lionel Richie - perfect!), the date we both
started at the University of York (some Will Young and Gareth Gates duet, how
very 2002), the date we started going out (Obviously by McFly - because she's
out of my league!), the day we moved into our first flat (Crazy by Gnarls
Barkley) and the day we got engaged (something by Pitbull - my timing not
especially romantic here).
For all
these Kate managed to get hold of the original vinyl or CD from eBay, the
artwork from which would be on the table plan and the discs on the tables
themselves. We took a huge gamble though
by saying the the top table would be whatever was number one on the day we got
married - ie. announced the Sunday before, giving us not much time to arrange
it. Thankfully virtually no singles are
released on CD anymore (I'm amazed we got hold of the 2011 Pitbull one) which
meant all we had to do was print off the artwork and label up a CD-R for the
table. Throughout April we nervously
watched the charts and at various points thought we might end up with
"Let's Get Ready To Rhumble" or "Ding Dong The Witch Is
Dead" as the lead record. The last
week saw a battle between a dire will.i.am/Justin Bieber collaboration and a
nice enough Rudimental track. Thankfully
the latter won, although we wished Daft Punk's epic Get Lucky had been released
a few days earlier as we both love it!
Our last
day at work was Wednesday 24th April. I'd arranged for some flowers to be
delivered to Kate at the Google fortress a few streets away, but I was then
surprised by cards from both the London and Leeds presentation teams and bubbly
in the office, which was a great way to start our longest ever holiday!
Before we
knew it, it was Friday 26th April: t-minus one day, and quite an epic day of
organisation. We always knew that having
the wedding in London in two different venues would be quite tough given that a
huge chunk of our guests would be visiting London especially and hardly anyone
we know has a car. Luckily my sister
bucks that trend and so we spent Thursday picking up the six hire suits from
the tailor in Barking, and then Friday dropping our wedding night suitcase off
at our hotel, greeting our family off the train, shuttling all the suits, the
dress and the ceremony stuff to my hotel (with Kate's stuff then taken from
there to her hotel by taxi) and finally taking all the reception decoration to
the pub where it would be held. And
while all this was going on, Kate was getting her nails done. Not that we were conforming to gender
stereotypes, you understand. After a
quick run through at Kate's hotel of all the details in the "bible"
we'd put together with all the horrendous detail I won't bore you with about
who needed to do what when, with most of the bridal and groom parties, Kate and
bid farewell and I headed to Islington for some drinks with already-arrived
guests. And then, to bed...
The day
of the ceremony is always said to be something of a blur. I think the presence of a photographer is
required not only to immortalise the day but also to remind you what
actually happened! Given the huge amount of coordination I'm delighted to
report everything went pretty much to plan.
After much nervous checking of the weather (which remained stubbornly
stuck on "showers" throughout) we were relieved that not only was a
was it dry when it needed to be, there was beautiful sunshine around the time
of the ceremony! With my ushers, best man and a number of other guests in tow
we walked the ten minutes along Upper Street to the Town Hall. We'd been told by Islington Council that
there was a fairly tight turnaround between ceremonies and so we'd need to make
ourselves scarce fairly promptly after our ceremony avoid getting in the way of
the 2pm booking. Sadly that message
hadn't filtered through to the midday party, who were stood on the steps having
every combination of photo lineup under the sun taken, until we decided we
would have to edge past in order to get the council chamber ready. It was then we found another party on the
grand staircase having more photos that needed to be navigated past. It was like some sort of wedding-themed
computer game. I was half expecting to
find an end-of-level baddy at the top of the stairs.
The
previous group delayed us by about ten minutes in the end but eventually the
ushers got everyone inside and we were ready to go. The Council Chamber is an incredible space,
as you can see from the photos. The
amazing thing about it is that everyone is sat around you in a semi-circle, so
you can really see everyone as you're sat there. Thanks to the previous group I didn't have a
long wait but it's a lonely position, sat in the the middle of that room on
your own! I knew that the bridal party
would be entering before Kate and her Dad, but I didn't want to turn around too
soon and end up staring down the aisle for a long time. In the end this was made easy for me when I
heard Kate's Grandma say "oh, isn't she lovely"! The moment I saw Kate in her dress for the
first time is captured on camera but I was genuinely blown away by how
incredible she looked. Nothing can quite
prepare you for the arrival of your bride in the dress you've been
forbidden from seeing for months, looking more beautiful than she's ever been
before.
The
ceremony was brief but really, really lovely. My sister Laura read John Hegley's Beliefs and Promises and Kate's brother Lee read John Cooper-Clarke's i wanna be yours, both wonderful poems that mean a
lot to us. We chose some of our
favourite music for various parts of the ceremony. While guests were arriving we played Digital Love by Daft Punk, Two Doors Down by Mystery Jets and Make Me Feel Again by
Edwyn Collins. Kate walked in to TrueLove Ways by Buddy Holly and we signed the register to Something Changed by
Pulp and I Love You by The Pipettes and then, before we knew it, we were married! We walked out to Don't Falter by Mint Royale,
a track that wasn't a massive hit when released but both of us loved
independently at the time - it encompassing both of our musical tastes, with the
dying embers of Britpop coupled with the big-beat sound popular at the turn of
the century. After some photos on the
grand staircase and the confetti shots outside the town hall (in glorious
sunshine!) we were off!
We'd
solved the issue of transporting people from one venue to another by hiring a
Routemaster bus, continuing the London feel.
We'd asked that the bus go to the reception venue via Alexandra Palace,
partly to drop us off their for some photos but also to extend the journey and
give some of our northern guests a taste of north London. This worked really well, as everyone had a
good chinwag whilst sipping champagne that Kate's parents had kindly brought
back from France.
