Ok, who could use a sunny island getaway about now? Yeah, we thought so. For those of us not lucky enough to be jetting off to beachy paradise, do the next best thing and live vicariously through the fabulous Jewish wedding of UK couple Claudia, who works in advertising, and James, who works in affordable housing, who tied the knot in their favorite holiday destination, Mykonos.
We’re not sure what we love more, the totally epic locale, or the fact that Claudia and James worked with an amazing team of beloved Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendors to make their dream day a reality. Their first port of call was Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Elegante by Michelle J, who was, as always, “a dream to work with and took a lot of the stress off us in the planning process and the day.” Michelle helped the duo translate their island-perfect color scheme of crisp whites an blues into the fabulous day you see in the wonderful photos by Anna Roussos.
The couple’s stationers, Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Cartalia, designed the most exquisite pocket-style invitation suite in coordinating blues and whites, and the couple’s chazzan, Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Jonny Mosesson – who they flew out from London along with two of his musicians – performed in their trademark unforgettable style at the chuppah and again for the Israeli dancing.
And we haven’t even mentioned the fact that Claudia was lucky enough to have a bespoke wedding dress designed for her by a close friend of her mum’s – none other than Jenny Packham herself! We’ll turn you over to the bride for the rest…
How We Met
Claudia, the bride: We met through mutual friends in 2013, James had just finished his masters and Claudia had just finished her second year at university.
A Wedding in Mykonos
We got married in Mykonos, which was like our second home, we went for 7 summers in a row after we coincidently meeting a hotel owner of the Myconian Collection on our first trip there together, who we went on to become close friends with. With this connection we went back every year to stay with him at his hotel, once we got engaged Mykonos was a pipe dream wedding for us both and after we struggled to find the right venue in the UK we explored having our wedding in Mykonos.
As we had such an incredible friendship with the hotel owner it only made sense to get married in one of his hotels as he owned 11 hotels on the island. We decided on the Royal Myconian Hotel which suited our style of the wedding best, we had our Chuppah and reception on the Sunset Terrace and the dinner and dancing in the Horizon Suite upstairs.
Island Vibes
After we choose Mykonos, it only made sense to go with their style of crisp whites and blues that matched the style of the island. Claudia went for an elegant but timeless look that worked with the location and complemented the spaces we were having the wedding.
We hired our wedding planner, Michelle Jacobs of Elegante by Michelle J, when we first got engaged and there was never any dispute that we would use anyone else to plan our special day. Michelle hadn’t planned a wedding in Mykonos before but as we knew the island so well, we guided her with our knowledge and she used her international contacts and wedding expertise to put together our dream wedding.
Invitations / stationery
We found a company called Cartalia for our wedding invitations and stationery, Claudia found them on Pinterest after looking for a specific pocket style invite to house all the elements we needed for our invites and wedding day stationary. They had really unique styles and found them to be the perfect invitation for our wedding.
Hair + Make-up
After covid hit we weren’t able to bring out the suppliers we planned to from London, therefore we explored options on the island instead. My Make-up was done by freelance make-up artist called Maria of Makeup Mykonos who was amazing and had done celebrities such as Paris Hilton and Lady Gaga when they are on the island. My hair was done by the incredible Konstantinos Kontizas who brought my vision for my hair to life.
A Jenny Packham Dress
My dress was so special to me, my mum’s very good friend Jenny Packham designed my bespoke wedding dress for my wedding day. I knew the style that suited me after I went to a few places to try on dresses before meeting with Jenny to talk through what I was looking for.
She then sketched me some options to choose from, once I narrowed it down to one, her team then made me a few toiles until we got the right style to make the dress. At my final fitting I put on my actual dress, and it was magical, the dress was exactly what I envisioned and Jenny and her whole team made it such an unforgettable experience – THANK YOU!
