We love it when a couple really brings their skills and passions into their Jewish wedding – and Samantha and Alex did just that. The bride, a video editor by profession and lifelong music lover on the side, added THE most special, personal touches to her big day – teaming up with some of our very favourite London vendors to make it happen.
Given Samantha’s career, it’s no surprise she wanted only the best when it came to choosing a wedding videographer – and indeed, she opted for beloved Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Denee Motion. But instead of having her videography handle the whole business from start to finish, the team at Denee Motion handed their stunning footage over to Samantha and she edited it into her very own highlights film and wedding video – so special! (As if that’s not awesome enough, she also made a save-the-date video rather than sending out a standard paper note.)
This multitalented bride also happens to be an AMAZING singer, and she wanted to surprise Alex by performing at the wedding. She worked with the couple’s band, Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Totem – who are just beyond awesome; in Samantha’s words, “watching them perform is like being at the greatest concert of your life” – to perform a song with Totem’s newly formed gospel choir. It made for such a special moment; please do scroll down and check out the video of her performance!
We love how photographer Paul Toeman captured all the emotion and energy of the day (and we’re totally obsessed with the post-wedding shoot he did of the couple wandering around London at midnight!). There’s lots more we could say about this wonderful wedding, but we’ll let the bride – who looked smashing in Suzanne Neville – tell you the rest…
Oh… and one final detail – the groom’s mother is the the manager at my daughter’s much-loved nursery. Mazal Tov Tina and family!
How we met
Samantha, the bride: We met at 18, he moved into the same flat as one of my best friends when he was at university in Manchester. I went up to visit my friend Anthony and ended up speaking to Alex for 2 hours instead. Fast forward 7 years when I happened to join his gym and bumped straight into him, a couple weeks later we went on a 3 hour dog walk and the rest is history.
A London Wedding
We got married at the Sheraton Park Lane Hotel, we’d seen a couple of weddings there and it’s a beautiful place. After seeing a few venues, we went down to the chuppah room and pretended to walk down the aisle and I basically burst into tears and that was it.
Save the Date Video
Music is my life, and also my mum’s, and it was really important to me to be as creative as we could where we could. I’m a video editor so we thought we’d make use of it! Both our families get on so well and we’re all a bit nuts so we made a save the date video rather than sending out letters. I’m a video editor so our families got together one night for a couple of hours and we shot this at a studio.
We didn’t have a wedding planner but that’s because my auntie does a lot of events for her charity Rays of Sunshine and between her and my mum they are like Frank from ‘Father of the bride’ and Monica from ‘Friends’, you couldn’t find two more organised humans.
What ‘Smashing The Glass’ Did For Us
The inspiration and advice section was always great, when planning a wedding it’s amazing how many options for everything there is so having a look at what has worked in the past is always great.
Elegant Invitations
We wanted to go with something very elegant and simple for the invitations as our general theme was to go elegant.
Hair+Makeup
My sister is the greatest makeup artist out there. She works on fashion, beauty, TV and recently did the make up for Cate Blanchett. She’s done my make up for years, knows the style I like (not too heavy) and knows my face inside out so there was never going to be anyone but her!
My hair was done by Martin from the Salon Trend, a fabulous hair stylist who in one hair trial whipped up about 5 different styles in a couple of hours, all incredible!
A Suzanne Neville Dress
It’s a Suzanne Neville dress called “Elegance”. When we got engaged my Nana took me, my sister, my auntie and mum to the bridal expo. When we arrived, my Nana spotted a dress on a 6 ft tall blonde model and said that’s the dress. I completely disagreed as I’m a lot smaller and thought I’d want a more fitted look but we booked to go to Suzanne along with some other places.
About a month later after trying various dresses with my mum, nana, sister and auntie, the last shop we went to was Suzanne Neville and to please my Nana I tried the dress on, came out, and for the first time everyone burst into tears including me. The fabric was incredible and it was the dress that actually made me realise I was getting married.
A Long Veil
The veil was also Suzanne Neville. I always knew I wanted a long veil but wanted to keep everything else very simple.
Badgley Mischka Shoes
I went to Miami on holiday and came across a set of Badgley Mischka very high heels with beautiful details on the back and they were ivory, the same as my dress. Those were the only things Alex was allowed to see (purely to make sure I wasn’t taller than him).
My sister knows I’ve been obsessed with the film ‘Father of the Bride’ (especially the wedding trainers, so she made me my own beautiful pair for the night).
