Rustic Romance: Amanda and Jonathan's Homestead Wedding

Rustic Romance: Amanda and Jonathan's Homestead Wedding

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A M A N D A + J O N A T H A N

{ The Robertsons Photography }

Amanda and Jonathan had built their romance on years of friendship and so once they started dating, everything just seemed to fit together comfortably. Their wedding reflected the natural, 'feels like home' kind of love they share. The day was rustic, relaxed and full of flowers and antique treasures.

F R O M T H E B R I D E A N D G R O O M

We first met...

Jonathan: Amanda and I first met through mutual friends whilst we were both on holidays overseas in the US. We became good friends and then a few years later starting dating.

We knew it was love...

Amanda: I think I knew early on in our relationship that Jonathan was the one for me and that we would get married - he came from a similar family background to me, we shared the same goals and values and we complimented each other's strengths and weaknesses. I think having had a friendship first also made our relationship really comfortable from the start.

Jonathan: I remember that I told Amanda that I loved her during the first time I travelled back to Sydney to meet her friends and family as the trip solidified that we had the foundation for something great.

The proposal...

Jonathan: We got engaged in 2014 during a trip to Hawaii. Amanda grew up with horses so I proposed to her after we had been on a horse riding tour through the mountain trails at Kualoa Ranch. I had designed and purchased the engagement ring earlier that year and had kept it hidden from Amanda until the trip. Our close friends were on the trip with us so we were very lucky enough to get some great photos of the actual proposal!

T H E W E D D I N G

Our wedding photographer...

Amanda: We were so incredibly fortunate to have David and Shobana from The Robertsons Photography spend the day with us. I had first seen their amazing work in a bridal magazine but it was really after speaking to them over Skype (as we live in Melbourne) that Jonathan and I just knew that they were the right people for us. We can't be more grateful for how beautifully they captured all the special moments of our day and it just felt like we were spending the day with really close friends where everything was really natural and just a whole lot of fun!

Our dream wedding...

Amanda: From the very beginning I knew that I wanted a barn wedding with a really homely feel to the day and luckily Jonathan was OK with that! I wanted it to be really rustic and relaxed and full of flowers and antique treasures. We really wanted our guests to feel comfortable interacting with each other in the informal way that families do, enjoying the food, drinks and laughs of the day with a focus on connection, merriment and romance.

The colour scheme was a real mixture of blues, pinks, burgundy and purples which all worked really wonderfully together and a lot of the props used throughout the day were either handmade by my Dad and I or sourced from my parents' house, antique shops and vintage hire stores.

I also grew up in a rural area with horses and other animals so it was important that we had the Clydesdales and the chickens there at the wedding venue to add to the theme!

Ceremony location...

Amanda: We chose to get married under the large fig tree on Tocal Homestead's main lawn - it was just so grandeur and made for spectacular photos! My parents had taken me to the homestead as a child and it looked very similar to our home in Oakville so it was the perfect choice for a rustic garden wedding. My dad had built an iced-tea stand for the post-ceremony drinks to be served on and we had made all of the signage as well so it had a real DIY feel. We also had a beautiful floral arbour and mason jars full of wildflowers hanging up the aisle so it looked amazing!

Reception venue...

Jonathan: We chose to stay at Tocal Homestead for our reception as well which was held in the beautiful function barn on the property. We had also set up a picnic area for the guests on the lawn whilst we had our photos taken. The whole reception set up was DIY so our families helped out the day before the wedding to hang all of the fairy lights up, set up the place settings, furniture, signage etc. It was really exciting to see the final product when we made our entrance as we hadn't seen it fully finished with all the flower installations and it looked pretty amazing.

Pre-wedding celebrations...

Jonathan: I had a Bucks night with all of my friends and family - it was pretty low key at my brother's house with some drinks, music and sumo-wrestling suits!

Amanda: My bridesmaids organised for us to do a flower crown workshop for my Hens Day (since they know I am flower obsessed!) and then we wore them out to dinner and drinks at a Japanese cocktail bar in Melbourne CBD.

The bridal party...

Jonathan: I had my best man Michael and my groomsman Chris on my side of the bridal party - both really good friends of mine.

Amanda: I had my sister Jessica as my maid of honour and my best friend Jes as my bridesmaid.

The bridesmaids wore...

