Bride’s Credentials…
Robina Chappell (was Clough). Had my 36th birthday 3 days before our wedding, which actually meant that nearly everyone totally forgot about it this year! We moved to Essex from south London as soon as we got engaged so we could start our new life together somewhere we really wanted to live. I wouldn’t count myself as a particularly “girly” girl (my main hobby is golf for a start) and I absolutely hate being the centre of attention but I still wanted to be a princess just for this one day.
A bit about the Groom…
David Chappell. He’s my toy boy – a whole 10 months younger than me. Fortunately his favourite hobby is also golf, so it’s great that we have something we can enjoy together.
We met on a commuter train when we both lived in south London. He started talking to me out of the blue, which, for anyone who has lived in London will know, is a really controversial thing to do on the daily commute. It took a few more chance meetings (and some not so chance meetings I later found out) before we actually went on our first date – which was a very romantic trip to buy bathroom tiles.
What she loves about him…
Well of course I think he’s gorgeous and sexy, but I love him for how much he cares about things – like me, our cats, even my goldfish. In some ways he’s a super geek- and I love him for that too – just my kind of man.
The proposal…
It was Christmas day 2011. We were staying at my parents and the whole family took the usual early Christmas day walk around a local country park. It was freezing cold, so I’d borrowed his jumper, which didn’t match my outfit, and I was wearing a Santa hat to keep my head warm. I looked super sexy. He started telling me how much he loved me and then produced “the box”. I cried and put the ring on, but I’m told in all the emotion that I didn’t actually say yes for quite some time. He knew I would anyway. I found out later he had asked my dad’s permission the night before – I can’t believe they kept it a secret even just for one night!
What shopping at Abigail’s Collection / The Groom’s Room like…
I chose Abigail’s as my first port of call from all the positive reviews I’d seen. I’m sure wherever you go to buy your dress it will be an exciting experience, but as soon as I walked in the door with my mum and my chief bridesmaid as my “advisors” I got that “it’s all about me” feeling straight away (which, let’s be honest, it is!) I had no idea what kind of dress I wanted, so I was willing to try on a whole range of different styles. I fell in love with the first dress I tried on, well the top half anyway and although I tried others, I kept coming back to the first one. But I wasn’t so keen on the skirt part of the dress, it was too big for my liking, so I thought that was that. But the girls at Abigail’s knew that this particular designer would be able to change it a little and worked with me to make it into the perfect dress. The team also helped me pick out all my accessories, making great suggestions based on what would work with the style of dress and my own personality. The whole experience was absolutely fantastic.
Because I’d come home and raved about Abigail’s my husband-to-be decided to check out the Groom’s Room. Neither him, nor any of the male members of either of our families, are in the slightest bit interested in clothes shopping, so I thought it would be a bit of a chore for them – kind of walk in, we’ll have those and off we go again. But actually, they were in there longer than I was choosing my dress! I got a phone call asking me to go and approve their final choices and I was stunned at the fantastic combinations of suits, waistcoats and ties they had come up with, with Rob’s help.
We also got our bridesmaids dresses from Abigail’s, which was a really light-hearted and fun afternoon out. It was nice that I could sit back and relax (and enjoy a glass of wine!) whilst the girls paraded about it some beautiful (and some quite frankly shocking) dresses in a whole range of styles and colours.
The wedding venue…
The West Wing at Ickworth in Bury St Edmunds. It’s beautiful old building set in amazing grounds, but with a contemporary feel inside. It was only the second venue we visited and we both knew it was perfect straight away.
Wedding day theme…
(Possibly …Any special colour or use of theme in any way)
We didn’t have a particularly theme – we wanted quite a traditional wedding, rather than the currently popular country/vintage/shabby chic themes. Our main colour was navy blue, which was both of ours favourite colour (well actually I love pink, but I knew that wasn’t going to work for either the groomsmen or the bridesmaids). As a lover of diamonds and all things sparkly, I wanted to incorporate this into the theme as well, which I mostly did with all my bridal accessories and the lighting effects in the venue.
Special touches…
(Possibly …. Anything unique, handmade, special guests, anything unusual for something old something blue etc?)
One of our favourite special touches was something my chief bridesmaid arranged as a surprise for David and I. Obviously our cats couldn’t be with us for the day – but she had someone make two very good sugar replicas that appeared on the cake table before the reception. Seeing them for the first time actually brought a tear to my eye.
Most memorable moments…
Possibly my dad’s mobile phone ringing just before he walked me down the aisle! Actually, it was the wedding ceremony itself, when we said our vows and exchanged rings. I remember feeling so happy and the beaming smiles on our faces (and those of our parents) said it all. We even high-fived after. The speeches really stuck in my mind too. All three of the chaps managed to get the guests both laughing and crying
Any ‘wish I had not dones?…
I don’t think there’s anything I wish I hadn’t done – the whole day was just what we wanted it to be. Perhaps what I would have done in hindsight is delegate more. I’m a bit of a control freak and arranged most of our wedding single handedly. On the actual day, there were a few (albeit minor) things that weren’t quite right (not helped by the fact that our venue wedding planner wasn’t there on the day) and it would have been less stressful if we had perhaps given the bridesmaids and the groomsmen a bit more prepping on what was supposed to be what, rather than having to deal with things during the event. But, they were such minor things in the grand scheme of things and none of the guests even noticed and everything ran pretty smoothly.
Money saving methods…
Find out what your friends and family are good at and how they might be able to help! A distant relative made our beautiful wedding cake as a gift to us. Our photographer was my oldest friend who has recently set up a wedding photography business, so whilst we still had to pay her, we got a lot more than we would have with someone else. Another friend works in the corporate branding field and was able to arrange massive discounts on the printing of the wedding stationary I had designed.
Advice for Brides to be….
One of the best bit of advice I was given was to take time during the actually big day to stop, breathe and take a mental picture of everything going on our around you. It’s true that the day goes by so quickly, but because I took this advice on board, there aren’t any little details that I don’t remember and I can still run the whole thing through my head as if it were on video. Of course, it helps if you don’t get too carried away with the champers as well.