We’ve seen some pretty cute table plans, but today’s Jewish wedding has got one of the very best: tangerines! Yes, bride Emma (who just happens to be a dietitian — how perfect, right?!) and groom Joseph (a citrus-living lawyer) had the clever idea to pin a paper “leaf” with each guest’s name and table number on one piece of fruit, and it was just the most adorable thing.
And that’s just one of the wonderful, personal touches these two incorporated into their wedding day in beautiful Harrogate, North Yorkshire, perfectly captured by Ruthless Images. There’s the quintessentially Yorkshire venue, the modern chuppah adorned with asymmetrical florals, the smoking shots served to guests on the dance floor (!) — and that’s just for starters.
The simple dark wooden frame was dressed with an asymmetrical floral design. Loose tendrils of soft ruscus and ivy trailed down.
Now over to Emma, who looked so classically elegant in Rosa Clara…
How we met
Emma, the bride: Joe and I started dating after we sat next to each other on the plane on the way to our gap year, seats were allocated alphabetically — Emma Coupland was sat next to Joseph Davis! Seven years later Joe proposed to me with the help of my family dog (Joe put the ring on his collar!). It was adorable, my favourite boys together!
A Yorkshire Wedding
As a proud northern girl it was only fitting that we would get married in the beautiful town of Harrogate, North Yorkshire. We chose The Old Swan Hotel for its stunning Garden Room, featuring an original exposed iron beamed ceiling and floor to ceiling windows overlooking the lawns, gardens and surrounding Yorkshire stone houses.
Organic Chic
They say opposites attract, and this is very much the case. However when planning our wedding we combined all our loves and interests to ensure that our day was perfect and reflected our individual personalities and our love for each other.
Joe is very much a city boy; however, we both love the outdoors and love going on country escapes. We wanted our wedding to have an organic yet chic theme.
My late granny was a florist and I spent my childhood surrounded by flowers so I knew these would need to be one of the main attractions at our wedding.
Floral Invitations
Our planner Nicola designed our invitations and was extremely patient when I was being particular about our font, we must have looked at hundreds! Our invitations reflected our wedding theme, a simple white textured card with cascading floral print with a simple foiled silver calligraphy – we loved them! All wedding stationery, including place names were in the same font, and I loved how this continued our theme.
Smooth Planning
Our wedding planners Nicola and Janice from Smooth Operator spent time getting to know us, and pointed us towards vendors they felt would help us achieve the wedding we wished for.
Nicola and Janice were fabulous, they took all my ideas and made them a reality and on the day of the wedding they were reassuring, relaxed, and ensured that the day ran like clockwork.
Hair + Makeup
My hair and makeup were done by local, independent hair and makeup artists. Jamie Edwards Bulloch did my makeup, natural and long-lasting, while Lisa Myers did my hair in a low chignon that did not move all night!
Both ladies were fantastic and lovely to have around on the morning of our wedding. I could not recommend them more! Jamie also put ‘makeup’ on my flower girls, with the help of a clean brush!
A Rosa Clara Dress
I wore Pasion by Rosa Clara. This was the first dress I tried on and I fell in love with its simple yet dramatic bead-encrusted back and sleeves.
I had originally seen this dress online, and it was fate that the only store that stocked it in the UK was Knutsford Wedding Gallery which is conveniently near to my parents’ house! When I tried it on I knew it was the dress for me and that Joe would love it.
A Dramatic Veil
My dress was accompanied by a dramatic 10-foot veil; this made to order by Knutsford Wedding Gallery.
My mum bought her dress in Madrid and whilst there we went especially to Rosa Clara to purchase the matching hair piece to my dress. We wanted to ensure that that the intricate beading on my dress continued into my hair.
I also wore a yellow gold diamond ring made by Joe’s late grandfather who had been a jeweller, making my outfit even more special.
Alice Bow Insoles
I had read that the Duchess of Cambridge wears certain insoles in her shoes to ensure of maximum comfort, so I wore the same Alice Bow insoles in my ivory satin kitten heels. They were so comfortable and I managed to keep them on all night!