Amanda: I had a specific colour in mind for the girls which proved very difficult to find in Australia so I had to order their dresses from The Dessy Group in New York. The style was #2880 in the colour merlot. We did had to have them altered when it got closer to the wedding as my friend Jess was pregnant so we had the back zip taken out and a lace-up back put in.

The groom and groomsmen wore...

Jonathan: We were pretty much walking advertisements for Tarocash with our suits, shirts, belts and shoes all coming from there. Our suits were a charcoal navy and we wore a simple white shirt with brown shoes. Our navy ties were from Van Heusen.

The dress...

Amanda: I knew that I wanted a full lace gown in ivory but in terms of style I wasn't really set on a certain one as being quite curvy I wasn't sure what would be flattering for my body shape. Luckily I was super fortunate that in my first appointment with Luv Bridal I found my perfect dress! It was a strapless Mia Solano gown (style Adele) which was a lace slim A-line with a sweetheart neckline, beaded applique detail throughout and a chapel length train which had scalloped lace to finish. I was quite self-conscious of my arms and bust so I had an excellent seamstress who added delicate lace sweetheart sleeves onto the dress for me - I really did feel beautiful!

Wedding flowers...

Amanda: I love flowers so it was a really hard choice picking the types that I wanted to incorporate into the day but the girls at Jade McIntosh Flowers really understood the concept I was going for and put together some stunning, loose and unstructured bouquets that looked like we could have just picked them out of the garden that morning which is exactly what I wanted!

My bouquet was comprised of ranunculas, pieris, David Austen roses, blushing brides, anenomes, ivy berry, budding jasmine, mini gum and burgundy native grass in tones of raspberry, pink burgundy and plum with a little white and cream throughout.

My bridesmaids had bouquets comprised of snowball viburnum, budded jasmine vine, mini alium heads, ranunculas, snapdragons, blushing brides, david austen roses, sweet pea and native grasses in tones of white, cream and blush pink with splashes of burgundy, plum and deep aubergine.

The guys had buttonholes made of blushing brides, burgundy native grass, lavender, blush David Austen roses and pieris and the girls and I had stunning blushing brides in our hair.

Reception décor...

Amanda: Our theme was 'rustic romance' so everything was DIY pieces we had had made, vintage pieces we had sourced from my parents' house, antique stores and from The Vintage Way which is an amazing vintage hire business in Sydney.

We had covered the roof of the barn with hundreds of fairy lights which really added to the atmosphere of the room and when reflected on the glass windows made the room seem endless!

For our guests we had three long trestle tables with oak cross-back chairs and we decorated these with lace table runners, hand-made stationery and table numbers, our candle bomboniere and the amazing tree slice centrepieces and place-card holders that my Dad had made.

The flowers for the centre-pieces were in different sized mason jars tied with lace and jute and were made to look like we had picked them out of the garden so they were all different and including easter daisies, snowball viburnum, blush and burgundy snapdragons, blush pink David Austen roses, lavender and flannel flowers.

The bridal table was decorated in the same way and we had a beautiful flower installation on the wall behind us which was actually the top arch of our flower arbour from the ceremony.

For the room décor we had lots of vintage furniture from my parents' house including their dressing table for the wedding cake and teal velveteen arm chairs. We had a number of vintage ladders around the room which we had placed stacks of vintage books tied with jute and jars full of hand-picked apples on and we also had vintage photo frames, suitcases, picnic hampers, scales, typewriters, candelabras and Persian rugs scattered around the room to add to the homely and personal feel.

One of the more personal touches to the room was a vintage a-frame ladder that we had set up which had framed photographs of all our grandparents and parents weddings and some handmade signs that I had made to honour those loved ones who were no longer with us.

Our wishing well was a stack of old suitcases with a jar of flowers and some apples holding it open and we had a Polaroid guest book which was a lot of fun!

Flowers, decorations and cake...

Amanda: Our flowers and floral arrangements were created by Jade McIntosh Flowers. I am obsessed with flowers so this was something I really wanted to get right and Jade was amazing! Every crazy idea I came up with she brought to life exactly how I had dreamed it would be - they were stunning!

Jonathan: Amanda and her Dad made a lot of the decorations and the rest Amanda had sourced from antique shops and items around her family's homestead. The rest was hired from The Vintage Way based on a theming mood board that Amanda had put together in the month's leading up to the wedding. We also hired all of our lights from Beavis Event and Party Hire which really made the barn come to life during the reception.

