It's Friday peeps and to draw the week to a super stylish end I have a gorgeous Scottish wedding today. Bride Lizzie is a hat designer and designed her own head dress, her bridesmaids and her mum's butterfly hat.

Lizzie and Emeka married on the 3rd May 2014 at Ardtornish Estate. They wanted their wedding to combine their Scottish heritage and Nigerian roots, whilst having a great party. They opted for a fun Ceilidh in the evening, DIYed their gorgeous Spring blooms and had the prettiest edible floral cakes. Emeka planned the sweetest gift for his bride; keeping a secret diary a year before their wedding; he wrote a special moment down of the two of them together every day.

Lizzie and Emeka looked super cool, I love Emeka's velvet jacket and Lizzie donned the prettiest hair pieces. So much style.

Thanks so very much to On Love and Photography for sharing their fabulous photographs today.

THE PROPOSAL | Emeka had managed to convince me that he didn't have much interest in getting married in the run up to the proposal, which though a little mean, meant it was a real surprise! He told me he had an early Christmas present for me, and gave me a photo album of pictures of our five years together (we'd just celebrated our anniversary), I went through page by page thinking how sweet that was of him but never expecting to see the words 'Will you?' written on the final page, he got down on one knee with the ring ..... I was so shocked it took me a while to say yes!

THE VISION | We started with the venue; it is a really special place to me as we used to go on holiday there as children, as did my Mum when she was a child. Emeka had also spent a holiday there with us and so we both said straight away that this is where we wanted to get married. We knew we wanted a humanist ceremony, a great meal and a big party with a Scottish Ceilidh, and we wanted to marry together both my Scottish heritage and Emeka's Nigerian roots.

THE PLANNING PROCESS | We started early with the venue, which was just as well as there was only one weekend that spring that we could book! Then we dealt with the other big things; the band and the food. Once all that was booked in we felt a bit calmer, made a lot of spread sheets and started looking at our outfits, venue décor, flowers, music , cakes, rings etc. It was really fun! I got quite sad towards the end when I realised that we wouldn't have any more planning to do and exciting choices to make. I don't think we found anything stressful (except my dress) and it was nice that we agreed on nearly every aspect of what we wanted.

BUDGET | We budgeted £20'000 and we went a little over this once the honeymoon was booked!

THE VENUE | Ardtornish Estate, Morvern, Scotland.

THE DRESS & ACCESSORIES | Bespoke dress, headwear by myself and my close friend Piers Atkinson (in order of wear) shoes by Dune, jewellery was my Grandmothers.

FINDING THE DRESS | I found the dress very quickly at a vintage couture dress shop in London. It is a re-make of a beautiful 30's bias cut silk dress. The original was too short so could not be altered, and the dressmaker also offers a 'made new' service where she copies the original pattern and then alters it to fit. Although I love my dress and it looked great on the day I actually had the final alterations on it done elsewhere as the process with her was so awful. She cancelled appointments on the day (when my Mum had come down from Scotland), failed to deliver on any of the proposed time schedule and then told me 5 weeks before my wedding that the most important thing was that she enjoyed the process of making my dress, and I should give her some space. She's very skilled but does not understand the bridal industry!

GROOM'S ATTIRE | He had a much nicer bespoke experience! He went to Beggars Run, a bespoke tailors in London. They found the suit pattern and fabric he liked, and then had one made to fit him, it looked amazing! It is a midnight blue velvet tux, with blue satin lapel which he wore with a midnight patent leather shoe, dark blue Lanvin tie and a Gieves and Hawkes shirt.

THE READINGS & MUSIC | We had two readings; my Mums was a combination of phrases from the works of Howard Cutler and Jack Kornfield. The Emeka's friend Ged read A Lovely Love Story by Edward Monkton. We had Fleetwood Mac, Songbird playing as I walked into the clearing, then Stevie Wonder signed Sealed Delivered as we signed the schedule, and finally Carly Simon's Nobody Does it Better to play us of to the reception.

BEAUTIFUL BRIDESMAIDS | My sister Clare, and friends Emily and Sarah-Lee were my bridesmaids and my niece Iona was my flower girl. The wedding would not have been the same without them! We did our own flowers as the venue is so rural. In my head as I planned I was there arranging with them, but of course the day before the wedding I kept having other things to attend to, people to speak to and things to do so they all soldiered through and did an amazing job! They also dressed the tables with the finishing touches as well as keeping me sane! They all looked beautiful on the day in green / blue Ghost floor-length dresses and with floral head dresses on. Iona wore a Next pale pink dress with floral embellishment and gave everyone a little giggle when she ran out of petals half way down the aisle and ran the rest of the way!

