An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress and a Jay Gatsby Inspired Party!

There beats nothing on Friday on Love My Dress than finishing off the day with an absolutely beautiful wedding.  John
and Michelle tied the knot in September, at The Samling, Ambleside, The
Lake District
, and their photographer, Caro Hutchings, sent in these absolutely wonderful images of the couple and their stylish, relaxed, intimate day of celebrations…

"I found my dress whilst rummaging through my mum's wardrobe one day. I
had already fallen in love with it before she told me that it was an
Edwardian crepe silk nightgown and dressing gown that she had bought in a
vintage shop at around my age.

If anything this made me like it all the
more! It was far more my style than a traditional wedding dress and I
never felt tempted to look for anything else. I wore it again on our
honeymoon and can't wait to wear it again for other special
occasions."    

Love  My Dress Wedding Blog – Photography Copyright (c) 2012, Caro Hutchings

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"We knew that we wanted to get married at The Samling
right from day one. We both definitely wanted to have a small wedding
and were aware of the hotel as my parents had stayed their previously,
John had spent a lot of his childhood in the Lakes too.

The hotel is a
large, beautiful house with 11 suites, with the added bonus of a
fabulous restaurant which was one of the main attractions. The hotel has
a licence to perform ceremonies in the drawing room overlooking lake
Windermere, and we knew we could have the exact type of wedding we
wanted here – a stunning setting where our closest family and friends
could join us for a fantastic dinner and slumber party!"

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"Our Florist, Alex, of The Flower Shop in Ambleside
was wonderful. I had sent her a flower Pinterest board I’d been
compiling and when we went to meet her she had interpreted it perfectly
with what we had in mind. We loved powder blue hydrangeas and seaholly
and wanted freesia as they are my Mum’s favourites. Alex used those to
create a lovely country garden feeling.

We collected mismatching vintage
glass bottles throughout our engagement for the table flowers and used
my bouquet as a centrepiece. Rather than a bouquet Janine had a wrist
corsage, which suited her perfectly."

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"John proposed in the Yorkshire Dales where we were spending New
Year in a cosy cottage with our closest friends – it was perfect! We
were engaged for two years before the wedding.

We
wanted to avoid any particular themes or colour schemes as we didn't
think it would appropriate for such a small gathering, but to set the
tone and give some guidance for dress code we told people to imagine
they were going to a party thrown by Jay Gatsby."    

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"John wore a bespoke suite from Cad & The Dandy on
Saville Row. It had a maroon paisley lining inspired by Will Smith’s
‘Fresh Prince of Belair’ school blazer (when worn inside out).  He also
wore his Grandfather's 1940's wrist watch."

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"We sourced our champagne coupes in London and brought them to the
Lake District for the day. I think John thought I was mad for suggesting
it, but I'm really glad we did as they were one of my favourite details
of the décor."

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"Our photographer, Caro Hutchings was
wonderful, she blended seamlessly into the small group of guests and
made everyone feel at ease. In fact one family member asked whether she
was one of our university friends!"

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress


An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"Janine my bridesmaid/assistant did my hair, which I preferred as we
don’t live in the area so weren’t able to have trials anywhere local,
and for the same reason I did my own make up. I went to a Benefit store
before the wedding and had a make-up lesson and bought some products,
which was great as I learned a few things and also ended up with lots of
nice make-up to keep after the day! I also had eyelash extensions done
at
The Nail Salon in Windemere, which were great."

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"We didn't ask our assistants to wear anything specific or fit in
with any colour theme as we wanted everyone to just wear what they felt
best in.  Janine wore a black jumpsuit from Asos and Ben wore a Versace
suit with an Hermes scarf – they both looked fabulous!
"

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"My Dad walked me down the aisle, to Israel Kamakawiwo’ole’s
‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’. We chose this because of John’s love of
Hawaii and the ukulele, having lived there briefly with his sister when
he was younger.

We had two readings at the wedding; the
first was an extract from Wind, Sand and Stars (Terres des Hommes) by
Antoine de Saint-Exupery, read by John's sister Emma. This was combined
with a short quotation from Hamlet.  The second was the Walt Whitman
poem 'When I heard at the Close of the Day' read by Michelle's
bridesmaid Janine. We had spent a large proportion of our relationship
before getting married living in different cities whilst at university
or with our jobs, and this poem really captured particular feelings of
being reunited after time apart, which felt very relevant to us."

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"One of the main reasons we wanted to have a small wedding was
so that we could make a real fuss of each guest and tailor to day
towards them as well as us. There were 25 guests in total, and so we
bought everybody an individual present, all of which we wrapped up in
matching paper and ribbons and left on their chairs for the wedding
breakfast. Lots of the presents were home-made, or sourced around
markets in London such as Portobello and Greenwich markets. We also got a
lot of good ideas and gifts from Pinterest and Etsy.
"

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"Doing
the individual presents was probably the most rewarding part of the
whole preparation process – it was like the best Christmas morning to
sit amongst our closest friends and family and see them all open
surprise gifts we had spent so much time on."

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"We both loved waiting outside the dining room peeking through the
door watching our guests try to locate their silhouette place setting
around the table and discover their presents. Everyone looked so
excited, like a big game of musical chairs! It was wonderful to see
everyone look as happy as were feeling, and such a treat to be able to
surprise everyone with something nice after all of the kindness that
they had shown to us."

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

"After dinner our guests all went back to their rooms to put on
their pyjamas and we all met back in the drawing room to have tea and
sit by the fire. We set up a projector screen and put on Dirty Dancing,
and people drifted in and out to watch it; it really did feel like a
slumber party!"

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

Words of Wedded Wisdom… 

"My advice for the planning stages
is to choose the thing that is most important to you and build the day
around that – for us it was having really special food, but it might be
the music, dress, location or whatever else particularly matters to you.
Making compromises is inevitable and it's good to set out priorities
from the outset.
 

Personally, I am so glad that we chose to spend
the night before and morning of the wedding together rather than
separately – we were both so nervous beforehand, I would have felt much
worse to be apart from the only other person who knew how I felt!

And, as everyone says, enjoy it because it goes by so quickly, and don't worry about the small details!"

An Edwardian Crepe Silk Nightgown Wedding Dress

Exquisitly stylish, beautifully vintage, I kind of wish I had been a guest at this wedding.

Huge congratulations Michelle and John, and thank you so much for sharing your beautiful photographs too Caro, they really are wonderful.

Let's show some Friday afternoon love for this couple and sign off for the weekend on a high-note (don't think I'm going anywhere however, I have weekend goodies for you too!)

Annabel

Heart

 

Photographer – Caro Hutchings
Venue – The Samling, Ambleside, The
Lake District

Wedding Dress – An Edwardian crepe silk nightgown and dressing gown, via the bride's Mum
Brides Veil – Birdcage Veil, Gilded Shadows, Etsy
Bride's shoes – Kurt Geiger
Bride's accessories –
Grooms Suit – Cad & The Dandy + Grandfather’s 1940s wrist watch
Florist – The Flower Shop, Ambleside

Annabel

Annabel View all Annabel's articles

Founder of Love My Dress. Passionate Podcaster and Editor. Annabel lives in rural North Yorkshire with her husband and business partner Philip, their two daughters and menagerie of furry hounds. She loves photography, meditation, walking, being outdoors and star gazing. She is fierce when it comes to championing talent within the wedding industry and when she's not working on Love My Dress, she supports her husband Philip in the running of the family's sustainable flower farm and floral design business, Moonwind Flowers. In 2013, she became a published author.

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