Amanda: My very talented Mum, Jenny made our wedding cake from scratch the night before the wedding. It was a 3 tiered naked cake, each tier with a different flavour - caramel, vanilla and Mississippi chocolate mud cake. It was served with a French cream and raspberry coolie and was set up on a rustic log slice that my Dad had made.

On the menu...

Amanda: We had a traditional sit-down alternate drop menu for the wedding. Our caterers were Sprout Catering and their food was absolutely delicious!

Jonathan: Our friends and family still comment about how good it was today!

Amanda: The menu was as follows:

Entrée - Crispy Pork Belly with roasted carrot puree, apple and radish salad - alternating with - Pumpkin Arancini with garlic aioli, basil mayonnaise and leaf salad

Main - Roasted Chicken Breast with pumpkin risotto, bean and almond salad - alternating with - Slow Braised Beef with mash potato, autumn vegetables & red wine jus

Dessert - My mum's amazing wedding cake!

Bomboniere...

Amanda: Yes we made candle bomboniere for all of the guests which we handmade all of the kraft labels and dressed with rustic jute ribbon. They all had a little message on them that said "Thanks for making our wedding day a little brighter".

Memorable moments...

Amanda: The whole day was very memorable - you could feel the joy and love in the air - but some key moments for me were having my Nana be my flower girl (something I had promised her as a little girl!), our unique and special ceremony that our celebrant Jacie had put together that was 100% a true reflection of us as a couple, dancing with my Dad and getting to have so many things from my family home and that my Mum and Dad had made for us brightening up the room!

Jonathan: Memorable moments for me were also the ceremony, having my Dad there after he went through a double lung-transplant the year before, seeing all of our friends and family enjoying the day and the food was pretty amazing and memorable.

Wedding soundtrack...

Jonathan: We wanted a real rustic garden party vibe so Amanda had spent weeks putting together a playlist loop of all of our favourite songs in acoustic and orchestral form - this was played whilst our guests were being seated.

Amanda: I walked the aisle to 'Somewhere over the Rainbow' as it was the song I had always said when I was little that I would have, our signing songs were 'Just You' by Amy Stroup and 'I Do' by Colbie Caillat and our processional was 'Stuck on You' by Meiko.

Jonathan: During the reception we entered to 'Can't Stop the Feeling' by Justin Timberlake, our first dance was to 'From the Ground Up' by Dan + Shay and Amanda danced with her Dad to 'I Loved Her First' by Heartland.

M A R R I E D L I F E

The honeymoon...

Jonathan: We took a short mini-honeymoon directly after the wedding and spent time in Batemans Bay and Merimbula. We then took a 5 week honeymoon in December where we travelled in Vietnam and Cambodia which was a really great experience.

Future plans...

Amanda: We are really looking forward to putting some focus back on our home which we built at the end of 2015 - and all of the things we need to do to get it finished - and of course we look forward to starting a family one day.

In 40 years you hope to...

Amanda: be two happily married retired travellers with lots of grandchildren to spoil!

W E D D I N G W I S D O M

The engagement...

Take some time to enjoy your engagement before you start planning anything - it's such a great time in your life so need to rush!

Planning...

Take your time and talk to each other about what is important for each of you on the day. Also as we did most things DIY, creating a budget and task list really kept us organised and on top of all of the decisions and payments we need to make - it was a life saver!

On the day...

Relax! Not everything is going to go as perfectly as you planned but at the end of the day it doesn't really matter. We also recommend making sure that you take a moment just for yourselves to reflect on the ceremony and to look around at all of your loved ones who have made the time to come and celebrate your love for each other.

Photographer: The Robertsons Photography / Videographer: Bowline Media / Suits: Tarocash / Wedding Dress: Mia Solano at Luv Bridal / Bridesmaids Dresses: Dessy / Hair and Makeup: Chic Artistry / Venue: Tocal Homestead / Catering: Sprout Catering / Decorations, Signage and Stationary: The bride and her family / Vintage Props: The Vintage Way / Fairy Lights: Beavis Event Hire / Celebrant: Jacie Whitfield / Flowers: Jade McIntosh Flowers / Music: One Fun Band / Cake: The bride's mother

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