Good afternoon lovely readers. The wedding I have for you today is absolutely gorgeous and it’s a Smashing The Glass first! Yes, Zina and Igor wanted to be the first super cool Jewish wedding from Russia on the blog… and they’ve achieved that accolade! Not only are the details divine, the citrus colour scheme to-die-for, and the flowers fabulous but Zina’s write up of her and Igor’s day really comes from the heart; as did Zina’s efforts for the entire wedding.
Zina and Igor managed to pull off their wedding with a modest budget. And what an AWESOME job they did too. Sometimes stripped back, unfussy weddings are the best.
All of the decor was made by Zina’s best friend and so many friends and family were involved with this wedding – it’s really heart-warming.
I particularly love the gingerbread men and women favours. Such a unique idea and all made by Zina’s mum, Zina, and another great friend.
AN OUTDOOR CEREMONY AND VENUE
Zina, the Bride and Igor, the groom: Our wedding took place at the Casablanca Hotel, a small country hotel, with only about 50 guests made up of our closest friends and relatives. We knew we wanted to have our ceremony outdoors, as the date of our wedding was in the middle of summer and it was one of just a few possible days to have good weather in our rainy city.
We wanted to have the whole day outside the city, ideally in a country hotel where most of our guests could stay overnight. We were very lucky as we chose the first hotel we visited. It was perfect: it had a small, cosy garden with a swimming pool and enough space for a reception, chuppah, dancing and just general ‘hanging out’!
AN ORANGE, YELLOW AND GREEN ORCHARD THEME
Zina, the Bride: I wanted to have a bright, colourful bouquet and kippot, and Igor wanted to tie in a theme to the wedding (“why would we have orange or green kippot out of the blue?” he said!). So he came up with the idea of a ‘Pardes’ (orchard) themed wedding as it made a lot of sense for us. We love citrus fruits, and the ceremony was taking place in the garden. We also love Torah studying and midrashim and I spent a year in Jerusalem studying in Yeshiva Pardes. So, it was really wonderful to have all these ideas combined in a Pardes wedding with an orange, yellow and green colour theme. As soon as we got the theme, we started planning everything. We didn’t have a planner but we both read The New Jewish Wedding
A CUSTOM MADE DRESS THAT DIDN’T COST THE EARTH
I really wanted something super simple and convenient as I was looking forward to dancing and having fun at my wedding and I absolutely did not want to suffer from medieval tortures! So, I called an old friend of mine, Asya Kogel, who has a fashion house, to help me with the dress.
I didn’t want to spend a lot of money on a dress I was going to wear for one day only, and I thought that it would be cheaper to buy a dress ‘off the peg’, and not to have it made especially for me. Amazing Asya broke this stereotype and made me my perfect dress for a very good price. We started by discussing what I didn’t want (no straps, no lace, no huge long skirt, no corset) then she draw a sketch and she started sewing. After a few fittings I got my perfect dress: simple, playful, it fitted perfectly, and it was soooooo comfortable! Most of all, it was so me!
ACCESSORIES
Of course I had a veil for the badeken, and I borrowed some pearl jewellery (some earrings and a ring) from my mum which my father had made for her. My father is a jeweller and our rings were actually made by him.
SHOES FROM NEW YORK
It’s pretty hard to find shoes in Russia (they’re all very expensive and tasteless), but fortunately my best friend lives in New York and she was of course going to come to the wedding (and more importantly has the same size and the same taste as me!). I showed her few pictures of what I was after and she bought them for me which is great! They were pretty high, so I had orange flats to change into for the dancing but they were pretty comfortable, so much so that I wore them all day and for most of the night!
It was the first (and maybe the last!) time I had a professional work on my hair and make-up and I had no idea where to find a person to do this, so I asked Asya, my dress designer. She gave me a contact of a person who often does the hair and makeup for her fashion shows and that was Victoria Spirova. She and I understood each other from the word go and she made me look like myself (that’s rare for so many weddings I’ve witnessed) yet still look very festive.
THE HANDSOME GROOM
Igor is a programmer, so last time he wore a suit was on his graduation from high school. We were pretty stressed about finding his outfit as it might be his last time he’d ever wear the suit! Luckily, we went for a winter holiday to Berlin and found him the perfect navy suit from Tommy Hilfiger. His two ties (orange and blue with orange dots) were bought during sales in Stockmann in Saint Petersburg (Igor said he would wear the orange one depending on the result of the Holland football team on the FIFA World Cup 2014. He wore it anyway, though!). Our search for shoes was pretty long as Igor doesn’t wear classic shoes (only sneakers or trainers) so he felt uncomfortable in pretty much every shoe we tried. Finally, we found them! Dark blue soft shoes from TJ Collection. They perfectly matched his suit and were very comfortable!
NO BRIDESMAIDS JUST TWO OF MY BEST GIRLFRIENDS
I didn’t have bridesmaids in a way you would think about it. I have two best friends with the same names Katya, they were very supportive and helped me a lot! One Katya made all the decorations: the decor for the tables for dinner and the decoration of the chairs during the ceremony. Another Katya made it all the way from New York to be at my wedding and brought me my perfect shoes.
