Metro Gardens Wedding Photos

Rachel and Nick’s Metro Gardens wedding photos in London were fab, unsurprisingly because they are a wonderfully warm couple. Nick is perhaps the chattiest ‘bloke’ I’ve ever met and Rachel enjoys ribbing him alongside me – so together we were a formidable team 🙂

Rachel, as you can see, looked absolutely knock out in a gorgeous Delphine Manivet dress from one of my favourite bridal shops – The Mews of Notting Hill. Seriously every single dress they stock is jaw-droppingly beautiful but also extremely cool…they get the big thumbs up from me.

We really did a tour of London in a super cool Tesla (I’m not going to pretend I know what I am talking about here…but a green car has got to be a good thing, no?!)  – starting East side; getting married in North; heading West for pictures via the Chelsea Flower Show before crossing the river for the party in South. Phew!

A little mention for The Metro Gardens restaurant before i sign off…what a little gem! Gorgeous unfussy food, super friendly staff and the decor was cool too – kinds rustic but not in a try hard, ‘Next Home’ way. Clapham Common was full of life too and if we hadn’t done a whole tour of London for portraits then we totally could have done them all there – I love me a bit of London grit 🙂

Anyway, I’m off. As ever I have made a pact to blog more this year…I literally have so much work that I have never shared it’s rather ridiculous. It’s the writing bit I struggle with but, actually, once I start I can’t STOP…

Love these two – loved their day. Loved that they met in Snobs 🙂 – one of the most studenty student haunts in my beloved Brum. I leave you to 20 or so frames…

“Jordanna is amazing and a very talented lady, we couldn’t recommend her enough. She made us feel totally relaxed, was so accommodating and not afraid to let us know if she thought something wouldn’t work, or if we needed to move on. She captured so many special moments on the day, that we really will cherish forever.”

Rachel’s words of wedding wisdom…

Where it all began…We met nearly 12 years ago during our final year at Aston university. We were both out at Birmingham’s grungiest rock club (Snobs), a friend introduced us, after a bit of an awkward start and a couple of cheap vodka shots later, we had our first kiss and the rest was history.

Six years later we both quit our jobs to go travelling, two weeks into our adventure, after the most amazing and beautiful trip climbing up to Everest base camp Nick proposed to me with a replica plastic Princess Diana engagement ring at a grotty youth hostel on the way down. Despite me wearing my Dad’s brown fleece and us both not having showered for 7 days – the proposal was really romantic and emotional and of course I said yes!

We were engaged for over four years, mainly because we were living in Sydney for the majority of our engagement and planning a wedding on the other side of the world is quite hard.

Finding the venue…We wanted to get married in London, mostly because it’s where we live and we love it. We’d been going out for nearly 12 years so we wanted the day to be relaxed and a celebration with our closest friends and family. We chose Islington Town Hall for the ceremony, mainly because we love the building, it fitted all our guests in and it felt intimate. Our reception was at a restaurant 10 minutes away from where both live, Metro Gardens, Clapham Common. It has a fabulous fairy lit secret garden out the back and has a great relaxed vibe – the owner Fran was also amazing and made us feel at home.

Our style…Even though we were engaged for a long time (nearly 5 years), I didn’t start looking for my dress until 7 months to go. Luckily I fell in love with all the dresses at The Mews Bridal in Notting Hill, and then struggled to pick ‘the one’ as I wanted all of them. I ended up choosing the one that made me feel the most special.

Nick got lucky and found his suit in the Reiss sale. He then decided to blow the budget on a Tom Ford shirt. He found he’s shoes at the Crockett and Jones factory outlet in Northampton on our way to meet Jordanna – they were half price and another great reason to chose Jordanna as your photographer.

Our florist…I love peonies, as we were having a garden wedding we wanted a English country feel. Our florist Nicola Eve was amazing and very talented.

The ceremony…We got wed at Islington Town Hall, the guest jumped on a London route master to take them to the reception. Me and Nick went on a bit of a tour around London to have our photos taken, Jordanna was very accommodating as we had our photos taken at Smithfield Market and then stopped off to have a couple of photos on the Albert Bridge near Chelsea on the way back. It was one of the most favourite parts of our day as we didn’t get to spend much time together once we got to the reception.

Final tip…Relax and have fun, you’ve put so much effort and time into planning it, just enjoy every minute!