The butterflies fluttering around Kamal and James at their wedding ceremony held on the 6th September 2014; must have been a magical moment.
Their wedding day reflected both of their cultural backgrounds, Kamal’s family are Punjabi Sikhs and James’ are Catholic. It made for the most personal yet beautiful celebration.
They had an English style wedding during the day before a full on Indian style party in the evening. Cue a change of outfits and a lot of dancing.
Kamal looked stunning in her two dresses, I adore her Henna adorned hands and purple bouquet, while James was dapper in a custom made suit with emerald tie.
Thanks so much to Scuffins Photography for the gorgeous imagery today.
THE PROPOSAL | James: I proposed on top of a mountain in the Lake District. It’s a hill we’d wanted to climb on our first ever trip there, but didn’t manage to because Kamal hurt her foot. So when I decided to propose I planned to do it there. I managed to keep it a secret until the actual moment.
Kamal: It was pretty much the perfect spot. We both love the Lakes, and it means a lot to me as it’s somewhere that we went to on family holidays when I was young. It was perfect weather, we could see for miles and James proposed right at the top of the mountain. Amazing!
THE VISION | Kamal: Neither of us are religious, but we do come from two different religious and cultural backgrounds – my family are Punjabi Sikhs and James’ are Catholic. We wanted a wedding that reflected both of our backgrounds and that both families would relate to, so we knew from the get go that we wanted to have a more English-style wedding and then an Indian reception.
The key things for us were to have a meaningful ceremony, followed by a big party where everyone would have a fantastic time.
THE PLANNING PROCESS | Kamal: I’m pretty methodical about planning, and I’m certainly the organiser of the two of us, so I soon had a spreadsheet on the go, as well as a few Pinterest boards.
We knew the key thing was to find a venue, so that we could set the date and then everything else would hang off that. I have a really big and very close family, and James’ family is pretty big too, so one of the biggest challenges was finding a venue that would fit everybody, but we managed it eventually.
I used a combination of wedding magazines, and advice from the venue and our registrar (who was a family friend) to figure out what we needed to plan and when it should be done by.
BUDGET | Kamal: We didn’t have a budget as such, and were really lucky that my parents were able to help us with the wedding costs, but even so we didn’t want things to cost the earth. I bought one of my outfits on eBay and the other one in a sale. I also made all the decorations, and our family and friends were incredible with helping out with stuff which I’ve described a bit more below.
THE VENUE | Kamal: We wanted to get married near Chester where my parents live, as we were planning to have a couple of Indian ceremonies in the lead up to the wedding, which would be held at their house. We saw a few venues over one weekend, and Abbeywood was the first one we saw, but I think we were both pretty certain from the minute we got there that it was the right place. The glasshouse was lovely and light and airy, but there was also the café/bar area and orangery, which was great for the evening because my grandparents and older relatives could sit somewhere a bit quieter while the music was going.
And then there are the gardens, which are just absolutely amazing. We chose the venue because we knew it would be nice no matter what the weather, but we couldn’t help hoping it wouldn’t rain so that we could go outside, as the gardens are so beautiful.
THE DRESS & ACCESSORIES | Kamal: I had two dresses and two sets of accessories, which was a real treat of course! I bought the white wedding dress on eBay – it was Alfred Angelo and would have been over £1000 new, but I got a sample from a wedding dress shop via eBay and it was £250. I found a fabulous seamstress who took the dress in for me. It was obviously a bit of a punt, but I’d tried on some other dresses before I took the plunge, so I had an idea of what I wanted. The lace top was from a shop called Parampara in Southall. I wanted something with Indian embroidery, as a nod towards my background and they made it exactly to order.
In terms of accessories for the day, I had a pearl necklace and earrings, which my auntie (Ashi Marwaha) made for me as a gift from my parents. (We also paid her to make James’ wedding ring, and the bridesmaids’ gifts.) I also had a gold bracelet from my parents. One of my sister’s friends – Laura Apsit Livens – is a milliner who’s worked with Philip Treacy, and she made my hair pieces for me to match my top. My shoes were from Debenhams – super comfy and only £30!
In the evening I wore an Indian outfit called a lengha, which I bought in a sale in Southall. My jewellery was all gifts from my grandparents, and my shoes were Rachel Simpson (I needed higher shoes for the evening and these were by far the most comfortable I tried!)
GROOM’S ATTIRE | James: I bought my suit from a place in London called Dressed to Kill. My friend Tom had bought from there before so recommended it to me (and got a free bottle of Champagne for doing so!) All the groomsmen and I went together to have fitting, where we were all plied with free beer and measured up. The suits and the accessories were all bespoke. I’ve not had a bespoke suit before, so my wedding seemed like a good excuse to get one! It was a really great process, and I found that going with my groomsmen was very helpful, as we could discuss the various elements of the outfits together and come to a consensus more easily.
THE READINGS & MUSIC | Kamal: We chose four readings, three poems and one piece of prose. We had an extract from Captain Correlli’s Mandolin, Shakespeare’s Sonnet 116, I carry your heart by E.E. Cummings and The Good-Morrow by John Donne. We chose them all because they meant something to us.
We had Pachelbel’s Canon in D when I walked in, but we really struggled to pick something to walk out to. We wanted something upbeat and happy, but which meant something to us. We finally hit upon the right thing – Queen’s You’re My Best Friend.
