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A Super-Luxe Champagne Gold and Ivory Jew-ish Wedding at St Ermin’s, London, UK

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All that glitters… is, in fact, gold, but only at this very special super-luxe Jew-ish wedding.

Nina and Matt’s wedding took place at top London hotel St Ermin’s and was, simply put, chic beyond words. The couple’s champagne gold and ivory colour scheme perfectly complemented the breathtaking venue with its high ceilings and opulent chandeliers.

Every detail was captured by exceptional photographer, Nadine Van Biljon, including the epic moment the bride and groom were showered with colour-coordinated champagne gold confetti — every glitter lover’s dream, and that moment when BOTH the bride and groom smashed the glass – we simply adore this! Nina told us:

Both of us broke a glass to say goodbye to the past and hello to a future together. We will be bringing the two glasses together to make one as an ornament.”

We love all of the little stories that paint a picture of the perfect day, from the wonderful tale about Anthropologie customer service that makes us want to drop everything and head to the nearest store, to the best man singing his speech.

We also love the beautiful ways in which Nina honoured her late grandmother, showing that the ones we love never truly leave us.

Over to Nina with the full story about her and Matt’s decadent and dreamy wedding day.

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How we met

Nina, the bride: We met on Plenty of Fish! Though if you ask Matt, he would say Vegas! We knew very quickly that we were perfect for each other.

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Finally finding the perfect venue: St Ermin’s in London

After dragging Matt around 18 venue visits across London, we knew that we wanted something different, somewhere no one had been or expected. We finally found that at St Ermin’s Hotel in Westminster. It’s a true hidden gem of London. The staff were incredibly friendly, the history is amazing and we instantly felt comfortable and knew it was special. We love going back there now and it holds a very special place in our hearts.

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Jewish rustic barn wedding with a Fairy Gothmother Dress and fresh wildflowers at Colville Hall, Essex, UK

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Happy Friday everyone! To celebrate the imminent arrival of the weekend, sit back and enjoy this real wedding, which had such a fantastic party atmosphere that it spilled over into a second party the day after the big day.

Cool and quirky bride, Hannah, looked like a stunning artistic vision with wildflowers in her hair, in her tea-length Fairy Gothmother dress and wow-factor sparkly green Irregular Choice heels. 

We love all of the unique ideas that express the couple’s life together, with their many in jokes, including stick-figure illustrated invitations and some special, limited edition, Hannah and Peter Sauce. 

A personalised chuppah is always a winner and, in this case, the couple asked their loved ones to contribute a square each to a homemade patchwork chuppah, with their friends and family’s heartfelt wishes watching over them during the ceremony.

The whole story of the day and all of its detail and emotion was expertly captured by photographer Marianne Chau. We’ll hand over to Hannah now for the full report on her and Peter’s rustic barn wedding. Take it away, Hannah! 

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How we met

Hannah, the bride: We met on Jdate, much to our surprise and shock!

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A venue with character at an old converted Tudor barn in Essex

We got married at Colville Hall which is an old converted Tudor barn near Hatfield Heath in Essex, UK. There were two barns on the site and we used one for the ceremony and dancing and the other one for dinner. We chose the venue partly because we needed somewhere big enough to fit all of our guests (!) but mainly because we wanted somewhere with character and outdoor space as we were having a summer wedding.

We added a lot of personal touches throughout right from our hand drawn invites to the ceremony to the drinks at the bar which we think gave our wedding a unique ‘Hannah and Peter’ laid-back feel.

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Real blogging bride quirky and cool Lauren’s Jew-ish wedding at Stoke Place, Buckinghamshire, UK

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Attention everyone: we have an exceptionally exciting real wedding on the blog today and one that I’ve been eager to share for quite some time!

Our real blogging bride, Lauren, who we LOVE, finally married her darling John. She is the first of our 2016 real Jewish brides to be blogged and boy, did she get wed in style. Lauren’s Jew-ish wedding was every bit as chic, contemporary and downright cool as I expected it to be. The day was expertly captured in all its glory by Photography by Krishanthi.

Lauren was a very detail-oriented bride with an exceptional eye for design. This shone through in every quirky and awesome choice the happy couple made for their big day, from their stunning gold-foil calligraphy invitations that they sourced from much-loved Smashing Supplier, The Golden Letter Paper Studio to their absolutely astounding pink ombre meringue shard cake, which almost looked too good to eat (almost).

OK, can we talk about that chuppah, please? What a wonderful sentiment and a beautiful way to involve friends and family in such an important life moment. I won’t ruin it for you, go and have a look — and then come back next week for the DIY tutorial to see how it was made.

Lauren has her own fabulous blog, which I’d encourage everyone to follow, but for now I’ll put you in Lauren’s capable hands, for one more encore on the blog (and then another cheeky one when Lauren posts her chuppah tutorial next Friday, 17th — I just can’t get enough)! Take it away, Lauren.

