Kayleigh and Sam’s summer celebration featured a light-and-airy palette, with a twist of stylish sparkle.
Following a romantic proposal in Barcelona three years ago, Kayleigh and Sam booked their dream 2019 wedding at Le Petit Chateau. Nope, not a venue à la Française but rather a stunning luxury venue that brings a sprinkling of French magic to the very heart of Northumberland (think golden furniture, sparkling chandeliers and a jaw-dropping marble fireplace).
After their traditional ceremony – held in the same church where Sam’s grandparents had married years beforehand – the newlyweds and their guests headed to Le Petit Chateau for their reception, which was filled with fresh florals and sparkling rose gold.
Sounds gorgeous, no? And don’t even get us started on that sequin-studded wedding cake! Scroll on for all the photos, gorgeously shot by Carn Patrick.
With images by Carn Patrick
Proposal
We got engaged in April 2016 in Barcelona, a place we’d both always wanted to visit. Sam planned the whole trip as a surprise – I had no idea he could be so romantic!
We were touring the sights and stopped off at the Magic Fountain of Montjuic. It was beautiful, even in the pouring rain! Sam started to act a little strangely and I knew something was up; the next thing I knew, we were by the fountain and he was handing me a letter to read! At the end of the letter, he asked me to marry him. Of course, I said ‘yes’! He’d chosen a gorgeous ring and we spent the rest of the trip on cloud nine. It was amazing.
Setting
We got married on 26 August 2019, which was Bank Holiday Monday. Sam is a teacher so we knew we wanted it to be during the school holidays.
We got married at Our Lady & St. Columba in Wallsend, which is the parish Sam grew up in and where his grandparents also got married. Our reception was held at Le Petit Chateau in Otterburn.
As soon as we stepped into Le Petit Chateau, we fell in love with it. From the stylish décor to the stunning garden, it had everything we wanted and more! We could picture our special day being there; guests enjoying a glass of fizz in the Mediterranean-style garden and hitting the dancefloor before relaxing in the gorgeous bedrooms, which are all uniquely decorated.
The garden also has a fountain centrepiece which reminded us of our engagement spot – as if it was a sign that this should be the place for us to celebrate our marriage!
Theme
Our main colours were pink and rose gold. This ran across our bridesmaid dresses, the men’s ties and pocket squares, the flowers, the table settings and other little touches here and there around the venue.
I think pink is a perfect wedding colour and rose gold is really on trend at the moment. Plus, the décor within our reception venue is very romantic so it complemented the setting and all tied in together beautifully.
Dress
My wedding dress was by Stella York and I got it from The Wedding Dress Company in Corbridge.
It was ivory, fitted with a low back and decorated with lace and subtle beading; my veil had the same detailing.
I visited a lot of boutiques and tried on many different styles of dresses, yet never had the feeling of finding ‘the one’ until trying this one on. I loved it and felt amazing wearing it.
The Wedding Dress Company is owned by a mother-daughter team and they are lovely – they made me feel so comfortable throughout the whole process!
Groomswear
Sam’s suit was by Remus Uomo and he got it from Woven in Durham; the groomsmen and my dad wore the same suit too. It was blue check with a white shirt; his tie and pocket square were pink and from Next.
Bridesmaids
My bridesmaid and maid of honour both wore pink dresses from the new wedding range by Dorothy Perkins. The dresses were so pretty and hopefully they’ll be able to wear them again for a summer ball or party.
Beauty
My make-up was by Chantelle Thornton and my hair stylist was Get Up & Pin Up.
Transport
I stayed at our reception venue the night before the wedding with my bridesmaids. We travelled to the church in a white Bentley Mulsanne, which we hired from Autograph Chauffeur.
We wanted something modern and luxe – something you don’t see on the roads every day. This car was perfect and it definitely turned heads!
Photography
Our photographer was Carn Patrick. We couldn’t recommend him highly enough! He captured our day all the way through, from me getting ready with my bridesmaids to after our first dance.
We first spotted him on our reception venue’s Facebook page; they shared a blog post he’d published with photo highlights of a wedding he’d worked on there. We didn’t yet know what we wanted from our own photos but seeing that post made us realise. They were amazing and really showed the venue off, too.
Every supplier choice is important but we hadn’t realised how important the choice of a photographer was. After all – it’s not everyday you’re the star of a photoshoot and wearing a wedding dress! There’s so much riding on the pictures as they’re the one thing you’ll have to look back on and remember the day by.
