THE PARTY
The party at the Party Field – what better named field for a party than this one! My couple had their legal ceremony the day before at Brighton Town Hall with a small group of immediate family and friends. I also covered a couple of hours for them and will also blog this shortly! They chose to have their blessing and big old knees up in the Party Field near Lewes. The field is a short taxi ride from Lewes train station – you could actually walk it in 30 mins! It’s basically a blank canvas for you to do what you wish, which is awesome for a festival wedding! Your guests can choose to camp in the field but it’s also the perfect location for those who prefer a proper bed and toilet ;) as it’s SO close to Lewes.
THE SNOW MAN !!
My couple did lots of the decoration themselves, one of the bridesmaids provided and styled the flowers and bouquets, My Grooms’ artistic parents created the metal daisies and ceremony back drop from used beer cans and his Mum is an illustrator who actually – get this – illustrated on the original SNOW MAN animation!!! I guess you might need to be of a certain age to REALLY appreciate that – which make me feel VERY old – yikes! She illustrated all of their table numbers which are Brighton Pubs, they are amazing and what a thing to be able to save from your wedding day! I totally wanted to ask her for an autograph, and if i’d had my copy of the book to hand I really would have!
WHEN THE LIGHTS GO OUT
Almost as soon as the band got started the generator cut out. I have seen this a couple of times at out door weddings. It can be a problem for a few people like the caterers, and portaloos if they are flushable rather than compostable but luckily on this occasion somehow the band were still able to play (maybe there were two? and one of them cut out) and the caterers were finished serving food, but the lights went out in the Tipi just as the first dance started! I actually hadn’t realised until after the first dance because I had my two off camera flashes set up so it really hadn’t made much difference to me, and then everyone went straight into dancing – luckily I am experienced with using flash and knew exactly what to do with such little light. In very low light our cameras struggle to actually focus at all, but the trick is to switch to manual focus, a wide depth of field and direct flash works a treat! It’s a trick I often use for dancing anyway as the camera/lens usually struggle to keep up with focussing.
One of the bridesmaids broke out a bubble machine – I think it was the first time I’d had this on a dance floor and I loved it! It made some really great photos and added a bit of interest to the regular dance floor photos.
A good tip for a very quickly filled dance floor is to put bottles of spirits/aperitifs on your guests tables – also makes great photos! see below ……….
One of the BEST deserts I have EVER tasted!!!!
Everyone took a stone before the ceremony and was asked to hold onto it in their hand, and then towards the end of the ceremony a jar was passed around and all the guests were asked to put there stone in the jar, which I thought was a lovely idea.
Brilliant! Dad managed to throw red wine down himself JUST as the speeches were about to start hahahah – AMAZINGLY, almost like he predicted this happening, he had a full spare white suit in his tent!!
The Wedding Dream Team:
Field // The Party Field, Lewes.
Tipi // Beautiful World Tents.
Bell Tents // Brighton Bell Tent Company.
Wedding Dress // Ocean Bridal, Hove.
Caterer // Jacaranda Catering
Flowers // Brides – Maid, Becky Wilson.
Metal Daisy installations // Grooms Parents
Band // Oomfph