Amy & Dan

You’re are going to LOVE this mornings wedding. The eclectic 70’s American bohemian style at Wood Farm Barns is a thing of wonder. There’s patriotic flags, traditional mail boxes and signs, all combined with macrame hangings, succulent centrepieces and greenery. Making some pretty fabulous PIN-spiration.

The couples love of New York and the outside runs deeper still, even opting for a New York cheesecake as their wedding cake, plus their fabulous camper van photo booth also originated from New York. Have you seen all the props yet? So cool.

The mood looks perfectly chilled and inviting and we can’t thank Steed Photography for sharing her beautiful captures with us.

Venue

Amy the Bride : We stayed in the most incredible barn called “Alfred’s Barn” at Grove Farm in Bramfield which is approx 20 minutes from the venue. We stayed there the whole weekend with our family and friends. It was the perfect place for us to get ready on the morning of the wedding as it is open plan so we could all chat and drink champagne whilst having our hair done. The barn has been tastefully restored with old meets modern. Just my style!

We chose Wood Farm Barn as our venue as it is very close to where I grew up and we loved the fact the Barn is fairly untouched and hasn’t got a very “commercial” look to it. The barn sits on its own surrounded by beautiful countryside, a small lake and a woodland area. It has no residential buildings around so we could make as much noise as we wanted!

Transport

The 1960’s Cadillac cars that picked us up from the accommodation to take us to the venue were arranged by my father, who is a classic car enthusiast. We had no idea what the cars were, all they knew was that they were old and American!

Ceremony

The ceremony was short and personal. I walked down the aisle to ‘First Day Of My Life’ by Bright Eyes, played by Dan’s band mates. The reading during the ceremony was the lyrics from a Ryan Adams song ‘My Love For You Is Real’. Ryan Adams is an artist that we are huge fans of so, naturally, the first dance was ‘When The Stars Go Blue’ by Ryan Adams.

Colour Scheme & Decor

The Bohemian American style for the wedding didn’t come from following the latest trend in weddings but from a pure love of this style. Our home is heavily influenced by this style, and lots of our own pieces were used to decorate the venue and bar: everything from a bamboo sofa from the bedroom, to some 70’s wicker trays from the kitchen to serve the prosecco!
We purchased a few special bits to add to the decor (that I secretly wanted anyway so I used the wedding as a good excuse to purchase these!) such as an old American mailbox from a farm in the US, wooden beer barrel-top sign from Brooklyn Brewery and a lovely ‘Forever’ affirmation banner by Secret Holiday Co which we had on display as we signed the register.

Groomsmen

The decision for the groom and his men to wear brown suits was made quickly as it suited the 70’s theme and I just love a man in a brown suit! Trying to find one though was a challenge as every place we tried only sold blue or grey suits! The groomsmen wore beige linen ties and Dan’s tie was custom made using fabric from my favourite textile designer, Brooklyn based Amelie Mancini. It was also beige linen but with a Cacti print.

Bridal

I was dreading shopping for my dress. I haven’t got a traditional taste when it comes to bridal gowns, and I knew I wouldn’t find anything locally. However, my dress search wasn’t too painful thanks to Instagram. I was perusing the ‘bohodress’ hashtag and found the account of ‘Lucy Can’t Dance‘ a maker of bridal wear for non-traditional brides… perfect! The whole collection was stunning, I could have chosen any of them but as soon as I saw the ‘Jungle Fever’ dress, I knew it was the one. The lace was made up of an almost fern-like, leaf print and I have a fern tattoo on my arm which is similar as I adore plants and nature so this dress was perfect for me!

Bridesmaids

My bridesmaids wore cream maxi dresses from Mango which had a 70s look to them as they had flowing angel sleeves. They wore tan clogs and their hair down with plaits in keeping with 1970’s hippie style. The flower girls wore floral lace retro style dresses from Minibasic and they looked adorable.

Beauty

Hair was by a popular local hairstylist Flamingo Amy, who specialises in retro and vintage style hair. I wanted something very relaxed and hippie like and she got it bang on.

Keep It Local

As well as sticking to a subtle American theme for the wedding it was important to us that we used local independent suppliers or the talents of our friends, to make sure the wedding was personal to us.
The bridesmaids’ wore copper necklaces with raw quartz stone which were made by local maker Sophie of Moon & Moss.
The incredible macrame table plan and table mats were made by local fibre artist Jenny of Fringe & Fray.

We had our first date at The Birdcage which is our local in the lovely Norwich Lanes. The owner, Lauren Gregory, just so happens to run her own events/party planning company, Lullaby Inc., so it made perfect sense to have them run the bar. The brief was to have the bar loosely set on our favourite honky tonk bar Skinny Dennis which is in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. We spent the night in this bar when we got engaged and drank lots of Tito’s vodka so we just had to have mini bottles of Tito’s as our wedding favours.

Lullaby did a fantastic job of creating an American style bar by adorning it with taxidermy and having a speciality drinks shelf named ‘The United Spirits of America’.

The bar area also featured various bits from our home such as old American number plates, a 1970s American flag which we picked up from Brooklyn Flea market and a 1970s bamboo rack to store the wine.

Florist

All things floral were by the amazing Jo Flowers. I have been a big fan of Jo’s work for sometime, having met her at local craft fayres over the years. The flowers were rustic but romantic with an American twist. Jo created installations that hung from the barn ceiling using bamboo hoops from IKEA. The idea was influenced by the foliage hoops that featured on the wedding invitations, which were designed by one of Dan’s groomsmen (and illustrator) Jim Goreham.

Stationery

Jim was asked to create something that represents us a couple with some foliage thrown in. The invitations featured our portraits in a foliage hoop, along with sketches of New York, guitars, records, booze and house plants – everything we adore.

Food

Norwich based Proper Pizza Co put on an American BBQ inspired feast during the day, followed by wood fired pizza in the evening to enjoy with some Krispy Creme donuts and baskets of American sweets. Our cake was a New York-style cheesecake made by one of our bridesmaids, Sarah.

Entertainment

We are lucky enough to know a wedding DJ so he spun a great set of indie disco classics into the early hours and we never left the dance floor. I wanted the DJ boot to fit in with the theme too, so we dressed it with some bamboo trellis and a wooden ‘let’s dance’ sign hung above. I also used wooden crates each side of the booth to display our bouquets in vases and some plants. (A money saving tip there for brides: use your bouquets as part of the decor in the evening).

The photo booth was provided by The Boho Booth, as soon as I found them I fell in love! It was exactly my style so I quickly sent an enquiry to them but unfortunately they were booked for our date. However 2 weeks before our wedding I received an email to say they were now available on our date. I just had to make our budget stretch so we could book them and I’m SO glad I did as it was one of the highlights of the day. The guests loved it and had so much fun with the beautiful stylish props which included animal masks and faux flower crowns.

Final Thoughts

The day turned out exactly how we envisaged it. It was incredibly relaxed, we felt it represented ‘us’ as we made sure personal touches were included but most importantly we celebrated with all of our family and friends. If I’ve learnt anything from our day, it’s that if you’re a laid back bride and groom, your guests will feel the same and it will naturally be a happy, relaxed day.

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