We’ve heard so many inspiring stories of Israeli couples getting married since October 7. Today’s newlyweds, Aviva and Jeremy, are among them.
Aviva, a wedding hair stylist and makeup artist originally from London, and Jeremy, an ASO Analyst for a marketing agency who hails from Sydney, had originally planned a big Jewish wedding to take place on October 17. When the war broke out, they had to make some major changes to their plans – including a new venue, a much smaller guest list, and a revised date of October 25 to allow Jeremy’s parents time to get to Israel amidst constant flight cancellations.
Luckily, Aviva and Jeremy had been working with wedding planner Vicki Rosen from the beginning, and she was able to help the couple plan what amounted to a whole new wedding from scratch at Nefesh B’Nefesh’s campus overlooking the Jerusalem skyline – which the organization generously offered up to couples who needed somewhere to get married during the war – in just 6 days!
One constant throughout it all was the couple’s photographer, Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Herschel Gutman. Aviva knew she wanted to book Herschel even before she got engaged, and when the wedding was postponed she and Jeremy chose their new date around his availability! And a quick scroll through Herschel’s ultra-emotional images will show you why.
During the chuppah, Aviva and Jeremy’s rabbi shared some moving words speaking to the couple’s situation:
In times of war, there are two ways of fighting back: one is to physically fight and battle and our beloved soldiers are doing so, while the other way is to love and to build families.
Such a powerful reminder that, in the end, that’s really what Jewish weddings are all about.
Now over to Aviva…
How We Met
Aviva, the bride: We met at a Shabbat meal at a friend’s house and soon after Jeremy asked me out for coffee. We connected over our mutual love of fiction books and chocolate. I knew I was falling for Jeremy when he drank an entire cup of melted chocolate on one of our early dates!
Change of Plans
We originally chose a different venue from the one we got married in. Our wedding was supposed to be at Lelot Ksumim (Magical Nights) in Kibbutz Chafetz Chaim, which has lots of nature and greenery with white tiled floors – this felt like the perfect combination of elegance and nature for us.
Unfortunately we had to both delay our wedding and change the venue, as we were supposed to get married on 17th October, 10 days after the war in Israel broke out. When the war began, Jeremy’s parents were not yet in Israel and their flights kept getting cancelled. So we delayed the wedding to make sure they were able to attend.
Our venue was closed, but we saw that Nefesh B’Nefesh were advertising their campus for couples who needed somewhere to get married during the war: “In these dark times, we’d like to offer a ray of light. We are opening our doors to the Nefesh B’Nefesh Campus in Jerusalem to host small weddings during Operation Iron Swords.”
Our wedding planner got in touch with them and we chose a new wedding date (25th October) and began planning our new, much smaller, wedding. At that point we didn’t really care what our venue looked like, we just wanted to get married! But we were very pleased to see that the Nefesh B’Nefesh campus has a gorgeous view of Jerusalem from their rooftop, where we had the chuppah ceremony. It ended up being such a beautiful wedding and we are so grateful to Nefesh B’Nefesh for helping us.
Theme & Wedding Planner
We had a wedding planner and she was fantastic. Aviva is in the wedding industry and knew from experience what a massive difference having a wedding planner makes in terms of staying calm and organised in the lead-up to a wedding, as well as on the day itself. Vicki Rosen was amazing during the first stages of our wedding planning, helping us from A-Z, and we were so extra grateful to have her when the war broke out and we had to re-plan everything.
She kept us calm, gave us amazing advice on everything wedding-related, from recommending great vendors to budgeting. We really felt confident in her organisational skills and her spreadsheets were fabulous! Her personality was just right for us with planning, as she is such a calm, low-key person but so organised at the same time, and sensitive to our needs. We had the most beautiful wedding and even after re-planning in just six days it was still so incredible.
Some things that really stood out to us:
– Getting the candles for Aviva’s parents. They were so happy with them, and Aviva’s mum even chose her new profile picture holding them! Another small detail that meant a lot was that Vicki remembered to ensure there was a chair for Aviva’s mother to sit on under the chuppah. That meant so much to us.
– The advice she gave us throughout wedding planning was so helpful, and so reassuring
– The fact that she always answered our messages no matter the time of day or night was so great, especially when we were in the last week before the wedding
– How on top of things she was – when we asked her to get things done, she immediately began working on it, especially dealing with vendors on our behalf. She was so quick to contact them, even when we had a million questions.
We would absolutely recommend her to others looking for a great wedding planner! Our wedding was quite different from the one we originally planned, however one detail we were sure we wanted no matter what, was the chocolate fountain. Aviva’s childhood dream was to have a chocolate fountain at her wedding (but white, so it wouldn’t ruin her dress!) and we decided that even with our new guest list of just 65 people instead of the original 270, we would have a chocolate fountain regardless.
It ended up being brown chocolate but we think our guests were pretty happy with that, and we received lots of great feedback about it being a really fun way to end the wedding!
