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The REAL heros of our Wedding Day!

On the 25th of October 2019 I married the man I had been put on this earth to find.  As we all know, the path in which we found each other was very serendipidous but then that’s a story for another day!

5 months after our wedding day I can’t believe how much my life has changed!  Yes being married ‘is’ different; weird that no-one says it isn’t but it so is!  You feel safe, less vulnerable, more in love, scared for his safety and also very protective.  But the biggest change for me personally is that people are openly talking to me more!  Turns out being married makes you relatable to everyone else!  Men and Woman alike now have a subject they can start a conversation with me when they see me!  I honestly never solved it until now but people didn’t really know what to ask me when they run into me. My history is being the one who is the conversation starter, the one who makes the first move in saying hello or the one to simply smile and move on.  So yes being married is awesome for so many different reasons.

We had the most epic day and for any future brides spending the next few weeks inside I thought this list might help inspire you to see what NZ buisness’s are out there who can help you on your speical day. Seeing that the Bride and Groom show is currently postponed hopefully this list of amazing vendors will help.  Good thing to get onto when we have all this time on the couch hey?

The Wedding Dress.

I chose a traditional Mikado ballgown with a hint of lace detail from the largest Bridal Dress shop in the country! @bridesbydonnarae in Invercargil.

It has a matte lace embellished circular train and an element of function with deep hidden pockets. A rare dress for it’s day

The iconic look is emphasised with an ivory cathedral circular length veil with delicate crocheted edging.

My second gown was a head to toe shimmering ensemble and is one of a kind.  Full sequin, firm fitting cut, alluring back and a deep plunge creates the most flatting shape finished with a crystal beaded belt.

This dress is exclusive to Donna Rae from Brides by Donna Rae, Southland.  I went down with my mum for a weekend and came back with two dresses and a new friend called Donna!

She will sort you out in seconds and with the store being 4 stories high you will not leave empty handed! She also sells Mother of the Bride  dresses so my beautiful Mother was able to get her dress from there also!bridesbydonnarae.co.nz

Zac’s Suit:

He along with this groomsmen wore suits from @barkersclothingZac wore the Holbrook Blazer and Trouser combo in stone with a white shirt.  For the groomsmen they had on the same trousers but a light blue shirt and navy jacket. For more options head to barkersonline.co.nz

Accomodation:

Situated in the heart of Matakana, a hidden gem of a wine region lies Matakana Estate!

This beautiful house lies between rolling green hills and beautiful sandy beaches less than an hour’s drive north of Auckland. Offering complete peace and privacy, @matakanaestate is set high on a north-facing ridge and enjoys panoramic views over rolling vineyards and hills.

It was amazing, we were able to have all the girls stay there the night before plus my brother and our Mum and Dad and as you can PLENTY of room to get ready!  The night of the wedding Zac and I stayed and then on the third night both our imediate familes and us stayed.  We couldn’t recommend it more.  In fairness also a great location for a whole wedding to take place if your looking for a venue still.

Visit matakanaestate.co.nz and talk to the girls about booking your stay.

Decorations;

If you click through to @lively_and_co you will come across every kind of party/event decoration you can think of! They have an amazing team there ready to help decorate any enviorment you have chosen and they simply send it all out to you in the post!

Catering;We went with the platter option as it simply is a great way to feed all dietary requirements these days.  But when I say platter I don’t just mean any platter!!!  @yourperfectplatter produce the creme da la creme of all platters.  They arrive a few hours before you require the platter to be ready with a mix of wooden accessories and tools to add different levels to the platters.  They bring in all the food  that has been freshly sourced that day and the team get busy in the kitchen prepping and then get creative with the display.  My Dad (who’s a dairy farmer in the Waikato) had never seen a platter in his life.  He came up to me and whipsered “have you seen what they have done with the food?  It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen, that is apart from you today naturally”  He still repeats the story of the amazing platter to his friends and colleagues to this day!

