Lizzie & Luke
Living in London, Lizzie and Luke wanted to celebrate their classic Bathers Pavilion wedding in a familiar place. They chose Luke’s childhood church, a reception venue at a restaurant in a spot filled with happy memories for the bride and most importantly, they chose to include as many of their family and friends as they possibly could. Even choosing Paul McMillan of Illustro Photography , a family friend, to take photos of the wedding day.
Lizzie tells the story of how they met. “We met at university – we were both studying law and lived in residential colleges next door to one another. We were in Cadequés in Spain for a long weekend from London after I had just finished a set of exams. We went on a long walk to a beautiful secluded lighthouse, and Luke got down on one knee and proposed.”
Living in London, Lizzie chose Elizabeth Todd to make her dress, remarking, “The dress I chose was the very first dress I tried on. Having tried on lots of dresses all around London, I couldn’t stop thinking about the first one! Elizabeth Todd make all their dresses in their studio below the store in Marylebone.
The dress I originally tried on was a sample, but I was able to work with the designer, Sophie (daughter of Elizabeth Todd) to create my perfect dress. Sophie started by making a calico template of the corset, and built the dress from there. It was such an amazing experience, and Sophie made it really relaxing and fun. My dress was very simple but classic. I absolutely loved wearing it!”
Lizzie and Luke chose St Mark’s Anglican Church, Darling Point for their ceremony, noting, “Luke and I decided to have the ceremony close to his family home, at a place that was meaningful to him, and to have the reception somewhere near my family home at a place which was special to me. St Marks at Darling Point is Luke’s family church. He and his siblings were christened there, and went to pre-school there.”
Lizzie remembers, “I walked down the aisle to Songbird, by Fleetwood Mac. My brother is a musician (in the band Art vs Science) so he did all the music for our ceremony along with Sydney singer, Elly Cullington.”
“Family and friends are really important to both of us, and we both come from very big, warm families, so we really wanted to include as many of our family and friends as we could in the ceremony. This was particularly important to us because we live in London, so don’t get to see a lot of our family these days.
We had five bridesmaids and five groomsmen, and Luke’s two sisters walked his little nephew (the ring bearer) down the aisle. My brother did all the music, and our siblings (8 of them between our two families) all sang a hymn together. My great aunt, Luke’s sister, one of Luke’s best friends from London, and two of my best friends did readings.
We really did find as many roles as we could for people! We took a long time choosing the readings, as we really wanted them to mean something to us and be relevant to our lives and our relationship. We had two Bible readings (required by the church) and two non-religious readings. They were: – Ecclesiastes: 4:9-12 – 1 Peter 3: 8-11 – Apache Wedding Blessing by E Arnold; Union by Robert Fulghum.”
Of their photographer, Lizzie remarks, “The photographer was Paul McMillan of Illustro Photography. Paul has known my family since I was in primary school, so it was really lovely to have him taking our photos. Paul takes beautiful natural and candid photos, and has a way of blending into the background so that you hardly realise he’s there! He captured the feeling of the day so well – every time I look at the photos I feel like I am there again! We are so happy with how the photos turned out.”
Lizzie and Luke chose Bathers’ Pavilion, Balmoral for their reception, telling, “Rob Davis, the events manager at The Bathers Pavilion was brilliant. I was in London until a week before the wedding, so most of the organising was done by email. Rob responded to emails really quickly, and nothing was too difficult for him. His first response was always to say yes, and then figure out how to make it happen! He made everything feel so easy and simple, though I know it wasn’t on his side! Rob and his staff also made everything go seamlessly on the night. And the food was really amazing.”
Guests received miniature bottles of limoncello, says Lizzie, “We did our own wedding favors which doubled as place cards. My sister bought 50ml glass bottles with little cork stoppers on Ebay and we filled them with limoncello. We then bought little brown cardboard tags and string from Ebay and wrote our guests’ names on each one. We tied the tags around the neck of the bottles with brown string and they were our name tags. The best man asked everyone to toast with them at the end of his speech.”
Lizzie tells, “The speeches were really important to us, so we had a lot of them! We had speeches from Luke’s mum, my dad, my maid of honour (my big sister) and Luke’s best man (his best mate). Luke and I also spoke. We also chose two of our best and funniest friends to be joint MCs.
The speeches all went down really well – particularly those of the best man and maid of honour, who are both incredible public speakers and managed to achieve the perfect combination of funny, thoughtful, and (importantly) appropriate in their speeches!”
Lizzie remembers, “We were both really excited about doing a proper first dance, but we didn’t want it to be too corny or slow. We chose “You’re My Best Friend” by Queen. We went to a few swing dancing lessons to prepare for it and learned a basic routine. We had so much fun doing the classes and learned how to dance in a couple for the first time since high school!”
One last special touch of the day? Hugh Joyner put together this film (complete with drone footage by the bride’s brother) of the festivities.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3Vpmu_GBUw
Congratulations on your marriage Lizzie and Luke! Thank you for sharing your day with us! Thank you also to Paul McMillan of Illustro Photography for sharing today’s wedding!
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