The handsome groom
Joe wore a tailor made Mullan and Mullan midnight blue suit with a black shawl collar and trouser stripe. Underneath he wore a slim fit dinner shirt with a black bow tie and braces, all from Thomas Pink. He wore black patent Stemar shoes.
His outfit was finished off with my wedding gift to him, engraved silver cuff links from an independent jeweller from my hometown of Leeds. He looked so handsome and adorable, I was so proud to see him standing under the chuppah!
A Maid of Honor and Flower Girls
My sister was maid of honour and as the only adult bridesmaid she had free rein in dress choice! We had been recommended to go to NABBD (Not Another Boring Bridesmaid Dress!) and they were fantastic. My sister had the option to choose from 14 designers, over 300 dresses, all available in a selection of colours. She chose to wear Liana in Denmark Blue by Jenny Yoo.
Our three flower girls wore handmade dressed by Gilly Gray. I had been really specific when looking for their dresses as I wanted their dresses to compliment mine. Gilly Gray was fantastic and was able to match us perfectly.
The flower girls each carried a single white rose wand, framed with delicate soft ruscus foliage. My MOH carried a simple and elegant petite handtied design of the same white roses.
The young girls each wore a floral crown made in soft ruscus foliage with small white floral detailing and MOH had the same white flowers tied into her hair.
Our 5 young bridesmaids and pageboys are Joe’s nieces and nephews. The little boys dressed to match ‘Uncle Joe’!
Our family and friends read our Sheva Brachot under the chuppah and the youngest niece joined us under there when her Dad came up!
A Modern Chuppah
We had planned for an outdoor chuppah; however this proved too ambitious for Northern England, and when rain fell on our wedding day in the middle of England’s hottest and driest summer our contingency plan was rolled out!
The ceremony took place in the hotels’s Wedgward room under its famous, exquisite glass ceiling. Our florist, Red Floral Architecture, was incredible and transformed the room into our chic, organic vision!
When I saw our chuppah, it was more perfect than I had dreamt. Joe and I had been keen to make sure that, although it was to be modern and heavily decorated, it still resembled the traditional Jewish canopy, and Red Floral outdid themselves, it was perfect.
The simple dark wooden frame was dressed with an asymmetrical floral design. Loose tendrils of soft ruscus and ivy trailed down, with white roses, hydrangea, and other delicate seasonal white blooms enhanced the organic chic theme of the day.
A Memorable Ceremony
Our ceremony was conducted by my close family friend Rabbi Jason Klieman. He was the third person to hold me when I was born at 33 weeks which made the ceremony even more special for us!
After the ceremony our family and friends sang and danced us from the chuppah, the atmosphere was amazing. Joe and I kept looking at each other, the moment was surreal. We were finally married and surrounded by the people closest to us. It is a moment that we will never forget.
Our guests then enjoyed the reception. They were given the option of roaming through the characteristic rooms of the striking hotel, or lounging on the lawn in front of the imposing building.
Chuppah Music
We walked in to our favourite chuppah music, sang by local singer Ilan Sherman. In the months before our wedding we had spent time chatting with Ilan, making sure that all the songs he sang were perfect for us.
Joe walked into ‘Mehera Hashem’ and I walked into ‘Boi Beshalom’. The badeken took place on the aisle and Ilan timed it perfectly so that as Joe was covering my face with the veil ‘Eishet Chayil’ started playing. We were both in tears!
Delicate Flowers
Red Floral, together with Light Tech, worked wonders in our reception room. Hessian-covered tables held transparent glass bottles, jam jars, and cut-glass decanters which meandered throughout each table holding delicate white blooms including bouvardia, freesia and anemones.
Soft ruscus foliage entwined throughout to create a delicate garland effect. This finished with tealights to illuminate the lower levels to create a Mediterranean outdoor chic feel. Festoon lighting draped from the ceiling between green foliage, this was intentionally placed to make sure that the ornate iron beams were still exposed!