While we were being photographed at Ally Pally - lest we forget the birthplace of what had brought us together, television - a little girl and her mother approached Kate and asked her if she was a princess, as they'd gone to the palace but the princess wasn't there! Quite a sweet moment. Before we headed to our reception - at a lovely pub called The Prince Albert in Camden Town - we had some more photos in the pretty streets nearby, before entering the venue. Nothing can quite prepare you for the high of walking into a room with everyone cheering you - I know this sounds weird on your wedding day but you do forget sometimes that everyone is looking at you two!
While we were being photographed at Ally Pally - lest we forget the birthplace of what had brought us together, television - a little girl and her mother approached Kate and asked her if she was a princess, as they'd gone to the palace but the princess wasn't there! Quite a sweet moment. Before we headed to our reception - at a lovely pub called The Prince Albert in Camden Town - we had some more photos in the pretty streets nearby, before entering the venue. Nothing can quite prepare you for the high of walking into a room with everyone cheering you - I know this sounds weird on your wedding day but you do forget sometimes that everyone is looking at you two!
After
some amazing food - that pub really do food well! - we had the speeches. I'd
had a good idea of what I wanted to say for some time - mentally writing it in
my head when swimming, mostly! - but had a few nerves about it in the weeks
before the wedding, rewriting it a lot. In the end, it went down quite
well. I was hugely encouraged by the
reaction to Kate's Dad's lovely speech, and how everyone reacted to mine once I got
going. I did worry I would lose it at
some of the more sentimental bits about Kate - and also in particular the
section about my Gran not being able to be there - but one of the advantages of
reading over it so many times in advance is that you become so used to the
words that, to you at least, they lose some of their emotional weight, which
did have the advantage that it was the guests who ended up blubbing, not me!
Tom also gave a touching best man's speech.
Well, touching apart from the washing machine bit. If you weren't there, that's all I'm saying.
Kate had
decided she would give a speech too, at the evening reception. I loved this: so few brides do it, and it
really gave her a chance to shine. Although she won't admit it she's really, really good at public speaking, and knowing
Kate as we all know her it wouldn't be right for her to go the whole day saying
little more than "I do". Plus she said some really nice things about
me, so that was good too! She received so much praise not only for making a speech but for how brilliant it was, and rightly so.
A long
time ago, before we decided much else, we had chosen what our first dance would
be. We both love Dusty Springfield's I Only Want To Be With You so, so much. The lyrics are pretty much spot on for how
both of us feel about each other, the sound is so evocative of the 60s look
that Kate was keen for, plus it does have the bonus of being quite short!
Neither of us are particularly any good at dancing but we did really want to do
the first dance. We kept the song choice a complete secret: only our DJ James
knew about it, but Tom nailed it when he said that the lyrics pretty much summed
up what we'd both said in our speeches.
We rehearsed it quite extensively, but neither of us are convinced it
was that great on the night. Still:
looks good in still photos, and what a tune!
I was
tempted to not do "thank yous" in this blog having done them at the
time and privately since, but so much of the day was a result of the fine work
of so many wonderful family and friends.
So, very quickly: both sets of parents, Steve & Sandra and Anne & Les, for all the financial,
creative and general wonderful support they gave; our siblings Laura, Lee and
Nick for the readings, design work and general organisational help with the big
day; the bridal and groom parties: Tom, Rowan, Dave, Vanky, Graham, Morgan, Claire and Oliver for generally being ace and supportive and making the day go
without a hitch, our witnesses Chris and Jamie for returning the favour we did
for them at their Civil Partnership a few years ago, the staff of Islington
Town Hall and The Prince Albert for giving us such a wonderful, flawless day,
Dunns Bakery and my new Grandma Audrey for the tasty cakes, our superstar DJ
James for keeping everyone dancing until 1am, Jack Bunneys and
Butterfly Vintage Brides for our outfits and finally our wonderful
photographers and videographers Eliza, Hannah, Frances and Becky (girl power!).
I'd also like to thank everyone that came, particularly from outside of
London. So much of the amazing wedding
atmosphere was down to have such a great group of guests who all genuinely
seemed to have a great time which meant a lot to us. We're also very grateful for all the numerous
and generous donations to our honeymoon fund.
We had the most incredible three weeks in St. Pancras Renaissance,
Berlin and St. Lucia that we simply would not have been able to do without
everyone's generosity, so once again: thank you.
I said in
my speech but I'll say it again here, the biggest thank you for the day has to
go to Kate. So much of the vision for
the day, the style, the look and the feel was down to her incredible taste and
general scarily good sense for what works and what doesn't. I'll admit that a lot of things I rolled my
eyes at when they were suggested (giant illuminated letters?!) really made the
day. She could easily go into a career
doing this sort of thing. That she
managed to do it largely off her own back is of huge credit to her. She's currently writing an entry for an
influential wedding blog who want to feature the wedding, which is really
flattering.
So now
it's all over, and the honeymoon we were on the way to when I started writing
this has been and gone. We're yet to
have the infamous "wedding blues". I think this is mainly because the
day was so, so wonderful and everything that we wished for. It's a cliché but it's true: it was the best day of our lives, and not only that but we're so excited about everything the future holds. We've nothing but
good memories about the whole day and are so grateful to everyone who made it
possible. I still get a buzz out of
calling Kate my wife, and I've a sneaking suspicion that's not going to change
any time soon! I'll end slightly on a
slightly soppy note (hey, it's an occasion when I'm allowed to do so), with the
lyrics to the chorus of Don't Falter. It's essentially "our song", and given that against all odds the sun came out for our big day, wonderfully appropriate.
Hey, don't falterYou know we ought to be togetherStrange, I saw yaI sort of knew it was for ever