Both of them helped me to make gingerbread men and women to put into paper bags with the name of each guest and the number of table where the guest would be seated. But it was just impossible to make them wear something similar so they just wore whatever they wanted. I gave them the same bouquets made of of the same flowers that I carried to unify our look a little bit.
THE CEREMONY
The rabbi who conducted our ceremony has been a friend of mine and my family for many years. The ceremony he officiated for us was a very special and personal one. Especially the closing part when he put aside the microphone, hugged us and gave a little speech just for the two of us (and also for the chuppah holders who happened to be there in this special moment). Another very touching moment was the reciting of the translation of the Sheva Brachot by our closest friends and relatives.
CHUPPAH DESIGN
We wanted something really simple and traditional and decided to have just a tallit fixed onto bamboo poles. Igor’s best friends were holding the poles and were very close to us during the ceremony.
A FANTASTIC KLEZMER BAND, A DJ, AND A DUET!
As we first met at a klezmer band concert, we wanted to have some cool and lively klezmer music at our wedding. We tried to bring Daniel Kahn and The Painted Bird, but in the end it was too hard and expensive and we decided to have our local Saint Petersburg klezmer band Dobra Notch. And they were so good! They played during the reception, and after that they accompanied Igor with his mum and grandfather to me for the badeken.
After the ketubah signing they accompanied myself and Igor to the chuppah, and they also played a bit during the party which continued with DJ Pontell (who I had worked with for several years). Pontell produced all the sound and lighting for the ceremony and party too – he was amazing! And some other friends of ours, a couple, played a duet of guitar and flute. It was very nice and touching.
OTHER ENTERTAINMENT
We didn’t have any particular entertainment as we knew that our crazy relatives, friends and colleagues would entertain themselves and us better than any circus. So, we just had the klezmer band for the reception and during the chuppah and a bit during the party.
We had host (a friend of ours) who came from Berlin to help us with our wedding (he is a theatre director and is studying to be a reform rabbi) and he acted as an MC of sorts. He was the person who told everybody a bit about what ‘Pardes’ is, what to do during the reception, as well as handling a few other duties.
CITRUS COLOURED FLORALS
I wanted a very colourful bouquet made up of oranges, yellows and greens, which wouldn’t look too much like a traditional bouquet, but more like a small bush with flowers! My florist did a very nice job and I also had two button holes and two small bouquets made for two of my best friends.
A DOCUMENTARY STYLE PHOTOGRAPHER
We wanted a documentary style photographer who would capture all the special moments, but in Russia, this isn’t easy! After a long search we found Alexander Sigaev and we are so thrilled with what he has produced! All the pictures are so emotional and we couldn’t be happier with our choice of photographer.
A CITRUS THEMED CAKE INSPIRED BY OUR KETUBAH DESIGN!
We wanted a citrus design with a citrus filling for our cake. We had a three tiered cake each one with orange, lemon and lime circles and with some mint leaves. Each tier was surrounded by biscuit sticks and each level had a different filling: yogurt with mango, yogurt with orange and yogurt with mint. I found the topping of our cake whilst searching for inspiration for our ketubah design on Pinterest. So, we used it on both our cake and ketubah!
FAVOURS
We had plenty of favours. First of all, during the reception all our male guests received kippot (amazing orange suede kippot with the date of our wedding inscribed), and our female guests received citrus brooches and hair-slides.
We also had a booklet made with the program of our day that also contained the translation of Sheva Brachot which which some of the guests took home with them as a reminder of our day.
We decided to make a very creative seating plan: we had a wooden frame with strings where we put small paper bags with the name of a guest and the number of a table where he or she was sitting, and in every bag there was a gingerbread man or woman that I made with my Katya’s during my hen night. My mum made the dough and we baked and decorated them with a colourful glaze. It was also my mum who wrote all the names and numbers on each bag (I have terrible handwriting). Unfortunately there aren’t any pictures of the gingerbread men and women as all of them were already inside the bags when the photographer arrived and nobody ate them there, all of the gingerbreads were taken home with our guests.
ADVICE TO OTHER BRIDES
You’re getting married and nothing else matter! You can’t plan for everything so just enjoy every minute whatever happens. Igor smashed his nose on the hotel door the day before the wedding (if you look closely you’ll see a plaster on his nose in the pictures!) and I still wanted to marry him, even with smashed nose 😉
ZINA + IGOR’S LITTLE WHITE BOOK
Photographer — Alexander Sigaev
Venue — Casablanca Hotel
Bride’s Dress — Asya Kogel
Groom’s attire — Tommy Hilfiger
Florals — Floral studio “Be together”
Hair + Make up — Image studio Touch
Wedding Cake — Alona Belskaya
Klezmer Band — Dobra Notch
DJ – DJ Pontell
Ketubah – Anna Kogan Zakai
Rabbi – Michael Farbman
Oh how I love this! Thank you for sharing your day with us, Zina!