Beth and Scott's Relaxed Family Wedding at The Willow Tree

I always tend to lay out the photos before I look at the responses to the questionnaires for our real weddings. I want to choose the best photos which will capture your imagination as readers. Sometimes this backfires because I read the submissions and think ‘oh, I really didn’t get that from the photos!’ and have to re-jig things a bit to sit with the text.

However, with Beth and Scott’s wedding at their favourite pub, The Willow Tree, I got ‘it’. Beth described their wedding style as ‘super relaxed’ and photographer Annie Lovett concurred: “It was a beautifully relaxed, people/family-focussed day. I have yet to see another bride who beamed as much as Bethan did all day long! It really was about the two of them, and their two families genuinely coming together.”

I recommend once you’ve read Beth’s recollections to make sure you scroll through the gallery to see the story unfold in the pictures. There are so many images which, for me, resound easily with Beth’s words that I feel I’ve been able to walk through and experience their wedding day.Beth told me, “We’re both fairly practical people, which meant we tried to be prepared for every eventuality – we’d luckily ordered loads of umbrellas as the forecast looked a little uncertain in the days running up to the wedding and, lo-and-behold, we had a mini-downpour just as we were taking the group photos.”

“[Our wedding style was] Super Relaxed! We included lots of traditional elements but we made each part our own – from the cakes coming from our favourite Café, right through to having the speeches before dinner so everyone could relax and enjoy the food.”

“We had the ceremony at Newnham College, Cambridge as we’d always loved the grounds and the location was perfect to enable our guests to get a ‘Cambridge-y feel’. The staff at Newnham were absolutely fantastic, especially Marilyn (Conference & Events Co-ordinator), as they helped ensure everything ran so smoothly on the day!” I totally adore Beth’s 50’s-style dress with the oversized belt buckle. Beth went a little bit further afield to find her dress: “As I’m originally from Wales I really wanted to include some Welsh elements in the wedding and when I came across the gorgeous dresses at Stephanie Allin Couture I was thrilled – Stephanie has a shop in Mumbles, just down the road from my 93 year old Gramma’s house so dress fittings were a perfect excuse to pop in for a cup of tea and a catch up with her. She wasn’t going to be able to make the journey to join us for the wedding day so it was really nice to be able to keep her involved in that way. ”

“From start to finish, the whole team at Stephanie Allin were amazing – right through from my trying on loads of sample dresses during my first visit to the final tweaks and alterations in the weeks running up to the big day. I think I knew the dress I chose was ‘the one’ when I saw my Mum and Sister’s faces when I tried it on for the first time. That, and the fact it had pockets…seriously useful, every wedding dress should have pockets!”The Best Man was Scott’s oldest friend from home: “It was his responsibility to make sure Scott got to the venue on time. Punctual as ever, they arrived with 5 minutes to spare, not realising that there was a pre-wedding interview with the registrars to do before-hand – the registrar handled this wonderfully and came to me with a quiet “I don’t mean to worry you, but we can’t quite find the groom yet…”. Typical!”

Despite the last minute panic the ceremony went as planned, although “we should also mention our self-nominated flower girl (the Best Man’s two-year-old daughter) who took it upon herself to serenade our guests with an impromptu version of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star during our vows…it was absolutely adorable and hilariously timed and we couldn’t have asked for anything better!”

Beth and Scott’s love story started when they were both only 19 years old. “We were both studying similar courses at University in Bangor, North Wales – we had a few classes together in the first year so we kind of knew each other by sight but didn’t really go much beyond that.”

“Then, at the start of our second year, I gave a good friend of mine a lift back to his house after lectures and he introduced me to his housemate, Scott, and we had one of those awkward ‘I kind of know you but you’ve probably forgotten me…’ moments.”

“Anyway, ever the gentleman, he invited me in for a cup of tea and we’ve pretty much been together ever since! It was the last good cup of tea Scott’s ever made though!”

For the reception, Beth and Scott headed to one of their favourite local pubs, The Willow Tree in Bourn. “We’d been going to the Willow Tree for years and we knew we loved the food and the location so we took a chance and asked if they held wedding receptions…and they said yes! The support we had from Jess, Shaina and the whole team at the Willow Tree was amazing and it meant we could just sit back, relax and enjoy the afternoon and evening!”

It doesn’t get much more relaxed than that!

“It was really important to us to support as many local or small businesses as
possible. Our cake was from one of our favourite local cafés (Afternoon Tease…awesome for weekend brunch!) and we’d heard Will Robert busking in town on a few occasions so knew he was the perfect choice for our evening music. We were also really keen to have British, seasonal flowers and were thrilled to find Great British Florist online as this is what they specialise in. The main thing we felt was that was that organising a wedding takes a lot of effort from so many people so it was really important to choose suppliers that we trusted and that we really wanted to support so that we could relax and enjoy the rest of the day!”

“We couldn’t have done without anyone…truly! Organising a wedding is a big deal and having suppliers you can rely on is an absolute must. We were really lucky that everyone who contributed to the day was wonderful, professional and just great really.”

And the praise extended the other way too. Photographer Annie, who chatted to guitarist Will during the evening, commented that “Will Robert… said it was the best wedding he’d played at, as, with a captive audience in all of the guests, it was like a special little gig (usually at weddings no-one’s paying any attention…!).” Will has been featured on BBC Radio 1’s ‘Introducing’ programme and will play their Big Weekend this summer. He’s Cambridge-born, brilliantly talented, and you can often find him busking outside Great St Mary’s Church in central Cambridge.

Beth told me she was ‘absolutely thrilled’ with her wedding photographs. “Annie is the most wonderful photographer – she put us and all our guests at ease throughout the day and caught some wonderful images of our friends and family as a result. She was a truly wonderful person to deal with throughout the whole planning process too – absolutely professional, chatting with us about what we wanted as well as making some awesome suggestions, while all the time being 100% approachable and wonderfully friendly too!”
This was actually the second wedding Beth and Scott had organised, explained Annie: “They had planned their first a couple of years earlier, but it snowballed into something they didn’t want/didn’t reflect them/what’s important to them. So they cancelled the lot and started again.”

So what is Beth’s advice to couples still in the planning stages? “Don’t sweat the small stuff. Really. When you look back, it’s the big things that matter like having the kind of day you and your partner really want and having family and friends around to help you celebrate. Also, don’t believe everything you see on Pinterest…there’s only so much hand-crafted, colour-co-ordinated paraphernalia that you can take before your head explodes…be warned.”

As a self-confessed Pinterest addict, I can totally relate to that last piece of advice! Enjoy the rest of the photos in this real wedding – I find them full of an honesty and integrity which is really refreshing. I wish Beth and Scott the happiness that is evident in these photos for all the days of their lives.

Kirsty xx