Real Life Wedding at Lainston House

We met a loooooong time ago! When I was at college and Jon had just finished university, we were both working at the local library in the cafe. I fancied Jon straight away, and set to work trying to woo him…not very successfully clearly. However we stayed in touch for the next 5 years and finally after I finished university and moved back to Winchester we started dating! It was another quite long wait until the proposal, we had been together for 6 years and had gone on a trip to Venice to celebrate my birthday. However, disaster struck as Venice was flooded! We had to wear waders everywhere…not many dry spots to take a knee! Jon persevered and on the evening of our first day when we were taking a selfie on a bridge, he put the ring box on my head. I turned around to see what he was doing and that’s when he asked me to marry him! It was a complete surprise and I was delighted of course to say yes!

I have always loved Lainston House. As a local it was always at the top of my list as a wedding venue. When we got engaged it was the first place we visited and we loved it from the start. We felt duty bound to see some other places but you really can’t compare anywhere else to Lainston! The beautiful house itself, the staff, the views, the food. It’s all so amazing that no-where else stood a chance.

I wouldn’t say we had a theme, but certainly bright colours were the inspiration. We saw these amazing vintage painted chairs, and Jon really loved them. At first we weren;t going to hire them as we felt they were an additional expense to an already expensive day so I set about trying to bring colour in other ways such as the flowers, candles, bunting and bridesmaids dresses. But it wasn’t enough! In the end we did hire the chairs and we were so happy we did, they were probably the most commented-on thing on the day and they looked so gorgeous in the sun. They made the day feel unique and totally our own.

My dress was from Grace Loves Lace and was actually a top and a skirt in separate pieces. It had a gorgeous train and was a beautiful silk that had a vintage look to it. The silk really glimmered in the amazing sun that we had on the day!

We were so worried about the weather! But the day came and it was glorious sun! Seeing all our friends and family in their colourful outfits drinking and laughing in the sun was a real highlight for me.

We were watching them all go into the barn for the meal from a secret little spot and it was so nice to have a quiet moment with Jon as well as just luxuriate in seeing everyone together after planning the day for so long.

I’m not sure we did too many things which were particularly unique! We had some amazing speeches from friends and family, we did some little changes to the norm such as doing scratch cards as the favours on the tables, centerpieces and jam jars made by my mum and her friends which I thought were gorgeous, and the cake was made by one of my bridesmaids. All of these little bits added together to make it a really special day which felt personal to us.

Our band, Mr Kanish, we had seen at a friend’s wedding and really loved, so it was great to see them again at our wedding! They were brilliant and got everyone on the dancefloor as well as doing a beautiful cover of our first dance song - Love you for a Long Time by Maggie Rogers.

Enjoy it! We planned our wedding through covid, so it actually happened a year later than planned. Hopefully you won’t need to contend with anything similar, but even through all that we never got too stressed about it. It’s supposed to be a fun day, so try not to take it too seriously! The major thing to remember is that whenever you’re a wedding guest, you’re just enjoying yourself and not picking apart the minute details of the wedding…so remember that when you are stressing!

Photographer @joelillywhite.photography
Flowers @bloomsdonebeautifully 
Styling @purpledoorprops 
Lindsey's Dress @grace_loves_lace 
Jonathan's Suit @suitsupply
Bridesmaids dresses @etsyuk