Chelsea and Pete's 'Crazy In Love' Brisbane Wedding

Chelsea and Pete

All Pete and I wanted for our wedding was a celebration! To make this happen we knew there were a few special ingredients – lots of good food, plenty of drinks, an explosion of colour and of course, Beyonce!

I am not a traditional bride, but I was marrying a more traditional Greek boy – so there was always going to be some compromise! A white dress (and not leopard print!) was the first of many. Luckily, I bought the first one I tried on at Carla Zampatti. Living away from my family, it was all done before I had even had my morning coffee; after a few MMS messages with my Mum, I had a dress.

Of course the big day didn’t go down without some hiccups… like Pete realising 30 minutes before the car arrived that tying a bow-tie wasn’t as ‘easy’ or as simple as ‘watching a video on You Tube’. They ended up taking it to the streets, walking into various shops and asking if anyone knew how to tie one – and amazingly, a lovely lady did! And then there was the story of the missing white shirt for the Groom – but we won’t go there!

I wanted my girls to look and feel as beautiful as possible (not hard as they are all stunners!) so I picked all of their dresses for them from interstate – thank goodness for online shopping from ASOS, Bardot and Sheike!

Our photographer was Simon Peter Taylor who was actually a friend from uni and husband of my good friend so it was great to have him there as a guest and also photographer – it made it so much more comfortable!

As many of our guests were traveling interstate to celebrate with us at Light Space in Brisbane for our big day, we wanted to make it worth their while. With all of the planning being done from interstate, there was lots of DIY creating happening at Toowoomba Wedding HQ! All 800 coloured paper tassels, painting, napkin making – you name it, it was created. As a surprise for Pete’s Mum, we secretly flew up their family Greek priest to perform the ceremony to honour his late Baba and Papou. This did mean however that at least 80% of the guests had no idea what was going on during the ceremony (including me!) but we are assured we are actually married!

The most emotional part of the day was definitely having Dad walk me up the aisle. The past two years have been difficult with him having under gone countless spinal operations and months in hospital. His only wish was to ‘walk his little girl down the aisle’. Every surgeon, doctor, physio, pharmacist involved knew this had to happen. I know he was in pain, but we made it! Even the walking stick was dressed up when we added a big white bow to it!

To get the party started, we had cocktail specialists Trolley’d from Sydney dish out three bespoke beverages and roaming canapes.

Then for a change of pace and a change of shoes… we entered the room which had been ‘flipped’ and turned into a colourful feast for your eyes of vibrant tassles and pinatas! The lighting by Wedding Lighting looked amazing! For main course, it was all about quality and quantity with shared platters of food from Dalton Hospitality. Everyone commented on how delicious the food was and how much there was – big tick!

Dessert was our favourite – Gelato Messina (Salted Caramel White Chocolate of course!) and trays of handmade glitter jewel chocolates, meringues, marshmallows, shortbread – you name it we had it! And of course – the cake was not a cake. Instead we had Party Pony Designer Pinatas make us a big sparkly, pink heart pinata … it really was a HIT! (get it?!)

Our first dance was to ‘XO” by Beyonce (naturally) and then the spirits were poured and the dance floor and photo booth kicked off. And, in the off chance people were still hungry, we had bowls of bow tie pasta (Pete’s Baba’s recipe) and wood fired pizza on offer. Lucky we did because the party didn’t stop until 4:30am when we finally made our way to the hotel and ordered room service! It was truly the best celebration of our life.