Rainbow Club Archives - Smashing the Glass

An Essense of Australia Bride for a Romantic Country House Jewish Wedding at De Vere Latimer Estate, Buckinghamshire, UK

17/02/2020 by Karen Cinnamon

There’s nothing like a beautiful Jewish wedding in the English countryside. And Samantha, who works as a voiceover agent, and Adam, the CFO of a gaming company, could not have picked a more perfect spot for theirs than De Vere Latimer Estate. Nestled in the rolling green hills of the Buckinghamshire countryside, it ticks all the boxes – historic manor house, breathtaking grounds, and that quintessential English countryside feel without requiring London-based guests to travel too far.

And of course the couple’s photographers, Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor LUZ, recorded the day perfectly, in their trademark artistic, architectural style. We’re obsessed with the way the team captured the blend of traditional and modern that made this day so uniquely wonderful.

There’s so much more we could say, but we’ll let the bride – who looked absolutely stunning in her Essense of Australia gown – fill you in on the rest.

How We Met

Samantha, the bride: We met through mutual friends on a night out in London.

A Pronovias Bride for a London-Meets-Israel Jewish Wedding at Offley Place, Hitchin, UK

09/12/2019 by Karen Cinnamon

What do you do when you’re dreaming of a destination wedding in Israel but family obligations keep you closer to home? Well, you could do worse than to follow the example of STG Brides Club member Nicola, a senior business analyst for a technical consultancy, and Dave, the CTO and co-founder of a digital design and marketing consultancy, who made it their goal to bring a little bit of Israel to their Jewish wedding right here in the UK.

How’d they do it? For starters, they worked with Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor XS Showband to put together two party simcha sets with a mixture of Mizrahi and Israeli music that kept everyone on the dance floor in true Israeli style – Nicola also can’t stop raving about how helpful the XS team were in creating the couple’s day of plan and processional order, plus providing day of coordination.

And in good Israeli wedding style, Nicola and Dave had the “reliable and fantastic” (in the bride’s words) Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Magniv mobile photo magnet team taking photos of everyone throughout the festivities so that people could have a keepsake to take home.

Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor The Crawleys photographed the whole day so beautifully in their trademark artsy documentary style, and we’re so touched to hear Nicola say that the ultra-supportive community of STG Brides Club was “literally the only thing that kept me sane” during wedding planning

Now over the bride, who looked simply smashing in Pronovias…

How we met

Nicola, the bride: We met in the good old fashioned way… on a dating app – Jcrush to be precise (seems this is the only way to meet your soulmate these days).

There was an instant connection when we met but both of us were not long out of relationships and not ready for anything serious so we maintained a strong friendship. Even as friends, we would go out for regular dinners and lunches together, him insisting on paying for every single one being the kind and generous soul that he is.

It wasn’t until a mutual friends party, and the help of a bit of dutch courage (tequila), that we both realised what was right in front of us and shared a kiss. The first of many more to come.

A Pronovias Bride for a Secret Garden Jewish Wedding at Alexander, Emek Hefer, Israel

10/07/2019 by Karen Cinnamon

It’s the beautiful Jewish wedding of our wonderful blogging bride Rebecca! It’s always a special moment for us seeing our blogging brides get married after following along throughout their planning, and today is no exception. Rebecca, a fashion buyer, and David, a financial advisor, had the most stunning destination wedding in Israel, and we are totally in love with everything about their big day.

Rebecca adores flowers, so it was a given that they’d play a big part in her day. And we’re totally blown away by her exquisite ketubah and gorgeous table centers – focusing on greens and whites, everything meshes so well with the natural beauty of the venue.

It doesn’t hurt that the couple worked with some of our very favorite Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendors. From the amazing Ran Bergman on photography and videography – he and his team captured all the emotion and love, not to mention the gorgeous décor, so perfectly – to the pair’s gorgeous modern ketubah from Ketubata, with a green and white floral design that perfectly mirrored the décor for the day, Rebecca and David truly assembled a dream team.

We’re crazy about Rebecca’s long-sleeved fishtail lace gown by Pronovias, which she found at beloved Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Mirror Mirror in London – in the bride’s own words, Mirror Mirror“want you to feel 100% and go above and beyond to make sure you are happy.” Rebecca’s Swarovski hair clip fromSmashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Emmy London was the perfect complement to her classically glam bridal style.

There’s so much more to say about this awesome wedding, but before we hand you off to the bride we’ll just leave you with this last little tidbit: the couple served their midnight snack in personalized Tupperware adorned with their wedding logo! If you’re looking for an unexpected favor idea that’s both fun and useful, we think this is a pretty excellent choice.

How we met

Rebecca, the bride: One night in March 2017 I was swiping on Jswipe and I came across David. We had lots of mutual friends, one being my best friend I had just booked my holiday with, so when we matched I instantly called her and said ‘who’s’ this?!’ to which she replied ‘OMG I love him he’s a really good friend you should definitely go on a date with him – I don’t think he’s THE ONE but I think you will fancy him and he is super tall’.

Being 5ft8 height is a REAL thing for me. I was like ‘how tall’ and she said ‘put it this way, you will be able to wear your highest heels’. The struggle is real for tall Jewish girls to find a tall Jewish man, I was so sick of wearing flats and worrying about how tall someone was — so knowing he was tall I already knew my outfit for the first date!

My friend messaged David saying you have matched with my friend and if he wanted my number — all he said was ‘oh she’s hot and he will have a look’. I wait 1 week and receive NO MESSAGE FROM HIM! I am obviously furious so decide to take matters in my own hand and message him first! #independentwoman (He still to this day said the app was “deleted” which is why he didn’t message me as he didn’t see it!)

We start messaging and we get on like a house on fire and start to arrange a first date. I am originally from Leeds and it was round Peseach in 2017 so was back home for the holiday, so we waited to meet up for a drink after.

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

04/09/2015 by Karen

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.