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How we met

We talked for a few weeks on Match.com before meeting up for our first date on Valentine’s Day. I turned up very late as I was evidently not overly keen at that point. John bought me a present – a rose and a card.

We got on so well and then watched Impractical Jokers until two AM while eating my homemade cookies. Lots more details are in my first blog!

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An autumnal Jewish wedding with a bride in a Melanie Potro dress at the Intercontinental on Park Lane, London

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Jewish-Wedding-Intercontinental-on-Park-Lane-London Fall has arrived early on STG! If you’re already missing all the seasonal colourful leaves, chunky knits and spicy drinks, then settle in and relive the season with Frances and Rudi’s magically autumnal real wedding, captured by photographer Elegant & Wild. 

Beautiful bride, Frances, wore an astoundingly stunning bespoke gown made by much-loved Smashing Supplier, Melanie Potro. The gown evoked echoes of Audrey Hepburn, and Frances looked like an absolute dream. We’re totally in love! We also highly approve of Frances’s choice to pair the dress with gorgeous, glittery gold heels.

Talented Frances was also able to harness her creative side, crafting the entire autumnal stationery suite for the wedding and even launching her own website selling her gorgeous products.

Melanie Potro wasn’t the only Smashing Supplier at Rudi and Frances’s big day. Amazing party band, Sensation Band, also played at the reception, even saving the day by keeping everyone entertained during a temporary mishap.

We also want to mention the beautiful, sentimental chuppah idea of using tallis from the bride and grooms’ respective grandfathers. The story behind this is so moving and it was a really wonderful way to honour generations of  their families. 

I’ll hand over to our gorgeous bride to tell us more. Take it away, Frances!  

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How we met

Frances, the bride: We have lots of mutual friends, we were friends on Facebook and knew each other from parties over the years, but in the end it was that good old matchmaker, Tinder, that got us together.

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An appropriately named venue: Intercontinental on Park Lane in London

We got married at the Intercontinental on Park Lane, quite simply because it was central and big enough to hold 300 people. My Dad gave a nod to its significance in his speech, commenting on the ‘intercontinental’ nature of our wedding. Rudi’s family is from Iraq and mine from London, although prior to that Austria, Russia and Poland. We had guests from all over too.

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A Modern Trousseau Bride for an intimate ‘dinner party-style’ Jewish wedding at Kettle Cove and Five Fifty-Five Bistro, Maine, USA

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Lauren and Aaron met online (they’re actually one of several online dating success stories featured on STG!), and Lauren says she knew by the second date that she wanted to meet Aaron under the chuppah… 😉

…And when it came to deciding how they would celebrate that eventual meeting under the chuppah, they knew they didn’t want a traditional wedding with bridal parties or first dance formalities. All they truly wanted was simply to marry one another with the people they love close by their sides.

I love it when couples make their weddings a representation of who they are and feel free to remove anything that just doesn’t fit them, and Lauren & Aaron’s Big Day is exactly that — a wedding that reflects who they are and what they wanted, which was a truly intimate outdoor ceremony on the water, followed by a small ‘dinner party style’ reception at a local restaurant.

From the farmhouse they rented in Southern Maine that housed their closest friends for a week,to the intimate ceremony on a peninsula jutting out into the foggy Atlantic, and the cosy dinner in downtown Portland, Maine where they could turn in their chairs to talk to anyone in attendance, their entire wedding was an intimate, homely, warm affair.

And since their wedding was held in a public park (Kettle Cove), they knew that they needed a simple chuppah that they could transport, put up, and take down easily. They ended up purchasing four tall birch branches and using Aaron’s tallit for the top of the chuppah. Aaron is great at engineering solutions and mechanical design, so he created a tension-free system using twine, the tallit, and four small hooks in each of the birch branches to create the chuppah of their dreams. Who said Jewish boys are no good at DIY?! (Oh, and if you want to build your own chuppah for your wedding, there’s a lovely tutorial on the blog, right over here).

Lauren and Aaron joke that their wedding theme was a “wedding-themed dinner party.” They knew that they wanted to be able to spend quality time with their families and closest friends, and wanted their ceremony to incorporate the beauty and experience of the outdoors, with a cosy reception with great food where they could spend time appreciating their family and guests.

All the pretty and emotion has been captured perfectly by Sarah V. Martinez. Enjoy!

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How we met

Lauren, the Bride: Aaron and I met via a dating website and exchanged a few witty emails before meeting in person at a coffee shop called ‘The Thinking Cup’, right off of the Boston Common. After coffee and tea, I asked Aaron if he was hungry, to which he replied “of course,” and we walked through the Common to a pizza shop on Charles St. The rest is history…

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