Bridemaids

Yes, I know 9 is way too many, 12 if you count the boys too but I couldn’t pick just three special friends – these are my people! My tight-knit group of mates, lead the way in how to be a best mate!!  I couldn’t have gotten to where I am today without each of these individuals in my life and they simply made my heart sing by being there and helping out through-out the whole day.

They beauitfully walked down the isle into the church carrying colourful umbrellas that I hand painted with words of love at 5am the morning of.  Flowers are expenisve and there was no way we could add into the bugget 9 bouquets of flowers so instead they each got a $20 umbrella (which they could have way more fun with).

Their beautiful dresses were the amazing Cairo dresses in navy from @blakthelabel.  They were the simplist ones I could find, the lowtest price and perfect for suiting each indiverdual body type.  I asked them to wear gold jewlery and what ever shoes they felt like. Their beauty on the day blew me away!

The extremley handsome boys in my tribe wore Navy Jackets, one of them was left over from Zac’s season of the Bachelor (he has so many suits) and two where owned already.   Finding the paints on the other hand was a liitle harder, and turned into a big group effort.

The night before I gave everyone a gift bag filled with random stuff I had been collecting as gifts all year, matching jandals and a dressing gown from @dream_sleepwear.

The team at Blush and Bloom were so easy to deal with, lovely gowns to chose from and sizing for different sizes wasn’t a problem! Have a look at their range here Blushbloomco

Flowers;

The tribe didn’t have flowers but I did however!

@blush_flowers came highly recommend by our photographer Amanda (more on her soon) as Kelly is her sister and the thought of everyone being on the same page made things even simpular.  The team at Blush said that white flowers would be best as they take nothing away from the brides face or dress so we ended up going with long white floating orchids.

And also a bunch of coloured flowers (the same colours as the umbrellas) just to have around the house with Amanda as we were getting ready.

Zac wore one Orchid.

And ‘all’ boys wore pocket flowers the same colours as the umbrellas too, red, purple and pink.  No plain red roses were aloud (for obvious Bachellor reasons).

Note: When collecting the flowers on the day check if they are to be collected from the store or from their warehouse as often these two can be located at two different addreses and make sure that you are collecting your seperate orders, we had a slight problem of accidentally collecting Zac’s flowers when we were there also (which was soon sorted).

Photographer;

The beautiful Amanda from @amandathomasphotography came to our rescue on the day.

Her and I meet up quite alot before the wedding, I had made a mood board of what Zac and I were after and she meet me at the venue to do a walk through.  We didn’t want any photos in front of random trees or grass, this was a personal decision I made as I wanted to work more with light and angels and the concrete, minimal look that our venue “The Auckland Museum’ wonderfully offered.

Amanda arrived early to Matakana Estate and she captured shots all day finishing off with sunset shoots and pictures of our first dance.  She’s based in Auckland but get in touch as she would easily discuss travel options. amandathomas.co.nz

The Video!

@nzweddingfilms were the master mind behind this video, we did nothing but suggest the song.  Have you seen it?

Michael single handedly shot everything on the one day and then him and his buisness partner Adrien editied it.  Based in Christchurch but they obvioulsy travel to you.  I highly recommend getting in touch with the boys through nzweddingfilms.co.nz

Vendors!

Once we arrived at the venue each vendor was ready, set up and in full swing!  Given we could only get then into the venue an hour before the guests arrived this was incredible and highly professional on their behalf!

The backdrop photowall;

Look no further than @stellarbackdrops! Their team has every option of amazing backdrops you could ever think of.  They made us a personal “Erin and Zac’ sign in gold which they attached to the backdrop on the night and they even let us keep it.

Have a look at their range here although I warn you theres so many great ones, you will probably end up highering two!

Selfie Station;

Infront of the backdrop we set up the most amazing selfie station from @littleblackphotobooth.

It’s a giant mirror that you personally touch to count down a selfie.  Everyone had so much fun using it, you could fit in big groups and because it was something a bit different the smiles and laughs on everyones faces in the pictures are just magical to look back on.

They have other great ideas on what you could use also, so have a look at their epic products here!

