Katherine and Sam's Autumn Wedding

How we met...

We met on Hinge, the dating app!

The proposal...

Ah, that’s a funny story actually. Me and Sam went on a holiday with my parents to Kefalonia in Greece, it was a beautiful hotel in a beautiful setting! On our first day there, I was having lunch with Sam and I said to him that I was really disappointed because I was sure he was going to propose to me on that holiday but I didn’t see him unpack any ring or even try to hide unpacking a ring! I gave him quite a hard time! He did very well not to say anything at that point because later that evening, he proposed! We had gone for a lovely evening sunset walk on the beach and he got down on one knee and asked me to marry him, it was perfect.

What made you choose Dodmoor for your special day?

When we first started looking at venues we really wanted an outdoor wedding, however most of the outdoor venues we looked at were very DIY, they didn’t have any staff and so we would have had to spend a lot of time the morning of the wedding putting out all the decorations and the linen etc. and after spending a year planning the wedding, I really wanted to not have to do anything on the actual day. We loved that the staff at Dodmoor took care of everything, we handed over all our decorations and drinks the day before and didn’t have to worry about a thing. The planning meeting was super helpful because we were able to talk about how we wanted our perfect day to be.

We also loved the barn area and even though we initially wanted an outdoor wedding, the courtyard barn was just too pretty to pass up and so we ended up getting married in there and having our drinks reception outside instead! I loved all the fairy lights and the pretty benches and the rustic theme across the venue. When I visited with Sam and my Mum, we all got a little emotional because we just knew after visiting that this is where we were going to get married.

Our vision...

My main theme was FUN! I wanted a day that everyone would remember as being just a super relaxed, fun day. I organised music and a bouncy castle and a sparkler arch and lawn games and then a group dance called a ceilidh which ended up being quite chaotic but everyone said how fun it was!

I organised a special surprise visit from our dog, Ghost who was our ring bearer for the day which I just loved surprising everyone with because their faces when he walked down the aisle was just so special for me to see! Most people said they weren’t crying during the ceremony until the dog walked down the aisle and then they were sobbing which I find hilarious!

My secondary theme was autumn. Autumn is my favourite time of year, I love when the leaves fall off the trees and everything is a gorgeous orange/red colour, so we planned everything loosely with an autumn theme. The flowers were gorgeous reds and oranges, the bridesmaid dresses were a lovely burgundy colour along with the table runners and sashes on the chairs. I bought ribbons from hobbycraft in red, burgundy and white to put on the chairs along the aisle. I had red confetti and burgundy hair! You get the picture, lots of red, orange and burgundy! I also incorporated my favourite flowers, Sunflowers, into my floral arrangements, invitations and even on my wedding cake.

The outfits...

So I had two outfits. One was from the Loved Bridal outlet at Serendipity brides in Weedon. I bought this dress a whole year before my wedding, I was just too excited, I couldn’t wait! The dress was perfect and was my dream dress that I’ve had in my head for a while except for one thing, it didn’t have sleeves! However, my wonderful seamstress, Ann was able to create some custom sleeves for me and sew them on which really made the dress perfect. Alongside my flower crown my guests said I looked like a fairy/elven princess!

My second dress was a surprise as none of my family or bridesmaids or guests knew I had bought one! This dress I bought from Silver Sixpence in Towcester and I had such a lovely experience picking a dress there. The dress I ended up with isn’t a dress I would normally go for but I’m so glad I tried it on because it was absolutely perfect for dancing the night away in! It was so sparkly and cute and I felt like Taylor Swift having an outfit change! Both dresses were completely different vibes but absolutely perfect.

Sam bought his jacket from Hawes & Curtis, it was a lovely brown/red colour which we both though would go really nicely with our rustic autumnal theme and it was such a lovely material too. However most of his budget went on this jacket so he then had to source his waistcoat and trousers from a slightly cheaper shop!

The food...

Me and Sam love a good BBQ and neither of us wanted to have a big sit down 3 course meal because most of the time people don’t have enough room and also it is just too formal for us! We wanted great food in a relaxed setting. That’s why we went with Passion food events and their fire cage BBQ! You could see the food being cooked during the drinks reception on their big firecage which was really cool! Then the food was served up on sharing boards in the middle of the table so people could pick and choose what they wanted and have as much as they wanted too! There was more than enough food and everyone said how good it tasted! I don’t even think Sam touched any of the sides, he just had a huge plateful of meat (which is his favourite thing).

Our favourite part of the day...

The entire day was so perfect, it couldn’t have gone any better so it’s really hard to choose! My stand outs were the ceremony, walking down the aisle and seeing Sam at the end tearing up, and when Ghost trotted down as our ring bearer.

The food was SO good and I loved that me and Sam had a sweetheart table for just the two of us as it gave us some time to just be with each other.

I also loved doing our first dance together because we learned a little routine from YouTube, although it was also quite stressful as I was so nervous I was going to mess all the moves up in the moment!

Another moment I actually really loved was on the wedding morning when I was getting ready with all my girls, we had some time to go and see the barn and I got so emotional seeing it because all the months of planning had finally come together. It was my first time seeing my flowers and all the decorations set out and it all went together so nicely and the room was just SO beautiful.

That moment right before the ceremony when you know you are about to marry your best friend and when you see all your plans come together and all is right in the world! That was such a lovely moment for me.

What made Dodmoor as a venue stand out...