Accessories
The jewellery I wore on my wedding day was my Grandma’s diamond tennis bracelet which she gave to me as a gift when I got engaged (this was my something old), my mums hoop diamond earrings (this was my something borrowed) and my diamond necklace which was also a gift from my Grandma for my Bat mitzvah which is a very special piece of mine.
I wore a crystal headpiece from Jenny Packham in my hair which complemented my dress, and my veil was plain by Jenny also as I didn’t want anything fussy to take away from my dress.
Wedding Choos
My shoes were gold glittered Jimmy Choo high heels with diamante detail on the front. They were surprisingly comfortable for such high shoes and I wore them the majority of the night before I changed into some chunky heels and then eventually flip flops 🙂
The handsome groom
James’s suit was tailor made from Esclot in Bond Street, he designed the full suit right down to the buttons and stitching on it. James had a vision of wearing two different coloured blues to complement the wedding party, so his suit jacket was a lighter blue (which had our names and wedding date embroider inside on the lining) and his trousers were a darker blue.
He also had two tailor made shirts made in white and two white pocket squares with his initials on. He wore Cartier cufflinks to match his watch which was Claudia’s wedding present to James, his shoes were handmade suede navy blue from Barrett an Italian brand.
Bridesmaids
I had 6 bridesmaids which included my sister as my Maid of Honour. The 5 girls wore blue sequin and chiffon dresses in two different styles from Jasmine Bridal which I brought from Boutique and Co in Fulham. My sisters (MOH) dress was from Jenny Packham which was a full-length blue sequin dress which complimented the bridesmaids.
Ceremony
We had a Jewish ceremony which was put together by our celebrant Jonathon Kustow, as our Rabbi options weren’t able to make it due to travel restrictions. With Jonny being Jewish himself we were able to put together a bespoke ceremony which included the Jewish traditions but also allowed for us to include readings and elements which wouldn’t normally be included in a traditional Jewish ceremony. My favourite part of the ceremony was the bedeken as it was such a special and emotional moment for us all.
We flew out our Chazzan, Jonny Mosesson and two of his musicians (a violinist and keyboard player) who performed our Jewish songs at the Chuppah and then later on before dinner they performed the Israeli dancing songs.
Ketubah
Our Ketubah was designed by The Ketubah Studio in Tel Aviv, it was a blue and gold style design to match the style of our wedding.
Chuppah
Our Chuppah was something we knew we wanted to be impactful but not over the top as the view from our Chuppah was spectacular. We used Studio 7 Mykonos for the flowers for our event and they also put together the structure and flowers on our Chuppah. The flowers were a combination of blue, white, blush pink and green to go with the rest of the wedding, with trailing white flowers at the back.
Our Music Choice
We had a DJ called Richard Horn at our wedding who was a renowned global DJ from the island, he was amazing at reading a crown and playing music which gets everyone up dancing. He also worked with a singer and saxophonist who came to perform at our wedding during the dinner between courses. Our music choices are vast and we wanted to appease all ages so went with a mix of old school, Motown, contemporary, house and pop music.
Our first dance was one of the most special moments of the night, it was sung my James’ brother (the best man) Matthew who once pursued a career in theatre performing. We worked with him to choose a song that we loved and suited his style of voice, which ended up being ‘You are the Reason’ by Calum Scott. Our wedding guests were blown away and wept at his performance, it was just MAGIC!
Flowers
Our flowers (as mentioned above) were by Studio 7 Mykonos, we had a mix of hydrangeas, roses, wisteria, eucalyptus, ruskus, ivy, freesia, delphinium and amaranthus. Studio 7 were incredible and really brought my vision for the Chuppah and wedding dinner to life. They ordered in special blue candles, and centre pieces just for us and together with Michelle made our vision come to life.
Photographer and videographer
Our photographer and videographer had both filmed previous weddings at our venue and had worked with Jewish couples before, so understood the special moments of the day.
Our photographer was called Anna Roussos. She has an elegant and captivating style to her work which was different to a generic Jewish wedding photographer. She knew the island and timings that would work best to capture the best light for our wedding day. Anna has an incredible attention to detail and worked with us so closely to bring our vision to life and was a pleasure to work with her and her partner Thanos.
