Today we’re down on the farm with Holly, Tom and all of their family and friends in deepest Yorkshire for a right old rustic knees-up.
On your marks, get set, BAKE! Today’s gorgeous real wedding has a vintage twist and a baking challenge for the guests! Get ready to be inspired! Rustic Deepdale Farm provided the perfect backdrop to get bride Holly’s creative juices flowing and we’re seeing milk churns filled with seasonal blooms, lots of amazing DIY styling and that GBBO-inspired dessert table, groaning under the weight of the efforts of the guests! And there’s even a special cameo by Bruce, our couple’s beloved dog!
The scene is set by the neutral palette accentuating the views of the rolling North Yorkshire countryside and romantic fairy lights galore. And the bride and her mum learned a new skill – flower arranging – to be able to do it all themselves on the big day! If relaxed, fun and country-style is your jam, we reckon you’re going to love this. We’ve caught up with Holly to get all the gorgeous deets.
With photography by Peter Hugo Photography
Proposal
Holly says: We got engaged on holiday in Lisbon in August 2017. We had the most amazing long weekend there and Tom proposed with a poem he’d written. Afterwards we went to a fab restaurant. Lisbon is an incredible place with gorgeous food and scenery, and we will definitely go back!
Setting
We got married on Saturday 24th August 2019, it was the bank holiday weekend and we chose it because it was one of the two dates our venue had free that year! I am glad we did choose that weekend because lots of friends and family stayed a few nights in beautiful North Yorkshire and the weather was glorious!
We had our legal ceremony a few days before, at our local registry office in Sheffield, with close family and friends. At the time Deepdale Farm didn’t offer the option for us to be legally married there (although they do now!) but this just meant we got to have double the celebrations!
Our wedding and main celebration was at Deepdale Farm in North Yorkshire, where we had a symbolic ceremony led by my brother followed by dinner and lots of dancing!
Deepdale was the first venue we visited, and it had the perfect rustic vibe we were looking for with amazing views! We were keen to put our own stamp on our wedding and Deepdale being a DIY venue was another plus point. The views out into North Yorkshire were stunning and the venue even had a log cabin and bow top caravan for us to stay in on our wedding night! It also meant that our dog, Bruce, could join in the fun.
Theme
Our style was rustic and vintage which worked perfectly at Deepdale Farm. We love old furniture and quirky antique pieces, and used a lot of our own things from home to decorate the venue. We used pallets to make signage ourselves and my dad made a wooden archway which we decorated with milk churns filled with flowers and white voile. This was also great for keeping within a budget! I did attempt to make my own table plan but I wasn’t happy with it so placed a last minute Etsy order!
We were torn between having lots of colour or having a neutral theme and in the end chose neutrals as we felt it went better with the rustic style and we liked the classic look. We had white flowers, green and grey toned foliage and soft natural linen table runners. We printed our place names on craft paper tags and we used brown beer bottles as vases, which Tom had painstakingly collected!
Dress
I found my dress at The White Yard at Elsecar Heritage Centre after trying on quite a few. It was the ‘Poppy’ dress by Stelfox Bride and had a lovely fitted satin dress with a delicate geometric lace layer over the top. I fell in love with the scalloped neckline and sleeves and low v shaped back. I still love the dress – although the bottom of it is a little worn now! A drawback of a barn wedding!
Groomsmen
Tom wore a dark blue Tailor Me suit from Moss Bros. Along with his best men, he chose the material and button style etc and was able to customise the suit.
Bridesmaids
The bridesmaids chose their own dresses but they ended up choosing the same dress! It was a stunning Coast maxi dress in pale grey. Our lovely flower girl, Evie, chose her own dress too and a matching headband which was from Not On The High Street.
Beauty
Ellie Fearn did our make up. I know Ellie from school and she is so lovely and very talented!
We had our hair done by Lisa Holmes Hair who I found on Instagram. Both Ellie and Lisa did an amazing job and were great to have around on my wedding morning, they’re both so calm and friendly. I let my bridesmaids decide if they wanted to have their hair and makeup done, as some people prefer to do it themselves.
Transport
The owner of the cottage where the bridesmaids and I stayed owns an old vintage white Rolls Royce. The day before the wedding they offered to drive us in the Rolls, it was a lovely surprise and we arrived in style!
Photographer
Peter Hugo was our photographer for the day. We would highly recommend him. He was great at capturing natural, special moments. He made us feel relaxed during the photos of just the two of us and we never felt like there was a camera in our face, in fact we hardly knew he was there! He was also really nice and friendly and knew how to organise the groomsman for their photos! The photos are lovely and really tell the story of the whole day for us.