THE FLOWERS | We ordered form a wholesalers in London that delivered to the venue. I hired the hurricane vases for the tables from Bespoke Touches in Glasgow, who were great and very helpful! We then arranged all the flowers ourselves. I wanted a natural, un-fussy feel but with some amazing bright oranges and pinks mixed with whites, and some big blooms like Icelandic Poppies and Peonies mixed with delicate flowers like Love in the Mist and Sweet Peas. I think they looked perfect in the venue!

THE CAKE | We decided we wanted a great tasting cake above all else, so we ended up having a cake table with 6 8inch round cakes from Humble Pie Bakery in Glasgow. We had them iced, and then asked the caterers to add the edible flowers I had ordered from Maddocks Farm (Devon). Everyone told us how great the cake was as we served it for dessert with the caterers home made ice cream. I'd like to also mention the caterers for the meal; The Whitehouse Restaurant. They are local to the venue so do all the weddings there, and luckily are a fantastic restaurant that have been in the Michelin guide more than a few times. They use amazing local produce and our meal was just incredible!

YOUR PHOTOGRAPHER | The amazing Sophia and Anita from On Love and Photography. I met Sophia's business partner Gulia at a wedding fair in London. I was instantly drawn to their work as it is so sensitive and natural while still being artistic, fun and personal. We met Sophia in Scotland months before the wedding and during that meeting and through the whole process she was friendly and reassuring and a pleasure to work with! On the day they both worked so hard, I couldn't quite believe they made it through to the Ceilidh! Our pictures are stunning, and it's such a joy to receive them and re-live all the moments we remember, and some we didn't see from the day.

THE DETAILS & DÉCOR | I'm lucky to have some great creative friends who I roped in! My good friend Cherith Harrison is a graphic designer and she did all the stationery and invites for us. We gave her quite a loose brief of marrying some African style prints and bright colours with some of the more traditional prints of the wallpapers in Ardtornish House. She did an amazing job, we loved our invites and the menus really brightened up the hall for the meal! Another good friend and one of my bridesmaids, Emily Pugh, is a set designer so she masterminded the table settings, flowers, ribbons on the chairs and the extra vases rounds the room.

THE HONEYMOON | We haven't had it yet! We decided to wait till Christmas when we could take a few weeks off work, and we're booked to go to Costa Rica which we can't wait for! It's nice to have that to look forward to now.

MEMORABLE MOMENTS | There are so many! Getting ready with my maids, Iona and my Mum was so fun. My dad surprised me by wearing his Dad's kilt on the day. The moment I walked round the corner with him and saw everyone and Emeka standing in the clearing overlooking the loch was beautiful. The warming of the rings was really lovely, and so many of the guests mentioned how much they liked this part of the ceremony. We took a short time for ourselves after the group photos and before we made our entrance for dinner just to sit and have a glass of champagne in our room looking out at the loch which was really special. ALL the speeches, hats of to the guys! The chaos of the ceilidh was great, and the fact that most people were up there for the long weekend meant we got to re-live it all with them the next day - after a dip in a very cold loch! Just having all our loved ones in one beautiful place was such a nice experience.

ADVICE FOR OTHER COUPLES | Have fun! It's a great time as a couple. We learned a lot about each other even though we'd been together 7 year on the day we got married. There will be some stresses, it's a huge thing to plan, but on the day all that matters is that you're both there and everyone is happy! It goes by way too quickly so savour every moment, and make sure you take some time during the day with each other to take a step back and smile.

CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE |

Venue | Ardtornish Estate

Photographers | On Love and Photography

Catering | The Whitehouse

Cakes | Humble Pie Bakery

Edible Flowers | Maddocks Farm

Emeka's suit | Beggars Run

Vases | Bespoke Touches

Stationery | Cherith Harrison

Venue décor | Emily Pugh

My first headband | Lizzie McQuade

My second headband | Piers Atkinson

Perfection.

Thanks so so much to Lizzie and Emeka for sharing their beautiful wedding with us XOXO Lou