Erin and Matt's Autumn Wedding

How we met...

Matt and I met at our church in Leicester, during our first year at university in 2017. We were friends for three years before we started dating, and the rest is history!

The proposal...

Foggy, rainy, but magical! Matt proposed at the Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland which is one of my favourite places, on the foggiest day I have ever seen! We had driven up the Antrim coast and seen so many scenic views, and ended at the Giants Causeway. He had planned to propose on the cliff tops overlooking the Causeway but it was too foggy to see anything, so he took me down to a section of the main rocks, knelt in a puddle, asked me to be his wife, and of course I said yes!

Our vision for the day...

Dodmoor House fit my vision perfectly! I always wanted a rustic and family feel to my wedding day, and every part of the venue made it feel like that. We didn’t have a theme as such, but my favourite colour is mint, so we tried to incorporate as much of that colour as possible!

The outfits...

I bought my wedding dress from Wed2B in Solihull with my Maid of Honour and mum on FaceTime (as she lives in Thailand), and it was the 4th wedding dress I had tried on. I instantly felt beautiful in it and even though it wasn’t what I thought I’d go for, I can’t imagine getting married in anything else! Matt wore a charcoal grey three piece suit from Suits Direct, and chose this colour because we knew it would go really nicely with a mint tie! Matt says this is the best suit he has ever worn! I got him some personalised cuff links as a wedding morning present which were engraved, to make the outfit complete!

The food...

We had a table served BBQ from Saffron Catering, which consisted of five different meat options, two veggie options, as well as three salad options and dressed new potatoes! It was a feast and I couldn’t get over the amount of food! We went for this because we wanted it to have a family meal feel, but still wanted there to be a sit down meal which was served to us, so it really was the best of both worlds! In the evening we had an Italian style buffet platter, which was delicious!

Our favourite part of the day...

So hard to choose one part, but we really loved our ceremony; the atmosphere in the courtyard barn was amazing, and it was better than I could’ve ever imagined! My mum also performed Brown Eyed Girl by Van Morrison which is always my song request when she plays at the Irish pub, which was a definite highlight for us! Everyone got into it, lots of singing, clapping and dancing and something I will always remember!

The idea we felt worked well on the day...

I think having my mum perform a song after the meal during the tea and coffee time worked really well and not only provided entertainment to help with the time while Dodmoor set up the barn for the dancing later, but our guests loved it and it was such a special moment and part to our day! My mum and dad also hired a Thai TukTuk since I grew up there that took our guests for a short drive around the venue, which everyone absolutely loved!

Entertainment...

We had a Scottish piper and drummer (surprise planned by my parents) who played as we left the ceremony and walked back up to the courtyard for drinks, and also walked us in to cut our cake. We had a Thai Tuktuk who gave our guests rides around the venue! We had my mum perform a song, as well as an acoustic band who played during the teas and coffees after the meal before the dancing!

Where we feel our budget was well spent...

Our budget was mostly spent on the venue and the catering, which we wouldn’t change for anything because those were the two parts of the day that we wanted to be great, and both did not disappoint!

Personal touches that reflected us as a couple...

We named our tables after locations which were special and significant to Matt and I as a couple, rather than just having numbers. For example, we had Bradgate Park as a table name which is where I first told Matt I loved him! We also had photo frames on each table with a photo of us in each of those special locations. We had photos hung up around the bar area too, as well as having lots of our friends and family involved in our day. My uncle officiated the ceremony, my aunt made our wedding cake, Matt’s sister sang for our first dance, and we had friends take our wedding photos and video too!

Finally, if we could give a tip to other couples...

A couple of tips! The first one is to make sure you take time away from everyone at some point to just be with each other. I would also say to make sure to sit down and eat your food when your guests are eating too, but to also go round each table after you know you’ve had enough to eat, as that is a great way to make sure you say hello to everyone without having to make sure you catch each individual person. We had disposable cameras that our bridal party used to take photos during the day and especially during the dancing which I’d recommend for a bit of fun, but also as something you can look at while waiting for your professional wedding photos to come back!

Special thanks to Erin and Matt for sharing their story, and to Phil Hearing for the photos x