Names: Di & Thomas from Hertfordshire

Month: April 2017 - Hit and miss with rain but warm.

Venue: Low House, Armathwaite

Photographer: Elodie Guige, Friend

Catering: Sara Ecroyd Catering

Flowers: Greenwheat Flowers

Others: DTL Marquees, Lauren Leeson Make Up, Mobile DJ Cumbria, Glen Urr Ice Creams, Hesket Kennels, Chiara Hair, Striding Edge Ceilidh Band

In Brief: Annabel had a few consultations with Di and chatted to the suppliers in the lead up to the big day. Then was present for a catch up the day before and management on the day. 

"Mingling English and Danish traditions was a glorious element of this wedding. I have learnt some fascinating new fun things to add in such as cutting off the toes in the Grooms socks after the first dance waltz! Mother of the Groom created a fab Danish wedding cake and there were jars of Loganberry jam on each table plus every time someone tings a glass, everyone joins in and the couple must kiss. Well, why not!

Other wonderful details included the stunning hanging wreaths in a picturesque marquee and having a cute ice cream trailer for after the ceremony. The ceremony itself featured the couple dog being walked down the aisle and gorgeous views of the River Eden.

I met the 'crazy' table who wrote a rude book instead of marriage guidance, hilarious part of the day for me personally, and learnt that Page Boys need to be strong if guiding a dog down the aisle to their owner. I also found that you must keep in mind that planning should involve fun. For the super organised Brides, like Di, its key to not only relish in their fantastic event creation skills but ensure that the main purpose and key people are in mind.

It was a genuinely lovely celebration of a glowing love between the couple. Each detail was thoughtful, mainly homemade, and added to the event without distracting from the location or sentiment of the day."

The happy couple very kindly shared their thoughts on Annabel's assistance too...

Why did you decide on hiring a planner? "We didn’t set out intending to hire a planner. After we had spoken to Annabel initially, we thought about whether the help that Weddings by Annabel could offer would be a good investment for some of the budget and decided that it was."

Why did you choose Annabel? "We initially made contact with Annabel while looking at options for venues for a large wedding in North Cumbria. Even though the venue is not one that Weddings by Annabel represented, Annabel offered us a list of recommended suppliers that she works with. We now live in Henley in Oxfordshire, which makes meeting suppliers locally really difficult, so a list of recommended suppliers was an amazing place to start for our research. Curious about what else Weddings by Annabel might be able to do to help, we talked to Annabel about the planning process and ended up booking the “On the Day Assistance” package."

How did Annabel help in the lead up? "Annabel helped in a number of practical ways: speaking to suppliers for us and letting them know she was on board on the day; providing us with extremely detailed planning and budgeting tools to keep us on track; acting as a sounding board for some of our ideas; helping us to refine and polish elements we were struggling with and challenging us to think about parts of the days that hadn’t yet been given much thought. More than that, though, Annabel was a huge moral support – calm and reassuring throughout - and reminded us that (now more than ever) a sense of humour and perspective were very important!"

What effect did having a planner have on your enjoyment of the day? "We did not feel that an off-the-shelf hotel wedding package was the right thing for us. Organising our wedding involved turning a very beautiful blank canvas into a fully functioning wedding venue for 140 guests from the UK and Denmark, which would allow us to get married outside in April, have our dog in attendance for the ceremony and involve as many homemade elements as possible. Looking back at it now, the scale of the project was huge. Pulling so many elements together meant there was a risk that Thomas and I would be distracted on the day making sure that it all went as we had planned, or that a family member would end up doing that for us. It was a great relief having someone there who could focus on making the day run as smoothly as possible. In the final run up to the day, we had several calls with Annabel where we ran through the plan, updates and who was involved at each stage. Annabel arrived the day before for a final handover while we were setting up and on the day she was in charge of everything. I imagine that there are a million things that Annabel did on the day to make sure it all went off to plan, but all I remember is her smiling and telling us everything was in hand. The result of all our work is that the day was absolutely perfect for us."

Would you recommend a planner to others? "Definitely. We found that there’s a level of involvement and a package that can be tailored to suit everyone."

Would you recommend Weddings by Annabel? "We would recommend Weddings by Annabel without hesitation. Annabel is both lovely and ruthlessly efficient. We cannot really explain how grateful we are to her for the part that she played in making sure that our day was just perfect for us."