The flexibility! They have so many options in terms of where you can have your ceremony and what equipment you can hire from them or if you want to provide your own drinks or use their drinks packages. I really felt like we could have the day WE wanted. There were so many venues that I spoke to who were going to force me and Sam to have a sit down three course meal and not even be able to choose our own caterer, we had to use theirs! So we were so glad when we found Dodmoor who said we could choose our own caterers and that we didn’t even have to have a sit down meal if we didn’t want to! We could have had food vans if that’s what we wanted. Your wedding day is so special and I feel like you should be able to have it exactly the way you want it and Dodmoor House were able to do that for us.

A plan/idea that worked really well on the day...

I just love how everything flowed really well. We had our ceremony in the courtyard barn, then we came straight outside to have a group photo on the steps, then we all walked down towards the lawn where the drinks were ready on trays, it was all such a smooth transition. Then after the reception everyone went up to the Catesby barn for food, before going back outside for tea coffee and cake in the courtyard barn/courtyard area which was now clear. We then had our sparkler arch which was a way for us to say goodbye to the day people and hello to the evening people and this led right back into the Catesby barn (which was now clear) for our first dance, ceilidh and then the disco. It all ran so flawlessly thanks to the staff at Dodmoor but it just worked really well. Lots of guests congratulated me on planning a flawlessly run wedding and I had to say that it was mostly thanks to the staff at Dodmoor, not me!

The entertainment...

We used the Dodmoor house DIY DJ package which was great. We were able to create our own playlist with music that we know we liked and we know our guests would like too. The disco ball was such a cute addition and the lighting too, it was perfect and saved us a lot of money rather than having a real DJ.

We also hired Daniel Butterworth to play during our drinks reception, we found out about him when he played at a local event called Weedon Weekender! A small festival run by the village every year. We heard him play and both agreed that we LOVED his style and so we asked him after his set whether he would think about playing our wedding the following year! It was so lovely to have some music in the background while everyone was mingling and drinking and a few of our guests commented on how good his music was.

We also hired a white bouncy castle from Two Hearts Wedding cars which was such a fun addition. It took a while for people to get on as I think nobody wanted to be the first person to go on! But once they did, everyone had a great time and it’s lovely to have some candid pictures of everyone just having fun!

Where the budget was well spent...

The flowers! My flowers were amazing. I had a florist recommended to me by a friend and I am SO glad I went with her (Ellie’s Flowers). We had a few meetings where we sat down and discussed my vision. I wanted something a little different to what most people had and I had a real vision in mind and so we had lots of discussions about colours and the type of flowers I wanted and my goodness they looked gorgeous.

So many people commented on them and how they were the most beautiful flowers they had ever seen! I wish they would last forever because I just want to keep them in my room to look at forever!

The other area was my photographer, Ania Aimes. One of my friends on Facebook hired Ania to photograph her wedding and I knew as soon as I saw those photos that I absolutely HAD to have her. I love her style of work and it really goes well alongside my autumnal theme, and my goodness she does the BEST golden hour photos. We were a little tight on our budget so rather than having a photographer for the whole day, we just hired her from the ceremony until the ceilidh, so around 5 hours. We weren’t bothered about having any getting ready pictures or pictures of the disco in the evening so this was a great compromise for us as it saved us a little bit of money but we were still able to have the photographer we wanted!

The venue and the food were the other big costs but again they were both so well spent. The venue was perfect and the food was incredible and we were able to make it so much cheaper by just having one course with sides instead of two or three courses. I also made my own brownies and rocky road for dessert to go alongside a wedding cake that I bought from a local café which really brought the cost down.

Personal touches that reflected us as couple?

Having our dog Ghost as the surprise ring bearer was really special, especially for Sam. He said to me that Ghost was the only thing missing on our wedding day and he was so emotional when he saw him walking in with our wedding rings attached to his collar!

Also, having passion fruit martinis for our drinks reception because they are our favourite drink!

The biggest part, writing our own vows!

The fact that I made or bought the decorations second hand and so it was all my creative design that came together.

Also the fact that I baked the dessert!

Recommended suppliers we used and loved:

Suppliers recommended by Dodmoor house: Passion food events, Sarah Evans makeup, Northants Budget Crockery, Dried petal company.

I could not recommend any of these suppliers more. I’ve already said lots about Passion Food but again I will say they were incredible. Alongside the meal, they also provided me with a grazing platter to share with my bridesmaids in the getting ready room which was delicious. They were also really good at catering for people with dietary requirements.

Sarah Evans was fab at doing my makeup. I am someone who doesn’t ever really wear any makeup other than some concealer every now and then and so I was looking for someone who could make my makeup look very natural so I still looked like me but just that little bit nicer and she really delivered.

NBC provided my linen alongside table runners and chair sashes which looked so lovely. I loved that I didn’t have to do anything really as I told the venue what tables I wanted and they then passed on that information to NBC who then invoiced me for the correct sizes of linen and table runners.

Suppliers we found that we would recommend:

Daniel Butterworth: Daniel Butterworth (@danielbutterworthmusic) • Instagram photos and videos 

Ellie’s Flowers: Ellies flowers (@ellies.flowers) • Instagram photos and videos

Glantz Productions videography: Glantz Productions (@glantzproductions) • Instagram photos and videos

Two Hearts Wedding cars/ 2 B Inflated: 2 B Inflated (@2binflated) • Instagram photos and videos

Our advice to future couples...

Ignore anyone else’s opinions! This day should be about the two of you. I was often questioned about my decisions from family members and friends because I didn’t follow the ‘traditional way’ but every single person came out of our wedding day saying how lovely and romantic it was and how it was just so “us”. Ignore what anyone else has to say when you’re planning your wedding and do what the two of you want. Have FUN!

A massive thank you to Katherine and Sam for sharing the details of their special day with us! Also, thank you to Ania Ames for sharing the stunning photos from their day!