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A Jew-ish Industrial Vintage same-sex wedding with a Lyn Ashworth gown at St Pancras Renaissance, London

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Tissues at the ready, folks, because I guarantee that you won’t make it through this gorgeous lesbian Jew-ish wedding without welling up — especially if you watch the tear-jerker of a wedding video at the bottom of this post, artfully and sensitively shot by Love Storage.

Charlotte and Ellie wanted a dramatic and industrial meets romantic, dark florals-vibe for their big day, and they found the perfect venue in the iconic St Pancras Renaissance Hotel in London. The story of the day was expertly captured by fantastic photographer, Dale Weeks.

We simply adore the moody aesthetic and jewel-toned theme; Charlotte and Ellie’s vintage-industrial look made their whole day so quirky and unique, but still so chic and stunning.

The attention to detail from artistic bride Ellie was simply phenomenal. Each item was carefully and lovingly picked with the theme in mind: the home-designed invitations, the rust-coloured chairs, the Victoriana table decorations and whole flower stems strewn down the aisle. The style extended to the brides’ outfits, which were simply beautiful and perfectly in keeping with the tone and theme of the wedding.

We love the birch pole Chuppah, complete with Charlotte’s grandfather’s tallit, and that the start of the Jewish ceremony was signaled with one of our all-time favourite wedding songs, Sunrise Sunset. Could there be a more perfect or sincere way to conduct a Jewish ceremony?

Over to Charlotte and Ellie to fill us in on all the details from their divine wedding day.

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When you know, you know

Charlotte: Ellie and I met online. There was no woo-ing and no long conversations. Ellie sent me a message saying “Shall we go for a drink then?” and when I agreed she informed me that I had to choose the location.

I chose The Bridge in Hoxton and we met outside Hoxton station that Saturday afternoon because we both already had evening plans.

We sat side by side in the boudoir-like surroundings, drinking coffee and chatting for hours. It felt very natural from the start, like we’d known each other for years. It didn’t take long before we were spending every spare day together!

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Is it ok to use vendors with no Jewish wedding experience for a Jewish wedding?

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When the first quote came in for a photographer and it was three times more than what we had budgeted for, I started to panic. Had our dreams of a relaxed, fun Jewish wedding on a budget been just that…a dream? Was it possible to have what we wanted within the constraints of our budget? I started to doubt the whole process and realised that we were now going to have to go down another route in our quest to find the vendors that would be able to create the wedding we wanted.

Rather than using vendors I had heard of from other Jewish weddings I took a different approach to my search. Using a range of wedding blogs and ‘real wedding’ write ups I collated a list of vendors that people had used and loved. Vendors  who hadn’t worked on  a Jewish wedding but had had the style of wedding we were hoping to have.

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Choosing a photographer without Jewish wedding experience

Photographs to me tell a story and should capture emotion and people in the moment. For my wedding photographs it was so important that this was the case. I was recommended Razia Jukes by my Mother in Law-to-be who had been at a wedding she was photographing. She said that she was really relaxed and the photos she had been beautiful — this all sounded perfect to me! I soon discovered that Razia features on loads of the blogs I read and I was able to see a big range of her photographs — which were exactly what I was looking for. They told a story with such emotion and love I had pretty much made up my mind before even meeting her!

Razia has never photographed  a Jewish wedding and at first this did worry me. At a Jewish wedding there are those key moments you know you want included: The badeken, the breaking of the glass, up on chairs for the Hora; and for most people knowing that the photographer knows when these moments will happen is a reassurance people want on their wedding day.  But hey, I love a challenge and when we went to meet Razia I realised that it wouldn’t be a problem. We spent a lot of the meeting talking in detail about the ceremony sharing and how the day would run. Her enthusiasm about the different components and their meaning was really reassuring and also made me even more excited about our wedding!

For Razia it isn’t ‘just another Jewish wedding’ and that makes it more special for me. I can’t wait for her to be a part of our day and to see the pictures she takes for us!

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Choosing  a  wedding venue that has never  hosted a Jewish wedding

This kind of set the ball rolling for Gid and I in our vendor search. After that initial panic we soon realised that with a bit more research, and a willingness to take risks, we could find the vendors we wanted that fitted with our theme, that were in budget and were a high quality.

I feel like now is a good time to mention that our venue, Lillibrooke Manor, has  also never hosted  a Jewish wedding and again they seem genuinely thrilled to be arranging  what they see as a new venture for them into the world of Jewish weddings. Initially they had some ideas of how we could set up our ceremony to fit everyone into the space. The ideas were focused on getting in the most amount of people rather than creating the atmosphere we were looking for. When I sat down and went through the ceremony with them they came up with a completely unique idea that we hadn’t thought of before.