Carn made us, and all our guests, feel totally at ease and walked us through every shot to get the best from it. We had so much fun posing for our photographs and feeling like celebrities for the day!
We had family members attending who hate having their photograph taken – Carn took the time to learn details like this, as well as what we really wanted from our pictures. We felt completely confident going into our wedding. The people we thought would be camera shy ended up posing away and even shared the photographs of themselves on social media, which they’ve never done before – we couldn’t believe it!
Our photographs were beyond amazing and we’ve had so many lovely comments about them. We can’t stop looking at them and will be getting an album made to keep forever.
Styling
I had a stunning bouquet made up of pink and white roses, along with other summer blooms. I wanted it to be large but neatly contained at the same time. My bridesmaids held similar bouquets that were smaller in size than mine, and Sam and the groomsmen had matching buttonholes. Fleur Couture designed all our floral arrangements, including those at the reception venue.
Our table centrepieces were a mix of rose gold high-risers with flower domes and rose gold candelabras, with smaller domed arrangements; each table also had rose gold tea lights.
We opted for a sweetheart table for just the two of us rather than a typical top table. This had a 6ft floral arrangement on it, which looked amazing positioned in front of the garden area. We chose this so we could guarantee we’d spend some quality time together on the day, just the two of us, and it was lovely sitting back together watching our guests enjoying themselves.
My best friend is a graphic designer and created all of our stationary, which included our welcome board, table plan and menus. This all followed the same theme, which we first used on our save the dates, so that everything tied in from the moment people knew about our big day.
Favours
We’re both known for our love of sweeties so had pick ‘n’ mix comprising love-themed sweets in pink-and-white striped bags. The bags had a ‘K&S’ sticker on, which tied in with the stationery. They went down a treat!
Cake
We had a three-tier wedding cake, which was made by Great British Cupcakery. We had a Victoria sponge tier, as well as a classic, chocolate sponge with white chocolate ganache and chocolate with peanut butter.
The bottom tier was pink with floral piping, the middle tier was white with a pearl gloss finish and the top tier featured white sequins. We had a rose gold ‘Mrs & Mrs Keys’ topper, which we got from notonthehighstreet.
We had a fresh flower spray on the second tier, which tied-in with our table florals; it was made up of the pink and white flowers which our florist had left behind.
Catering
Our starter was Moroccan tomato and red lentil soup, the main was grilled chicken breast with creamy mashed potato, roasted carrots and gravy, and for dessert we had sticky toffee pudding with sticky toffee sauce and vanilla ice-cream.
We knew the food would be amazing as we’d previously been to a tasting evening hosted by the venue where we had sampled the menu to help us choose our dishes. The venue was really accommodating when it came to catering for dietary requirements, meaning everyone got something they enjoyed.
For our evening food, we choose hot sandwiches. The venue selected our wines – one of each colour to match the food.
Entertainment
We had music from Soden & Sons, who we booked through AMV Live Music. They played two one-hour sets and ended the night with a DJ set. They were great and kept people on the dancefloor throughout the night!
AMV host wedding showcase evenings at As You Like It in Jesmond; we went along to one and heard five bands play. It was a good way to get an idea of what we wanted from a band, as well as get an idea of how a crowd would react to them. We’d already booked Soden & Sons after watching their showcase video on AMV’s website as we knew straight away they were our cup of tea but seeing them live before the wedding made us even more excited to have them play.
Best bit
Sitting at our sweetheart table with a glass of fizz in hand and watching all our guests enjoying themselves was a real ‘pinch me’ moment – knowing we were married and all the people who matter most to us were there in the same room, having a great time in honour of us. We’ll never forget that feeling and our photographer got some lovely photographs of it!
Honeymoon
Sam was due back to work a week after the wedding, which didn’t leave us long to go somewhere amazing. Instead, we decided to have our honeymoon at the end of the year.
We went to Windermere a couple of days after the wedding and had a lovely time staying in one of the Cranleigh Hotel’s Church Suites.
We’ll be honeymooning in Cancun, Mexico, over Christmas and can’t wait!
Advice
Celebrate your wedding year, not just your wedding day!
We knew the wedding would go by in a flash so decided to make the whole year about it. Sam planned a treat for me every month leading up to the wedding, from gifts to days out, which he gave me on the 26th of each month (as the 26th was the date of our wedding). Each month, I got even more excited and it made the countdown go by so quickly.
Delaying our honeymoon for a few months after the wedding has also helped us avoid any wedding blues – it still feels like our wedding year isn’t over just yet!