The handsome groom
He wore a suit from Charles Tyrwhitt, he always looks gorgeous in a suit but the waistcoat did it for me, he just looked like the new James Bond.
Bridesmaids in Biscotti
I had 5 bridesmaids, they wore dresses from David’s Bridal but the Vera Wang White collection. All the same colour – biscotti – and they all had the same couple materials but different dresses. They tied in with the bouquets which were all pastel colours.
Candlelit Chuppah
We just wanted very simple and classy, I’m a massive fan of candles so having those just made everything feel really intimate.
Ceremony
I’m a massive musical fan and so I spent ages trying to find a song to walk down to that I really loved and ended up having Totem perform ‘Someone Like You’ from Jekyll and Hyde the musical, but in Hebrew.
Our music choice
I wanted the typical traditional songs, but I also wanted to walk down the aisle to something that gave me chills and ‘Someone Like You’ (the Beau Dermott version) did that. For our first dance, we used the song, ‘Only Wanna Be With You’ by Samm Henshaw. (We both heard it on Love Island during a dramatic break up but weirdly both loved it).
Flowers
Funky Flowers did everything!
Photographer
Paul Toeman was our first choice from day one, he’s photographed one of my closest friends weddings a few years ago and after seeing the photos he was always the one we’d hope could do it. He kept me unbelievably calm and knew when to step in and take a step back and really got us all in the mood to get incredible pictures!
After the wedding he jumped in a black cab with us and we literally walked around London at midnight with him just taking pictures for an hour, we went into a bar, a coffee shop and got pictures with tourists, policemen and anyone else that would ask. Even after the wedding we had an amazing night with our family where he came round and we all sat and looked at the photos.
Videographer
Denee Motion was our videographer. Again I’ve seen the work they do and its really outstanding. Being a video editor I always wanted to edit our wedding video because as a bride and groom you miss so much, so being able to look through hours of their footage was really special and I’m really lucky they handed the footage over to us so I could make our highlights film and wedding video.
A Phenomenal Band
Totem… It was always going to be Totem. Every event I’ve seen them at, I seem to be dancing on the floor the entire night. Watching them perform is literally like being at the greatest concert of your life. Phenomenal singers, incredible musicians and the work that goes into it from behind the scenes is just amazing. Nothing was ever too much for them, always around to take many, many calls and they made our day so unbelievably special.
A surprise song
Alex has never heard me sing properly and always complains that I don’t sing and I always knew secretly I wanted to sing at our wedding but I wanted to do it a little differently. I’ve loved gospel music since I was little and I told my mum I wanted to sing with a choir. She also sang at her wedding so thought if she can do it then I should be able to!
I called Brett from Totem and told him my idea and it genuinely was (as my grandma says) bashert, as Totem had just started a gospel choir. I spent quite a few phone calls talking to the head of the gospel choir and Brett about the arrangement and how it would work and had two rehearsals with them and finally managed to surprise Alex after his speech and sang.
Honeymoon
We have been to South Africa in February for our honeymoon, travelling down the garden route.
Advice to couples currently planning their wedding
1) DO NOT STRESS ON THE DAY – There is zero point, whatever will go wrong, will go wrong and you can either get upset and panic about it or accept that realistically no one but you will notice.
2) Get emotional the night before – I was terrified I’d sob hysterically down the aisle the pictures would be awful, so the night before I wrote each of my family members letters, just to say thanks for everything, they all ended up emotionally unstable and so I was able to have a good cry and made sure on the wedding day I didn’t stop smiling. It’s the best day of your life – don’t cry the whole way through it.
3) The most important – Rescue Remedy – this is a god send. It’s totally normal to have butterflies and feel anxious before the wedding. My mum brought this with and as soon as I started to feel a little jittery, I took a few drops and was as cool as a cucumber. I’ve genuinely advised anyone I know getting married to have it on stand by.
Samantha & Alex’s little white book
Photographer – Paul Toeman Photographers
Videographer – Denee Motion {offers 10% discount to all members of Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club}
Band and chazan – Totem {offers 10% discount to all members of Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club}
Venue – Sheraton Park Lane Hotel
Bride’s dress and veil – Suzanne Neville
Bride’s shoes – Badgley Mischka
Groom’s attire – Charles Tyrwhitt
Bridesmaids – David’s Bridal
Hair + Makeup – Martin from the Salon Trend and Frankie Neal
Flowers – Funky Flowers
Catering – Arieh Wagner
Invitation – U Name It
Toastmaster – Jamie Paskin
It was an aaaaamazing wedding! Great memories! Denis x