Photographer
During early discussion with Nicola and Janice I had been really particular about the style of photography we wanted. Smooth Operator recommended Ruth of Ruthless Images and she was fabulous and an absolute delight to work with!
From helping me get into my dress in the morning, through to our post-wedding night shoot she was lovely and had us feeling relaxed and giggling throughout the day. Pre-wedding we had spent time getting to know Ruth, and her work reflects exactly the style we had discussed – natural, beautiful images capturing the characteristic features of the hotel and North Yorkshire town.
Videographer
Rebecca Reville was our videographer. We chose to use her because I had seen her work before and thought it was wonderful; she really captured the emotion and excitement of our day, and was a pleasure to work with.
Yorkshire Meets the Middle East
Joe and I love food, and eating out is one of our favourite things to do! Celia Clyne was fantastic and together we came up with a menu that combined all our favorites.
Starter was roast beef and Yorkshire pudding with horseradish sauce and gravy (Yorkshire wedding needs Yorkshire pud!), followed by a main course of barbeque glazed pargiot and baby aubergine with tahini and harrisa dressing, served with middle eastern rice with pomegranate seeds.
Joe doesn’t like potato so we had to make sure that this was not on the menu! Dessert was deconstructed Crunchie with honeycomb ice cream. This is my favourite chocolate bar so was a must have!
Smoking Shots
We used Jonny Cocktail drinks service. His staff were friendly, fun, and attentive. Each table had a dedicated member looking after them to ensure that the drinks were flowing.
We had chosen five cocktails for our guests to choose from, including Joe’s favourite Old Fashioned. We also had ‘Emma and Joseph’s Wedding Gin Bar’ and our guests were able to custom their gin as they liked it! ‘Smoking shots’ were also handed round the dance floor, along with iced hand towels at Joe’s request!
It’s All About You
Our guests enjoyed music by The Creation Showband, It was appropriate that they played at our wedding as Joe’s bar mitzvah was one of their first gigs 13 years ago!
Our first dance was to McFly ‘It’s All About You’, and we managed to convince our parents to let the band play Joe’s all time favourite ‘Thong Song’ by Sisqo – everyone loved it!
My sister was also chairman and did a wonderful job of introducing all speakers.
A Yorkshire Welcome
Half of our guests were from out of town, so a lot of people stayed in Harrogate for the weekend. All these guests were given a welcome back containing ‘The Best of Yorkshire’ — including our favourite Rakusens dark chocolate digestives and of course some Yorkshire Tea!
Tangerines table plan
Joe has a bit of a tangerine obsession and is known to eat bags of these at a time. It was only fitting that our table plan was tangerines with each guest’s name and table number printed on the leaf!
Safari Honeymoon
We are going to Kenya and Zanzibar later this year. We have both always wanted to go on safari and are so excited! We decided to not go on our honeymoon straight away as we wanted to have something exciting to look forward to!
Advice to couples currently planning their wedding
On the morning of our wedding I was so relaxed and excited because I was marrying my Joe. Remember that you are marrying the love of your life and that is all that matters. As long as you focus on the real reason why you are there the day will be perfect.
Before walking down the aisle I took a moment to stand and take in the moment. It was so wonderful to see the emotion on Joe’s face and of the faces of others round the room. Joe and I made sure to take in the atmosphere throughout the day, and it was a day that we will always remember.
Emma & Joseph’s little white book
Photography – Ruthless Images
Videography – Rebecca Reville
Wedding planner and invitation – Smooth Operator
Venue – The Old Swan Hotel
Bride’s dress – Rosa Clara found and fitted at Knutsford Wedding Dress Gallery
Bride’s shoes – Alice Bow
Bridesmaids – Gilly Gray, NABBD and Jenny Yoo
Flowers – Red Floral Architecture
Catering – Celia Clyne
Drinks – Jonny Cocktail
Band – The Creation Showband
Lighting – Light Tech