Our videographer was called Mont Videography and they had also a unique way to filming weddings to capture the special day, Tassos who runs the company worked with us to ensure they recorded all our special moments on the day. They knew the best ways to film in the heat and wind that Mykonos is known for which can be tricky for videographers. They even used a drone to capture the ceremony and wedding from above which really captured the atmosphere and scenery.
Food
The food was catered by the food and beverage team at the Royal Myconian Hotel who’s food was so delicious so only made sense to use them. We worked with the team to choose a bespoke menu for our guests which would be tasty and not too heavy for them to enjoy the evening.
We didn’t want a cake as this never seems to get eaten but instead went with a dessert buffet so guests could come and go as the pleased. We then also had mid-night food for all the guests to enjoy should they be hungry, and the only food Claudia knew she would eat on the night.
Entertainment
We had DJ Richard Horn along with asinger and saxophonist. Sound Mykonos supplied all of the sound, light and staging.
Favours
We wanted to give our guests welcome gifts typical of Mykonos to show our appreciation for them making the huge effort to come to Mykonos for our wedding. Michelle, our planner, found a lady on the island who supplied us with typical Myconian bags and accessories and Cartalia, our stationery created a welcome note to go with them.
We arranged for each hotel where guests were staying to place these bags in the guests’ rooms ahead of their arrival. It was so lovely to see so many of them being used around the pool both before and after our wedding day.
Extra details
The only unusual and unexpected element I can think of was James’ brother singing our first dance, we knew he wouldn’t want to make a speech and wanted to involve him in some way so asked if he would sing our first dance. It was touch a go along the way as he has stage fright and hadn’t performed in years but it was so special to us and all our guests.
The whole wedding was thought out by James and I and my parents, it was our vision of the day that made it complement our style and tailored to us. We worked on having the blue elements pull through in all aspects to go with the island, from the flowers, to the wedding stationary, to the centre pieces on the tables, to the ushers suites and bridesmaids gown right down to the candles on the tables.
Honeymoon
We are hoping to go to New York and Costa Rica for our honeymoon in April 2022, as our original plan to go to the Singapore and Philippines in January 2022 had to be cancelled due to restrictions for travelling there.
Advice to couples currently planning their wedding
My advice would be definitely hire a wedding planner (if you can afford to), Michelle was a dream to work with and took a lot of the stress off us in the planning process and the day. Also, to not get stressed about the small stuff and finer details that may mean a lot to you but could go unnoticed by your wedding guests, on the day everything will fall into place and be your dream day. This is something I had to keep telling myself along the way especially with battling planning a wedding during Covid and having to delay it a year.
Claudia & James’ little white book
Photographer – Anna Roussos
Videographer – Mont Videography
Wedding planner – Elegante by Michelle J {offers 10% discount to all members of Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club}
Stationery – Cartalia
Chazan – Jonny Mosesson {offers 10% discount to all members of Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club}
Venue – Royal Myconian Hotel
Bride’s dress – Jenny Packham
Bride’s shoes – Jimmy Choo
Bride’s accessories – Jenny Packham
Groom’s attire – Esclot
Bridesmaids – Jasmine Bridal from Boutique and Co
Hair + Makeup – Konstantinos Kontizas, Makeup Mykonos
Florist –Studio 7 Mykonos
DJ – Richard Horn
Production – Sound Mykonos
Rentals – Blue Event Rentals Mykonos
Ketubah – The Ketubah Studio
Officiant – Jonathon Kustow
If you’re a Jewish or Jew-ish bride-to-be, you’ll want to join Smashing The Glass’ Brides Club. Guided by the world’s number 1 Jewish wedding expert, Karen Cinnamon, Brides Club is the private community for Jewish and Jew-ish brides that removes wedstress and indecision and gives you what you need to plan with confidence during these uncertain times. Join our Brides Club here.
