Welcome to Who What Wear Weddings, the destination for style-minded weddings. Expect insightful tips straight from the newlyweds, shoppable elements and plenty of must-save imagery as we share the nuptials of our favourite fashion people getting married. For upcoming features, share your submissions here.
"I’ve always been a party planner, so much so that it turned into a career over time", says Alexandra Ting, a creative and marketing manager based in Boston, Massachusetts. "I get to work in some beautiful venues with teams of producers, designers, fabricators, videographers and florists. I think that’s why I was drawn to such a personal—in many ways, simple—approach for my own big day," she continues. And indeed, she is right; her wedding to scientist Charlie Gilbert was simple but incredibly beautiful, full of intimate and unique details that the couple, along with their friends and family, will cherish for years to come.
Their wedding took place on a particularly (and surprisingly) warm, sunny day in Kew, South West London, where the groom's family is from. It included a stunning dress, a pre-ceremony mindfulness exercise, portrait sketching and photography, a quintessential afternoon tea and a pretty spectacular version of a wedding cake that the entire Who What Wear UK team has been inspired by.
Scroll to read more about the wedding day from the bride's point of view, from the outfits and the flowers to the ceremony and the food.
"Charlie grew up in London and I’m from Boston, Massachusetts, in the U.S. We met whilst I was living abroad in the UK, and over the years, I’ve had the privilege of spending lots of time at his family home in South West London. It’s a place filled with so much love and warmth, and we couldn’t think of a more perfect setting to celebrate our marriage."
WWW Wedding Tip: Think about other ways you can use your photographer. What about individual portraits of your loved ones, documenting your daily coffee or tea-making routine in the morning before the wedding, or weird and funny staged shots with your friends? Or have your photographer follow you as you run a pre-ceremony errand so they can get a photo of you preparing for the big day.
"It was important for us to honour our friends and family as well as the home and garden we were lucky enough to have as the backdrop to our celebration. To do so, we asked each of the Gilberts to sit for a portrait in a meaningful place or with a cherished object, or to perform a daily ritual, captured so beautifully by Carr + Senteno in a series of mini photoshoots. Things were more spontaneous in the garden—hey, we’re taking environmental portraits!—but the images capture the perfect essence of who everyone is today and we’ll cherish them forever."
"I’ve loved Cecilie Bahnsen since the moment I discovered her designs over a decade ago. There is so much romance and playfulness in the silhouettes, exaggerated sleeves and hand-crafted details, so it was pretty much an immediate decision when I started thinking about what to wear."
"I also love the utility of the Faber dress. I needed to be free to walk around in (potentially wet) grass and break it down on the dance floor, but we also ended up climbing on top of our ceremony hut through the vegetable patch and exploring the wine cellar (amongst many other shenanigans), and the dress remained flawless."
"Charlie wore a sand-coloured, linen-wool-blend suit from Indochino and a white dress shirt from David Donohue. We found the perfect accessories at Keezer's Classic Clothing in Massachusetts: a shiny, off-white, ultra-skinny tie from the '60s paired with a hammered-gold tie pin."
"We didn’t feel tied to any wedding traditions and instead focused on creating moments of connection and fun for ourselves and our guests."
WWW Wedding Tip: We had the freedom to dream up our ceremony from scratch. If you can too, think outside the box, choose a few things that would be meaningful to you and your partner, get help from your friends and family and make it happen! I promise it’ll be magical.
"To begin our ceremony, Charlie’s sister Georgia led a mindfulness exercise to bring everyone fully into the space. She asked everyone to close their eyes and reflect on how they were feeling, what they were sensing and then eventually to visualise the first time they had met one or both of us and what their first impressions or strongest memories were. She then asked everyone to turn to the people next to them and spend some time sharing. Though the ceremony had only just begun, my heart was already bursting with love and gratitude hearing some of those memories."
"Next, it was time for us to take centre stage. Instead of walking down an aisle, we got up and struck a pose on the platform whilst Georgia led a blind drawing exercise where everyone had to sketch a portrait of us without looking down at the paper. It was so silly and fun but also a really nice way for us to look out over our ceremony and take in the grinning faces of our loved ones."
"The ceremony was written by my sister-in-law Megan, who is not a legal officiant but rather an English professor and one of the most thoughtful and eloquent people I know. Though Charlie and I were involved in most of the writing process, Megan (with help from my brother) added a surprise section, crowd-sourced from all of our friends and family in the audience. One of the prompts was, "In a zombie apocalypse, what roles would Charlie and Alex play in your squad?"
"Charlie and I were absolutely cracking up hearing the (remarkably consistent) things everyone had written about us, all woven together beautifully by Megan to tell a story of who we are as individuals and why we work so well together. I can’t think of a better way to say it: I’ve never felt so seen."
"One of my best friends, Maddie, is a poet who wrote and recited the most stunning poem about us. To this day it gives me goosebumps to think about it."
"We also performed a version of a Chinese tea ceremony. There was something deeply meaningful to me about the act of kneeling and serving tea to our parents. The gesture felt like a symbol of all the gratitude, respect, and love that I’m not sure I could ever fully put into words."
"When each set of parents handed back the empty tea cup along with a red envelope, they shared a blessing and wish for our happiness and good fortune. It was a really special moment."
WWW Wedding Tip: A friend told us that the best advice she got on her wedding day was to stay holding hands with your partner. Of course, Charlie and I naturally slipped into individual hosting roles, but I do think this piece of advice helped us cherish more time together on the day than we would have otherwise.
"The party itself took place in the garden. Charlie’s parents had planted sweet peas, raspberries, hydrangea and other June flowers. We also sourced seven buckets of locally grown flowers and arranged them ourselves so that by the morning of the wedding, every single surface including the bathroom sinks and bedside tables had a bursting bouquet."
"Our party opened with an afternoon tea, served on my mother-in-law’s extensive collection of Emma Bridgewater teapots and mugs. The tablecloths were sourced from both of our family homes, and Charlie’s childhood fossil collection held down the place cards. Libations were brought up from my father-in-law’s amazing wine cellar."
"Instead of a wedding cake, from the very beginning, I had this image of a giant pavlova, and so many people came together to make it happen."
"Charlie’s sister and her partner found a gorgeous plank of unfinished wood and spent days sanding and varnishing it. We also asked our friend John— who is somewhat of a Christmas pantomime star— to sing a song whilst the pavlova was being brought out."
"On the day, we tasked four 'pavlova bearers' with a slow and dramatic procession balancing the dessert on this great plank of wood, but of course, John’s booming lyrics had everyone in hysterics. It was one of the most deliciously memorable moments of my life."
Photography: Carr + Senteno
