Lisa & Tom got married on the 11th August 2012 at the beautiful Knockengorroch Farm in Galloway, South West Scotland. The farm is set within a stunning valley and is actually home to music festival Knockengorroch, which is described as being a world of music in the hills! Having been to the festival, the site held fond memories for Lisa and Tom but also the location gave them the freedom to marry exactly in the way they wanted…..

“The laws in Scotland mean you can get married anywhere … we wanted to be married outside in a really natural setting. The fact that there was nothing but a cow shed on the site meant that we could make it completely our own- but there was a lot of things to organise to make it work!!”

I absolutely love Lisa & Tom’s Cowshed wedding! Not only does Lisa make me want to dye my hair red (seriously – the girl is rocking that hair colour!), but I also want to cancel my venue and relocate the wedding to Knockengorroch Farm – the cowshed rocks and so does the setting it sits in!

Enjoy this one guys – it’s a beauty of a wedding with an equally beautiful tale to coincide – Tom’s proposal will make you swoon!

Lisa tells us all about it….

The Fox and Sky…….

We met at university in 2003/4 so that makes it 9 years! Crikey! We both studied fine art at Northumbria University and used to fancy each other from afar. We didn’t know each others names so I used to call him ‘the fox’ and he called me ‘Sky’ cause he thought I looked like sky from Neighbours (!?). One day I slipped my number under his door in halls of residence and we went from there!

Fairylights, a picnic and one knee….

Tom had planned it for months!! He asked my dad in Feb and at the end of October we were down in Brighton visiting some friends and we arranged to meet at a farm/restaurant (or so I thought…) We arrived and it was very dark. Tom led me into some dark woods and then we came across a trail of fairy lights! We followed the trail for about 5 minutes or so and there was a clearing with a picnic blanket and the trees were filled with lights- he got down on one knee, said some lovely things and asked me to marry him!

It didn’t end there though! He pushed me on through the trees and there was another clearing … with a fire and a tipi..I unzipped the tipi and was greeted with a huge cheer- it was filled with all of our closest friends! Magical stuff! …good job I said yes…!

Yellow Brogues and Rainbows…

My dress was called Colina by Pronovias but we changed bits of it like the sleeves and the band around the middle. I wore a Vivienne Westwood pearl necklace and yellow brogues from Office. 

Tom and my dad had their suits made in Nepal! They were made to measure and they both looked dashing!

Each bridesmaid chose a colour of the rainbow and chose a style in that colour that suited her. There were 8 of them so they looked wonderful stood at the front in their rainbow dresses!

A Humanist Ceremony….

We loved having our ceremony done by a humanist, Maggie made it just how we wanted. We had a close friend, Nick Porter, to do a reading and it was beautiful. During the ceremony there were swallows swooping around our heads and butterflies dancing past! It couldn’t have been more perfect!

Also, as a surprise my dad had dressed his car up as a giant badger and came to collect me in it! Glorious…yes I do have a bit of an obsession with badgers!

Wildflowers, Prayer flags and Homemade Decor….

My sister (Sambalino Heslop) did the flowers and they were gorgeous! I had a wildflower bouquet, the bridesmaids had sunflowers and lavender, the groomsmen had lavender and thyme herb gatherings as buttonholes – all tied up with brown twine! 

Our decoration was all homemade! Gingham tablecloths and rainbow bunting… some colourful prayer flags we had collected from Nepal..some paper rainbow flowers that we all made together the day before and lots of old medicine bottles that I had collected for the flowers.

Oh dear me – the lady is amazing!

Both Tom and I teach A Level photography and use a lot of photography in our own work so getting the photographer right was so important to us. I had been searching for someone who worked in just the right style and I came across Heather Shuker… oh dear me- the lady is amazing! I loved her wedding photography but I also thought her own personal work was really impressive too. I decided there and then that I must have her as my photographer! Heather doesn’t shoot an awful lot of weddings but when I explained to her what we had in mind for our wedding we won her over and she agreed! The ‘nearly married’ shoot was really useful too, although we take a lot of photographs we weren’t the most comfortable in front of the camera so it was good to meet and have a mess around before the big day.

Favourite Moment….

As well as our ceremony our favourite moment was also the cake (made by my sister in law). It was a giant stack of rainbow sponges covered in frosting and white chocolate flakes (topped with a pair crochet Mr and Mrs Badger made by Beth- my other sister in Law!) What was fantastic about the cake was that everyone was completely unaware that the cake was a rainbow until we cut it! There was a huge cheer and the first slice was passed around for everyone to have a bite! Yummmm!

Folk gypsy swing!

For the entertainment we had Rob Heron and the Tea Pad Orchestra! They were a mixture of folk gypsy swing craziness. They have a song called Lucy don’t like the fish and coincidentally I am terrified of fish – so they changed it to ‘Lisa don’t like the fish’… there were some crazy shapes being pulled on the dance floor!

Any advice for couples planning their big day?

Enjoy the planning- its so exciting! Don’t let any of it stress you out, it’s too much fun to spoil with worrying or stress! 

On the day itself let things happen as they will… just enjoy the day as it unfolds and don’t worry about anything! What’s the worst that can happen- you are surrounded by people who love you- they won’t care about little hiccups!

The Line Up

Photographer: Heather Shuker of Brighton Photo

Venue: Knockengorroch Farm

Wedding Dress: Pronovias from Deborah Moore

Invitations Andy Singleton

Photo booth: Hr Entertainment 

Catering: Hog 2 Roast

Flowers: Samantha Heslop 

Ceremony: Humanism Scotland

Bell Tents: The Tipi Hire Company 

 

Thank you so much to Lisa and Tom for sharing their amazing wedding with us and also to the fabulous Heather Shuker for taking such awesome photos!

We will be featuring more of Heather’s work in the next few weeks so watch this space!

Lisa and Tom’s first dance song will be featured in Independent Love Song later on today so don’t be a stranger!

Have a lovely Monday guys!

Big Love

Festival Brides xx