Videography
My cousin makes short videos as a hobby and we asked him to take some on the day. He took some great footage using his drone and combined them all in a fantastic video for us which we’ll treasure forever!
Styling
I carried a bouquet of white roses, gypsophila, eucalyptus and thistle, which was made by my mum. I have a gold engraved photo locket which was a gift from my grandad to my gran on her 21st birthday that we attached to my bouquet.
We collected brown beer bottles before the wedding and used these as vases for the flowers. My mum did all the flowers herself with help from my aunties. My mum and I did a one day flower arranging course a few months before and had a few practice runs! It was quite a big job to take on – especially as she transported all the flowers from a flower market in Sheffield up to Deepdale Farm – but they all looked amazing!
We printed lots of photos of our friends, family and us and made photo walls by attaching them to pallets with string lights. We made our own ‘til death do us party’ sign with wooden painted letters and coloured lights. My dad made the wooden arch we used for our ceremony and we kept it to use in our garden. We made our place names with craft paper tags and we attached a sprig of rosemary grown by Tom’s mum and dad.
Some of my favourite parts of the wedding were having all our closest friends and family help us to set up and decorate the barn the few days before the wedding! It was chaotic and a little bit stressful but also very fun. Packing away hungover is another story..!
We also used Loos2Ewe for the toilet hire, they were great and we hired trestle tables and chairs from Black Event Furniture, who delivered directly to the barn.
Favours
We decided not to have favours because we couldn’t find anything we liked and wanted to spend our budget elsewhere. My mum did get us some personalised chocolates which we had in a basket on the day.
Cake
We had a Great British Bake Off style cake table and asked guests who we knew love to bake to make something to bring along! I have loads of vintage cake stands and slicers so we set it up and I asked some friends to lay everything out as guests arrived with cakes. We ended up with a beautiful feast of chocolate cake, flapjack, shortbread, lemon meringue cake, brownies and raspberry and white choc cake! We sent a prize to our favourite cake maker!
Dining
We went for a BBQ menu served on large boards and platters with halloumi and vegetable kebabs, jerk steak and chicken with fresh salads and hasselback potatoes. We liked the idea of guests being able to try lots of different foods and choose how much they have to eat, plus sometimes wedding food portions can be tiny and we wanted to make sure everyone was well fed!
We went to France in May and bought red and white wine from a supermarket after thorough taste testing. We got the champagne for the reception from Herbert Beaufort Champagne House. Tom’s family have been going for years, after his Nana and Grandad stumbled across it in France.
In the evening we had Proove who came with their mobile pizza oven and made the most amazingly delicious pizzas! Deepdale allowed us to source our own beer for their bar so Tom and his dad did some taste testing and decided on a local brewery, North Riding Brewery.
Entertainment
We had been to a wedding fair and seen Michael Mulholland play, and we loved his relaxed style and that he played acoustic guitar and sang. He offered a DJ package and so we booked him for the whole day! He was brilliant and everyone loved him!
Tom plays guitar and writes music so he performed three songs later on in the evening. He learnt two of my favourite songs and then played one he had written himself. All our friends and family were singing and cheering, making it a pretty special memory.
Special touches
Because we had a symbolic ceremony we were able to write our own vows and we chose to include a wine blessing. We asked close family to write us a letter to read on our first anniversary and then, during the ceremony, we put them all in a box with a bottle of red and sealed it ready to open August 24th 2020.
Thanks to
Our venue! It’s a beautiful place with so much space and scope to make it whatever you want it to be. But it’s definitely only for those that are willing to do lots of planning and decorating themselves and it is a working stable, but it has the rustic farmyard vibes.
Best bit
I’m not sure we can choose one! Probably early in the evening when the ties come off, heels are off and everyone was dancing and singing along together. One of our friends splitting his trousers down the crotch dancing was also pretty funny!
Honeymoon
We stayed on in Kirkbymoorside for a week after the wedding to relax. We were due to go on our honeymoon to South America in Autumn 2020 but unfortunately this was cancelled due to Covid19. Hopefully we will go next year!
Advice
My advice would be to plan and prepare what you can in advance but try not to sweat the small stuff! It will all come together in the end and all that matters is that you have all your loved one together in one place and plenty of wine!
I read lots of wedding blogs whilst planning the wedding and always find the real weddings the most useful. I liked to look at the venues and the different themes and ways people have personalised their wedding.
