Emma and Adam's Gold and Marsala Garden Party Wedding

Emma & Adam

Adam and I met for a coffee at night and sat at the beach talking about the possibility of land sharks (sharks that had evolved to be amphibious and eat beach goers obviously!) for our first date. It wasn’t really a conventional first date, but we both enjoyed it enough for a second date, and from there our story began.

Our wedding day was something I was simultaneously excited and anxious about. As a wedding photographer myself, I had some self-imposed pressure to create something magnificent and unique, something not so “white” or “bridal” and something I hadn’t seen before (which was a huge task for someone who was inundated with wedding ideas constantly via work!) I wanted my guests to feel relaxed and have fun, and to look at the day we had created and say “Yes, this is so fitting for Emma and Adam”.

I started, as most people do, on Pinterest, but I got way too caught up in all the trends and DIY bits and pieces and it was frankly, pretty overwhelming. So I went to my best friend, who had created the most stunning personalised wedding for herself and her husband a year earlier and she talked me down from my mini meltdown. She suggested that I start with some colours that I liked, and go from there. Immediately the ball was rolling and I became obsessed with this rich, decadent gold, marsala, plum, burgundy and dark green winter styling.

We knew we wanted a space that would be our own, where we could create a relaxed garden party atmosphere. We needed to be able to bring our two little fur-babies along for the wedding and it had to fit in with the rich colours and deep wood tones of our styling – Capriole Estate was it, and it was a huge bonus that it had enough accommodation for our families and camping was available onsite for our guests.

We decided early on that we wanted the reception to be outdoors, under the stars with festoon lights and beautiful occasional furniture, and hearty, filling food (plus a killer dessert table!) Adam is very handy, and has made many pieces of the wooden furniture that adorns our home. When I started showing him some of my ideas, he suggested maybe he should make some wooden furniture to use for the ceremony and reception.

So we hired some beautiful lounges, armchairs, lighting and long wooden farmhouse tables, and Adam got to work building a lighting feature, a counter for our food to be served over, bench seats and coffee tables for our reception. Having Wild Heart Weddings to coordinate on the day was some of the best money I have ever spent. All the little things that I had forgotten to delegate or organise on the day were taken care of. Our drinks were restocked, the ceremony furniture was moved up to the reception, our cheese platters (that I told myself I was going to make up on the day, pfffft) were created, I didn’t have to speak to anyone or answer any questions and I felt so calm and relaxed knowing everything was taken care of.

There was no way our day would have been complete without including our naughty little dachshunds, Pepper and Bueno. I organised a doggy sitter to take them home and stay with them after the ceremony though, because I didn’t want them to be overwhelmed and for us to stress about them getting stepped on at the reception! Our florist Julia from Ginger Lily & Rose Floral Studio made them some stunning little floral collars and they stole the show in the ceremony as the ring bearers!

Our guests loved the German sausages, mini Burgers and pulled pork buns – and the dessert table was the hit of the night. The Krispy Kremes were the first to go, along with the baked New York cheesecake made lovingly by our good friend Karen. People were scared to cut into our main wedding cake, a gold sequinned masterpiece created by Madam Macaron, and some guests were suffering chocolate hangovers the next day from the decadent Cherry Ripe mud cake made by one of my past brides and talented baker Ilana!

Food (especially dessert!) was important to us – we were extremely conscious of having enough of it and making sure that it was delicious, which was why we enlisted the fabulous Mick from Capelli Foods to fancy up our humble menu options!

It truly is a crazy experience. I have watched more than 250 couples get married, and I mean REALLY watched them. “Followed-them-around-with-a-camera-all-day” kinda watched them, and then relived that day for weeks as I processed their images, and remembered their friends and faces and all the moments of the day. So when it was my turn, I thought I would know exactly how everything would go, but I was so wrong – it was a truly unique experience for me! The confetti was something that nearly didn’t get done in time but I’m so glad it made it – some of my favourite shots are of that confetti being thrown in our faces – at my request haha!

We were so very lucky to have some of my incredible friends as our wedding suppliers. Lani is a really close friend of mine, and she and Andrea captured the most beautiful images from our day. She was battling a terrible flu, and didn’t even get to make the most of the food but you would never have known looking at the beautiful story of our day, which along with our amazing wedding video from my pals Kris and Delyse from Jasper & Ruby Visions, is all we have left to remember the day. It’s so surreal looking back now, almost like an out-of-body experience, so I am so glad that I have this video and these beautiful images to remind me of every minute.