Today I have a double dose of gorgeous grooms with Simon and Nik, who held their Jew-ish wedding at Sunbeam Studios in Ladbroke Grove not far from London’s famous Portobello Road. This super cool venue is a photographic studio by day (Mario Testino shot this Vogue cover there) and holds weddings and events by night. The building was originally the UK’s first ever purpose built car factory and is the perfect blend of classic historical and creative cool.
Their wedding theme was inspired by the venue (always a great starting point for a theme!), in particular, its monochrome interior. Yes, these two limited their colour palette exclusively to black and white, and they weaved it through every last detail including their entire outfits, and that of their guests, which I must say is really effective! Black and white is such a chic theme and relatively simple and easy to work with, and these guys let their creative juices run wild with statement details like their extraordinary black and white wedding cake! It’s by Choccywoccydoodah and it will set your taste buds and creative sparks alight. Honestly folks, I have yet to post anything quite like it on the pages of Smashing The Glass — I can’t wait for you to see it!
And with Simon being a fashion blogger (check out his site, The Very Simon G) it wasn’t surprising that the two grooms looked super hot in their haute couture black and white ensembles, my personal favourite detail being Simon’s studded Christian Louboutin shoes. Super epic.
The wedding film below, courtesy of one of my hand-picked Smashing Suppliers, Denee Motion, will make you laugh and cry, as will the images by STG regulars, Reportage By.
The report today is written by both of our grooms. Enjoy!
How we met
Simon + Nik, the Grooms: We met 12 years ago in Heaven nightclub, believe it or not. We both knew then that we’d end up together at some point. It took a while, but we got there eventually!
Choosing a Sunbeam Studios as our wedding venue
We chose to have our wedding at Sunbeam Studios. Simon had done a few fashion shoots there in the past, but never considered it for a the wedding until we saw it on a few venue sites. It ended up being perfect as it’s all black and white, which was the trigger for our colour theme.
A black and white theme
Our invitation stated that all guests wear their ‘finest black and white’. It was very modern and chic, and as it was in a photographic studio, we had a huge white backdrop to play with. The DJ was in front of it, and behind him, we had old black and white movies playing throughout the party. We also had couches in the three little dens that ran along one wall of the venue, and we had moustache cushions, echoing our wedding logo (see below) and more black and white cushions with our initials on.
super cool stationery and wedding logo
We did something really different for our invitation, so we designed a white cotton napkin printed in black writing with our wedding logo in the middle (two moustaches, joined together with a heart). We wanted something different and special. Simon’s sister used it as a pocket square!
Groom Fashion frenzy: Versace, Vivienne Westwood, Christian Louboutin and Valentino!
Both our suits were black and white… obviously! Simon’s was by Versace, a runway piece. It was black with gold buttons and had white embroidered shapes running down each arm. His shoes were Christian Louboutin, and studded all over. Nik’s suit was by Vivienne Westwood and was big, blown up black and white check, over the jacket and trousers. His shoes were Valentino.
the ceremony
As it was a civil partnership there wasn’t much we could change, but we wrote our own vows which was amazing. They whole thing was amazing, and quite an out of body experience! Simon had two of his best girlfriends as bridesmaids who wore black and white trouser suits, and his four-year-old nephew, Cooper, was paige boy, walking down the aisle before them to a round of applause.
We didn’t have a chuppah, but we chose to smash a glass after the ceremony and Simon’s mother recited the wedding prayer in English to us. Two of Nik’s friends, who are musical theatre trained, sang during the signing of the ketubah, with the harp playing in the background.
Music for the ceremony — a harpist playing Beyoncà©
We had a harpist who played during the ceremony. We walked down to her playing Beyoncà©’s Halo, which was beautiful. She was meant to play Beyoncà©’s Crazy In Love as our recession song, but somehow someone got it wrong and played the actual song, which was hilarious and very camp. It got a big laugh.
Striking florals that perfectly echoed our black and white theme
We worked with Wild About Flowers and Leanne was brilliant. We didn’t have bouquets or button holes, but we had massive black vases with sprayed white twigs and white orchids glued on, two for the ceremony and two for the main hall. Then on the tables, we had square ice vases which had black Cala lilies weaved through the ice. And on all the window sills we had different black and white vases with white twigs and orchids.
We couldn’t have been happier with our videographer and photographer…
We were recommended Denis at Deneemotion for our videography and after we saw his previous wedding videos we fell in love with his style. We didn’t want anything too cheesy, so he was perfect. It was exactly what we were after.
A lot of friends (and my sister) had used Pascal at Reportage By, so we were familiar with his amazing work. Again, we didn’t want anything too posed and cheesy, so we sat down with Pascal and discussed everything. Pascal and his team really go above and beyond to get amazing pictures, like taking us to the Versace shop on Sloane Street and Vivienne Westwood on Conduit Street after the party at midnight to take more pictures. Absolutely amazing!
A black and white statement wedding cake
The cake was a big thing for us, we really wanted a statement cake. Choccywoccydoodah designed and made it and it was quite the spectacle! It had four layers, each with a different filling (ginger, lemon, sponge and chocolate). The creativity was unbelievable — we had a chocolate model of our dog, Dhillon, on the bottom, with a big black top hat on the top, a black glitter heart in the middle, the Vivienne Westwood and Versace logos made from chocolate over it and our double moustache logo too, as well as black roses. It was truly amazing.
Food, glorious food
Carole Sobell did the catering. We didn’t have a sit down meal, they created food stations around the venue, and each one a different type of food.
A DJ, a drummer, a violin player, and a live singer
We had an amazing DJ, Kwame Knight from Accelerate Productions, who worked in conjunction with a fantastic drummer and violin player. It was amazing, they played along to the tracks K, the DJ, played. We also had singer Laura White perform a set for us, which was magical, and our first dance was Paloma Faith’s Never Tear Us Apart.
A surprise song in the speeches
Nik, who trained in musical theatre, surprised Simon by singing to him in their speech together. He sang Paloma Faith’s ‘Just Be’. Some guests still talk about this bit! Both our mothers did the welcoming speech, which was really lovely.
a wonderful wedding planner
We had a wedding planner, Katy Cresner, who helped with the last few bits of the wedding and ran the evening. She was a total God send!
Advice to others
Unfortunately, there’s no tips on how not to stress out, because usually it’s inevitable that there will be some stressful moments. But we made sure we took ten minutes out of the party to just be together and take it all in.
Simon + Nik’s LITTLE WHITE BOOK
Videography — Deneemotion
Photography — Reportage By
Venue — Sunbeam Studios
Wedding planner — Katy Cresner
Simon’s suit — Versace
Nik’s suit — Vivienne Westwood
Simon’s shoes — Christian Louboutin
Nik’s shoes — Valentino
Flowers — Wild About Flowers
Cake— Choccywoccydoodah
Catering — Carole Sobell
Stationery linen — Gailarde
DJ and percussion — DJ Knight + Accelerate Productions,
Just simply FAB!
Gorgeously Fab & inspirational!