Jewish Vintage Weddings Archives - Page 5 of 5 - Smashing the Glass

Tali & Mo’s Jewish wedding | Art Deco afternoon tea at The Savoy and an evening soirée in Soho, London

12/02/2014 by Karen

Today’s wedding looks like such a fun filled affair – it’s a twist on the traditional hotel wedding: yes, Tali and Mo chose to have the first part of their wedding at The Savoy, but *no*, there wasn’t a sit-down 3 course dinner, or show band in sight.

Instead (partly due to Tali’s pastry chef background) they went for a splendid afternoon tea theme with everything from flowers arranged on cake stands (genius!) to beautiful home made jam favours, to a splendid art deco theme, sprinkled with some lovely DIY details.

Then, to top it off, for the second part of their wedding, they held an evening soiree at Kettner’s in nearby Soho, complete with props and a rocking dance floor, and celebrated their big day with a larger circle of friends.

So let’s partake in some champagne and a macaron or two and be serenaded to The Savoy followed by a night in Soho. What more could you ask for? Perhaps for the imagery to be by our very own Wedding Smasher, Blake Ezra? Oh yes, I’ve got that for you too… we’re in for a treat!

TWO LONDON VENUES
Tali, the Bride: Our choice of venue came down to a few requirements. First of all we wanted to get married in London. It’s where we met, and we are both great lovers of this beautiful city. We wanted to serve afternoon tea at our reception, and as I am a pastry chef it had to be good so we went with the only London hotel that offered in-house milchik kosher catering — The Savoy. Oh what a hardship! Luckily for us around half of the hotel is Art Deco and as we are massive fans of the Art Deco period it was a no-brainer.

We chose to split the day between two venues, we had the chuppah and afternoon tea at The Savoy, and we then moved on to an evening soiree at Kettner’s in nearby Soho. This allowed us to share our big day with a larger circle of friends.

Kim & Shay | 1920’s Inspired Israeli Wedding at Citrus, Even Yehuda, Israel

04/11/2013 by Karen

Today’s uber-stylish bride, Kim, was born in New Zealand to a non- Jewish family but has lived in Israel for the last 20 years. Kim says that she wanted to take the plunge and convert to Judaism for many years but never found the right time.

So a few years ago, having dated her then-boyfriend, Shay, for three years, they decided that they wanted to get married and that it was the right time for Kim to convert. She studied and converted at Beit Daniel in Tel Aviv and officially became Jewish in May 2011.

Being a wedding planner and designer Kim had a blast planning things. “Finally I could do things exactly how I wanted – the only problem was making up m mind – I have too many ideas!” Let’s see what she chose to do…

VENUE + THEME
Kim, The Bride: We got married at Citrus in Even Yehuda, Israel. I wanted a classic wedding and loving the 1920’s, I adored the way the venue was decorated in an elegant soft way that complimented the whole vision that I had for the day. We also chose this venue because it was new and I had never done a wedding there. I wanted something fresh – I have been in the wedding industry for over 10 years now and done weddings in so many venues I wanted it to feel special for me and really different.

It was a classic yet modern type of an affair and the decor included a lot of pot plants that created a softer natural look (and became great giveaways at the end of the night).

A 1920s STYLED DRESS
My mother made my dress from a soft lycra type material with pearl button holes and a lace belt. I envisioned something simple and classic and I had seen a similar dress similar on a bride that I had worked with years before but I couldn’t find it anywhere. Lucky for me I could call upon my mother make it and I ended up with the perfect 1920’s styled dress! I matched a short net veil to the dress, and wore my grandmothers pearls to complete the look.

Sara & John | Incredible ‘Granny Chic’ vintage Jewish wedding, Kidbrooke Park, Sussex

28/10/2013 by Karen

Sara is one incredibly beautiful and creative bride. And I’m talking creative with a capital ‘C’ folks. Yep all the amazing decor and imaginative touches you see in the pictures below were all hand made by Sara. It’s one big explosion of colour and thrills with lots of vintage prettiness everywhere!

As the bride herself says, “With our wedding it was more “what did you leave alone?” than what did you create! It was the biggest project of my life but I was so happy with the way it all came together!”

Sara and John met at work in Sara’s first ever contract job as a copywriter. She left the job pretty soon afterwards but kept a special souvenir!

Over to Sara for the story of her gorgeous W-day.

VENUE
Sara, the Bride: Our wedding was at Kidbrooke Park in Sussex. We chose this venue because it’s actually my old school. At first I’d ruled it out because I thought it would be strange to get married just outside the room in which I sat all of my exams, but the first venue we booked fell through when they insisted we use their preferred caterers who priced us right out of our own wedding and wouldn’t do a simple meal for us citing colours and presentation (or something silly).

After that I revisited the idea of getting married at my old school and suddenly felt like it would be really great to say “I do” somewhere so close to my heart. There is a beautiful, crumbling outdoor theatre which is covered with flowers in the spring and summer, and I suddenly had a vision of making my entrance through the doors of the theatre. It was such a nice daydream that I booked immediately!

Sarah & Ben | Vintage Tea Party Jewish Wedding at London Zoo

20/08/2013 by Karen

Now this is a wedding that I seriously would have LOVED to have attended. It’s so different, so creative and incredible fun. I mean what could be better than a vintage tea party at London Zoo culminating in an outdoor Jewish dancing session and big party (not forgetting a drunken guest attempting to climb into the gorilla enclosure!)?

Just scroll down and you’ll see the bride arriving in a flower-bedecked Karma Kab, the groom arriving by canal boat, a seriously jaw-dropping vintage styled bride, a hand-drawn animal-themed ketubah, stunning photography by Steve Poole and David Klein that captures some of the most amazing Jewish dancing energy I’ve ever seen, and on top of everything this report is a little bit special as not only do we hear from Sarah, the bride, there is also a bit of commentary thrown in now and again from our groom, Ben. A Smashing The Glass first! The idea for holding their wedding at such an unusual venue was triggered by Ben proposing to Sarah in the Penguin Pool building…. aaaah, I’ll let Ben take over from here:

IMAGERY BY STEVE POOLE UNLESS OTHERWISE CREDITED

WHY WE CHOSE LONDON ZOO
Ben, the Groom: I proposed to Sarah at London Zoo as when she was a child she wrote to Jim’ll Fix It to ask him to let her into to the zoo’s penguin pool building. She loved the architecture as a little girl – that space age type of feel – and she was a bit besotted with the building. When I proposed to her I organised with the zoo to take her round and then led her into the Penguin Pool building and proposed to her in there.

We also knew that we didn’t want a party in a hotel or ballroom, and we ideally loved the idea of getting married somewhere outdoors, but finding an outdoor London venue that could hold 250 guests for both the chuppah and the party on the same site, and that could also incorporate a kosher caterer didn’t leave us with many choices. Luckily London Zoo ticked all the boxes and we chose it as our wedding ceremony and party venue.

THEME
Sarah, the Bride: We knew that we wanted to have a summer fete / vintage tea party feel and that really worked in the beautiful garden terrace where we held the chuppah and Jewish dancing. We were fortunate enough to have an amazing, sunny day and the space couldn’t have worked out better for us.