The colour scheme was pastels, with an emphasis on pinks and blues. For flowers, the colours were green, white and pink. It worked out beautifully, both with the family’s outfits and with the flowers and design. Our wedding was much smaller than we planned, and the incredible thing was that it didn’t end up feeling that way at all. We felt like there was so much joy and love from the guests that were there, that we didn’t notice the smaller number on the day!
Invitation
We used Paperless Post for our invitations for our original wedding, and then did a quick new design on Canva Premium for the new wedding.
Hair + Makeup
I did my own makeup! This was my most asked question while we were engaged – “who is doing your makeup?” and I was so happy with my choice. I am a professional bridal makeup artist with over 8 years and 100 bridal clients of experience, and I know my own face better than anyone else does. I believe that no one else could have done a better job! I wanted to look like myself, just the most beautiful version, and I felt like I nailed it. I got the exact compliments I wanted, which were people telling me what a gorgeous bride I was, rather than how they loved my makeup!
I have so many colleagues and friends in the hair and makeup industry and choosing who to hire for my family was so hard. It was an abundance of good choices!
I chose Bracha Lustig for my bridal hair (and the hair for our families) and she was fabulous. I received a million compliments on my hair throughout the wedding – it still looked perfect at the end of the night. Her calm, cool, friendly energy was just what I needed on my special day, and my family also told me that they loved having her around.
The hair she did on my family was flawless as well! Jeremy’s mother looked at least a decade younger by the time she was done, and my 7 year old niece felt like a “ballerina princess”. She also did a gorgeous job on my sister and sister in law – she really is so great at listening to what people want and achieving it. We all felt so beautiful.
I chose Mel Bueno to do the makeup for our families as she is great at the natural look, and I knew that was important to all the members of our families getting their makeup done. She was also the one who recommended our wedding planner to us so we wanted to give back! She’s English, as is my family, which was also great, and she is just a lovely person to have around on the wedding day.
Dress
I knew I wanted a dress I felt beautiful in, but I wanted to at least try to find a dress at a lower budget if possible. And as I wanted a dress in the more modern-Orthodox style, I decided to try find a dress at a gemach first. (Wedding Dress Gemach = wedding dress salon where they either lend out dresses for free or for very low prices, as a kindness). I had a wonderful experience at שש וארגמן שמלות כלה, where they rent dresses for very low prices, and even offer an option to make a dress from scratch at much lower prices than I saw anywhere else.
I found my perfect dress there (out of the options they had on the rack) and really fell in love with how flattering, simple and elegant it was, in the style I wanted. The customer service there was really fantastic as well. My 7 year old niece’s dream was to hold a bride’s dress down the aisle and I was determined to give that to her, so even when the dress I chose didn’t have a train, I made sure to choose a long veil she could hold. It was so special to make her happy in that way and I loved that she was part of the ceremony!
Accessories + Shoes
Aviva loved her veil that was provided by the wedding dress rental, it was perfect and so convenient. Aviva bought her shoes from Republic Footwear – they were the only white heels that looked and felt good with her wide feet. She also made sure to do her usual dance workouts at home wearing her heels, and her feet thanked her on the wedding day!
Bridesmaids
We had a pastel colour scheme for the families. Aviva has four nieces and the two older ones wore matching dresses, and the two baby girls wore matching dresses, all from Monsoon in the UK. The baby girl dresses were ordered from Next.
Ceremony & Chuppah
The venue was a campus, usually used for more corporate events, so our (amazing) designer had to build a chuppah for us there. It was a bamboo chuppah and she added white fabric and some gorgeous flowers to make it look just right! The view of Jerusalem was incredible and we had our chuppah during the day, leading into golden hour.
Our favourite part of the ceremony: Our Rabbi, Rav Pini Cohen, said a meaningful Dvar Torah at the beginning of the ceremony, and one of the things he said felt very profound to us. He said that in times of war, there are two ways of fighting back: one is to physically fight and battle and our beloved soldiers are doing so, while the other way is to love and to build families. It was very difficult to get married in such a time and this was just what we needed to hear.
Our ketubah was the one provided to us by Tzohar, who were so lovely to work with. When we had to change our wedding date, our ketubah was already filled out so we needed a replacement – they helped us get a new one in time for the wedding. They were so kind and helpful throughout the process, and made the whole experience very pleasant.
Our music choice
We had the best band ever at our wedding! Kolot were absolutely incredible. The music at the chuppah ceremony was so beautiful and brought so much emotion to our wedding. They brought the most incredible energy and really helped keep everyone dancing all night. The lead singer has such a beautiful voice and the entire band was amazing and talented.
We had a smaller band than originally planned but we did not feel the difference, which we think is so impressive! We were told that most weddings during the war had only one set of dancing and we assumed that would be the case for us as well, however there was so much happy energy and joy at our wedding that we had two sets of dancing and the music was a big part of that. We chose to have mostly Jewish and Israeli songs, with some secular music thrown in as well.