BEAUTIFUL BRIDESMAIDS | Kamal: The bridesmaids were my sister, my two cousins and my oldest friend. My little cousin Daisy was my flowergirl. The bridesmaid’s dresses for the day also came from eBay. I wanted something that had a slight Indian feel to it, and these dresses were just right. Daisy’s gorgeous dress was from Monsoon.
In the evening all the bridesmaids changed into saris, which we bought in Southall and Wembley.
THE FLOWERS | Kamal: A local florist called Cocoa Flower did all of the bouquets and flower arrangements. I don’t know a huge amount about flowers, but Clare was so helpful and friendly. She sent me some suggestions after we had chatted, and she’d got it spot on in terms of what I wanted. When the flowers arrived on the day I was over the moon – they were even lovelier than I had expected.
THE CAKE | Kamal: My auntie Ashi (who also made the jewellery) made our cake. It was absolutely amazing! It was a chocolate and Guinness cake with cream cheese icing, and she piped henna-style designs onto it. We didn’t know exactly what it would look like until the day, and it was even better than we’d imagined.
YOUR PHOTOGRAPHER | Kamal: We knew the photos were going to be really important to us. We had so many people there and we just knew the day would fly by and we’d want to take time to look back over it. I spent hours trawling through photographer websites without finding someone that offered everything we wanted at a price we could afford, and whose photos we really liked. I actually found Scuffins Photography through the recommendation of another photographer and immediately loved the examples that Chris had on the site. In particular, his shots of people enjoying the day and dancing in the evening just really seemed to capture the fun, and that was exactly what we wanted.
We’re absolutely over the moon with how the photos have turned out. They’re even better than we could have hoped. Chris and Helen were fantastic and really went out of the way to make the photo process as unobtrusive as possible. They got some lovely group shots and ones of us, but we both agree that some of the ones we love best are the ones of our friends and family enjoying the day. The dancing photos from the evening are brilliant!
THE DETAILS & DÉCOR | Kamal: I made all the decorations myself – so I spent a slightly worrying amount of time over the last year making hundreds of paper pom poms, which were strung up in the glasshouse. I have to admit I’m not sure I’d recommend trying to make that many, as it was very, very time consuming!! That said, we thought they looked lovely.
The table names were all locations in the Lake District, near to where James proposed. I made them up to look like postcards, using our own photos. And then I also used the designs I’d done on the table plan itself. People’s place names were pieces of slate, which my sister and I wrote on with silver Sharpies, and then we had love hearts as the favours.
I also designed a family tree which was displayed next to the cake and used an old vanity case that I got in a junk shop for people to put cards in.
We had originally wanted a photobooth, but decided that was a bit expensive. Instead we bought a Fuji Instax and lots of film on eBay and then hung an old picture frame of my granddad’s for people to pose behind. People stuck the photos into the book with washi tape and wrote messages. I wasn’t sure if it would work and people would use it, but it’s one of the best things we have from the wedding. Some of the photos in it are amazing.
THE HONEYMOON | James: we went to New York for 5 days and Bermuda for 6. We were keen to split the honeymoon into two parts – one part busy-touristy holiday, the other part lazy-beach holiday. Given that, the planning almost took care of itself – I’d always wanted to go to New York, as I’d never even left the EU and have admired NY from afar for a very long time. Following that, Bermuda was the most logical place to go, as it was near to the east coast of America but away from the Caribbean which is a hurricane hotspot around that time of year. We stayed in a hotel in Hell’s Kitchen in New York, and went self-catering in Bermuda. The honeymoon itself was incredible – we tried to be as proactive as possible in New York, exploring as much of Manhattan as possible, and eating tremendous amounts of food! We hired a scooter in Bermuda (a bold move for us!) so we could explore the island easily, and took advantage of the incredible landscape. We have some friends over there too, and seeing them was a highlight of the holiday for us. All in all, it was perfect.
MEMORABLE MOMENTS | There are so many! One thing that almost everyone we’ve spoken to has said is that they won’t forget the butterflies that fluttered around us during the ceremony (this was completely incidental!)
Seeing all our friends and family chatting at the wedding breakfast was great, as we’d deliberately mixed the tables and it was lovely to see everyone getting to know each other a bit.
The ‘milni’ ceremony that we held when everyone had changed into their Indian clothes was also brilliant. Normally this would happen at the Gurudwara before a Sikh wedding ceremony, and is a greeting of the two families.
The dancing in the evening was amazing and we were so chuffed that everyone got really into the bhangra music.
ADVICE FOR OTHER COUPLES | Make the effort to meet your suppliers, it means you’re much more comfortable and confident on the day that everything will go well.
Getting a good photographer is so worth it – the day really does go by so fast, and having beautiful photos to look back on is just fantastic.
There are some things that you can get for cheaper if you search around – like the dress. Do a bit of investigating!
Making decorations can save money, but don’t bite off more than you can chew – planning the wedding is stressful enough without giving yourself loads and loads of extra work!
A photo guest book is really worth the effort.
CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE |
Venue (and caterer for the wedding breakfast) | Abbeywood Estate
Photographer | Scuffins Photography
Videographers | Skinny Boy Weddings
Hair and make up | the amazing Rebecca Wilson (on Jodie A Smith’s team)
Flowers | Cocoa Flower
Cake and jewellery | Ashi Marwaha
Hair pieces | Laura Apsit Livens
Totally beautiful.
Thanks so much to Kamal and James for sharing their wonderful wedding and report with us today XOXO Lou