They had taken from my description the importance of everyone being involved in the ceremony and that it was about being able to see what was going on just as much as being able to hear what was going on. I am so excited to bring together our vison for the wedding in the most beautiful venue. I know it is going to be incredibly magical and the venue have been really flexible and open to all of our ideas in order to bring together our Jewish wedding with the quirky, rustic barn feel that we want to achieve.

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A Vivienne Westwood bride for a city chic Jewish wedding at The Criterion, London, UK

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Anyone who knows me knows that I’m *obsessed* with Vivienne Westwood (I wore a couture design of hers to my brother’s wedding which was the first W Day I ever blogged) so I am super thrilled to be featuring a super glam Vivienne Westwood bride on the blog today — I have SO been waiting for this moment!

And what a stunning bride Ana is – all glowing skin and glossy locks (topped off with an exquisite David Morris tiara). She totally rocks that Vivienne Westwood gown (named ‘Bird of Paradise’), and it’s actually an adaptation of the purple Dita Von Teese Vivienne Westwood wedding dress that was featured in the V&A’s wedding dress exhibition earlier this year.

We also have bridesmaids in Alice Temperley and an equally fashion forward groom in Spencer Hart (my husband’s choice of suit designer for our wedding!).

This W Day is full of fun — from the bridal conga around Eros in Piccadilly Circus to the Scottish-Jewish melding of cultures, and the table centres designed by Ana’s mum. She’s a keen gardener and grew all the flowers for the wedding in the year leading up to it — how wonderful is that? Ana says she really wanted all of the family to play a big part in the wedding day and such a perspective always makes for a fun and inclusive celebration.

So sit back, relax and enjoy this incredible London wedding — not only do I have the breathtaking film for you by much-loved STG sponsor, The Dreamcatchers, but also the gorgeous images by Joshua Tucker. To life!


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A Jewish wedding with Scottish influences

Ana, the Bride: Our favourite part of the day was the mix of my Dad’s Scottish blood with Adam’s Jewish Traditional family and a Rabbi we both adore. We really wanted a happy, relaxed, fun party with some dressing up! I think from the fact our friends went on partying until the early hours of the morning means we succeeded.

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Juliette & Nick | Interfaith Jewish Christian wedding at The Brewery, East London, UK

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Some of you may be aware that at traditional Jewish weddings, the couple enter the reception under an archway of hoops to the sound of raucous clapping and cheering. Juliette and Nick chose to enter their party with that tradition but they added their own personal twist: Nick was a university fencer so they alternated the hoops with fencing swords. Brilliant! I love it when couples take age-old Jewish wedding traditions and make them their own and these are exactly the kind of personal details that ‘grab’ me when I look through a submission.

Juliette and Nick’s ceremony embraced both their faiths (Christian and Jewish) in a truly beautiful way, and it made me smile from ear to ear when Juliette told me that in the run-up to her big day, she loved seeing the range of mixed faith weddings on the blog. She was inspired by how other couples had worked out ways to incorporate two faiths into their day in their own unique way. Helping interfaith couples plan a meaningful Jew-ish wedding was one of the big aspirations I’d had for STG when I originally set it up so I’m one very happy blogger!

So what else do I love about this wedding? Well for one, there are some AWESOME musical choices – make sure you listen to those YouTube links further down the post. There’s also a groovy gin cocktail bar by those cool dudes, the Travelling Gin Company  and there’s beer imported from Brussels, as that’s where Nick used to live. And there’s an alternative to the traditional wedding cake made out of 20 kilos of cheese. That would have gone down VERY well in my house.

The venue is The Brewery and it gives this wedding an urban East London vibe that’s the perfect backdrop for a city-chic W day.

Photography today is by a much-loved STG-recommended supplier, Blake Ezra Photography. You can view more of Blake’s work and all his other STG weddings in his listing in my hand picked supplier directory, Smashing Suppliers.

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Emma & David | Elegant tropical garden Jewish wedding at Boca Raton Resort & Club, Boca Raton, Florida, USA

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Emma and David’s big day is absolutely exquisite, and for a summery garden wedding I don’t think you can beat their beautiful colour scheme and all their ‘beachy’ touches. I’m talking Emma’s starfish-topped heels, the elegant palm-patterned wedding stationery, the pretty florals with an almost coral reef-like feel, and  the cutest kissing flamingoes cake topper!

Emma’s wise words at the end are nothing short of perfect, reminding us all of the most important things in wedding planning and your lives together thereafter. But never mind that — check out their multi-coloured sprinkles covered cake. O.M.G!

I must also mention that our beautiful bride tragically lost her grandma very suddenly on the morning of her wedding. It must have been unbelievably difficult to genuinely celebrate the day, but these two managed to come through, and their rabbi sensitively incorporated the heartache into their wedding ceremony (which incidentally took place beneath one of the most beautiful chuppahs I’ve ever seen on Smashing The Glass).

Justin DeMutiis has taken some amazing shots that perfectly illustrate Emma’s tale of her big day with David…

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