Flowers
Our designer was wonderful. We were originally booked to have the designer who came with our wedding hall, and we had chosen the most basic package because we loved the greenery of the venue and didn’t feel it needed much to make it beautiful. With our new location, everything had to be done by scratch and Shira Abelow did the most incredible job. We told her the colour scheme and pretty much left everything up to her (this was with six days notice) and we were delighted with the result.
The design she provided for our wedding was absolutely breathtaking. We fell in love with every aspect of it – from the gorgeous chuppah, to the table settings, to Aviva’s cascading bridal bouquet – everything was even more stunning than we imagined.
Aviva is getting her bouquet dried by Ariella at Pressed Petals Studio, who posted on a brides Facebook group that she would like to do this for brides getting married during the war: “To any brides getting married during these challenging times, I would love to press your bouquets and create something for you to remember your special day. I know it’s something small, but it would be an honor.”
Photographer and videographer
Herschel Gutman is the vendor I knew I wanted to hire before even getting engaged. I have worked with him many times in my job as a bridal makeup artist and hairstylist, and was always impressed with how calm and collected he is on even the most stressful wedding day, and how beautifully his pictures come out. I get to see full albums quite often from my bridal clients and loved his style.
When we got engaged, Herschel was such a clear choice and we booked him immediately. We had an engagement shoot with him as well, and Jeremy also loved his style and photography skills. When our wedding date was postponed, we chose the new date around his availability, as he was that important to us!
We already knew he would be amazing, both photographically and in terms of his calm, friendly presence, and he totally met those expectations on the day. He also sent us our photos very soon after our wedding and we are in love with how they came out!
Magnet Photography: We loved our magnet photographers at Trend 54, and even though we had a small wedding felt it was totally worth it. Each of our 65 guests took home five or more magnet photos of themselves and they loved that. We also received the digital copies of the magnet photos the next day and it was so special to be able to look at them so soon, re-live the day and process a little that we actually got married!
We don’t have the video back yet, but we love Mikael Levy‘s work. His calm, happy personality added so much to our wedding and it was a pleasure to be filmed by him. We’re really excited to see the video he will create for us.
Live Stream: We had a live stream due to the high number of people who couldn’t attend our wedding and it was a great decision. We received so many messages from friends and family with screenshots of them watching live and it was heart-warming to feel that support from them all from afar.
Food and cake
Our catering was done by Nova Catering. We were so impressed with the menu and our guests said the food was delicious. They raved about the desserts especially. We agree as well – the food we had time to eat was so good! We truly felt like we got the wedding menu we dreamed of, even in the circumstances. We had a chocolate fountain during dessert and it was fabulous – much more “us” than a cake!
Honeymoon
Aviva stayed at the Inbal Hotel the night before and we both stayed there the night of the wedding. Aviva chose the Inbal as it’s a beautiful hotel with great service, in a great location, with parking. She originally chose the family suite in the older section of the hotel and it was such a lovely surprise and treat when we were upgraded to the most beautiful suite in the renovated section of the hotel.
The suite was stunning and so spacious! It was the perfect place to get ready for the wedding, with many family members doing makeup and hair, and to come back to after the wedding. Due to the war we had to change the booking about five times as our wedding date kept being changed – the staff on the phone were so helpful and kind about all the re-bookings and made us feel like guests rather than customers.
Advice to couples currently planning their wedding
We spent over five months planning our dream wedding, and ended up having a wedding that was significantly different. We knew throughout the wedding process to try stay calm and not get too caught up in the minor details, but Aviva especially did get quite stressed. Once we saw that our dream wedding wasn’t happening, we really internalised how the most important thing in this wedding was our love and our marriage, and that nothing else really matters in the grand scheme of things. It doesn’t stop the stress, but it can help put it in perspective.
We knew to choose vendors we liked. Personality may seem unimportant compared to talent, but Aviva knew from her experience that you need both for the best wedding day. We chose vendors whose work we loved, but also that were able to stay calm in a crisis, and that would help keep our day as positive and stress-free as possible.
AVIVA & JEREMY’S LITTLE WHITE BOOK
Photography – Herschel Gutman {offers 10% discount to all members of Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club}
Videography – Mikael Levy
Venue – Nefesh B’Nefesh
Planner – Vicki Rosen
Bride’s dress – שש וארגמן שמלות כלה
Bride’s shoes – Republic Footwear
Bridesmaids – Monsoon, Next
Hair – Bracha Lustig
Makeup – Aviva Sireling
Flowers – Shira Abelow
Band – Kolot
Catering – Nova Catering
Ketubah – Tzohar
Magnet Photography – Trend 54
Bouquet Preservation – Pressed Petals Studio
Stationery/Invitation – Canva Premium
Rabbi – Our Rabbi, Rav Pini Cohen
Smash The Glass Pouch – Smashing The Glass Etsy Shop {or join Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club and get one for free!}
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.