The Cake;

By now you will all know the amazing Mariska from @colabcakery but if not OMG you need to be following her and ordering her pieces of art!  That’s right, they are not just cakes they are custom made magical designs made from an increadibly gifted artist who has an amazing soul! She puts everything into her cakes, and half the time she puts your needs before her own.

If you ever run into any of our  family or firends who attended the wedding I can guarantee they are still going on about the taste of it! See for yourself here or if the website is still under construction her insta is epic @colabcakery

The Champagne;

I grew up working on What Now with the beautifully talented presenter Virginie Le Brun.  Her and her amazing family own and operate @no1familyestate wines so naturally she was my first port of call and she totally delivered.  The champagne was ordered and sent straight to the caterers, we didn’t even have to lift one bottle well except for the Magnum that Zac chose to enter the venue with.

When we arrived at the venue for the first time the first thing we did was pop the champagne and some massive party guns.  It made for some great photos and kicked the celebrations off perfectly.  To order or contact Virginie simply click through to here… no1familyestate.co.nz

Entertainment;

Two words for you…”Luke Bird”

As an entertainer and go to MC for weddings myself I found it really upsetting having to pass this role onto someone else but then I thought of @lukebird0 and boy did I not think about being upset anymore.

I cannot recommend Luke enough! He took over and got the crowd going as he broke into song singing Queen’s Somebody to Love, he personally introduced every Bridesmaid and Groomsmen and throughout the entire evening completely entertained every single guest from top to toe and did I mention he did it all in a full length sequen suit from @worldbrandinnz “AMAZING”

Also what’s a party without Brazilian Dancers!!

@braziliandivasnz joined us for the evening and wow did they top the night off!

Their style of music, dance moves and energy was perfect for welcoming in the bridal party and their feathered performance after we cut the cake was perfect to help open up the dance floor and encourage  everyone to join.

Such a talented group of dancers lead by an amazing buisness woman, I would highly recommend them for any event!

Styling;

In regards to styling we choose not to do much with the space but instead simply light up the amazing pillars throughout the venue.

I did how ever pay a visit to Fadia at @stylishweddingsandevents to collect a few vases, flowers and a wishing well which were all perfect.

Infact they have so many lovely things there it was hard to to stick to our minimalistic plan, if I had of gone to her show room earlier perhaps it would have been an entirely different wedding haha. Click through to see her many options stylishevent.co.nz

And other NZ buisness’s that were also involved in-and-around the wedding are as follows below. These are the important people in my day to day leading up to the wedding who I simply couldn’t have pulled it off without.

@montybetham coach, mentor and friend!

He worked on my body for 10 months leading up to the big day! Physical well-being is increadibly important and if you reach out to him he has a bunch of different ways in which he can train you.

@culetjewellery 

Scotty at Culet helped Zac and I to design the perfect matching signet rings that we were thinking of.  Starting right from pencil scetches through to the 3D computer designs, they were there every step of the way to insure we got what we were looking for.

@offthewallnz1 entertainment

If you’re looking for the prefct wedding band look no further than these guys!  I actually sang a song myself the night of our wedding (to Zac) and these guys were more than happy to have me along to one of their practices before the wedding to have a rehersal with them – Epic guys!

@chichairhairextensionsnz

We all know getting the perfect length of hair is near impossible! @chichair has hair extensions of all sizes and length.  Shipped right to your door with no stress!

@caci_nz skin care

I signed up for to their 12 month plan, 12 months before our wedding.  Every four weeks I recieved either a facial, microdermabrasion or dermapeel.  It can seem like a lot but if you thnk about the amount of time, energy and money we put into our guym memberships, diets and wellness regiems we need to  also be thinking about our skin care just as much!

@womansdaynz editorial

We were luckily enough for our wedding to feature in this amazing magazine and it was an opportunity we did not take lightly.  Zac and I both have worked separately and now together with this company for as long as we both can remember, the team there have become family and you simply can’t fault their love and professionalism.  Long may we all look forward to our weekly time-out to catch up on everyones speical moments in life in this weeks Woman’s Day xox

If you missed the article you can read the online version here from the amazing team at

Now To Love.

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