Grace and Ben met at a birthday party. “I’d just returned from Las Vegas, and Ben was travelling there in a few months, so we were chatting about things to do and places to go for the majority of the barbecue,” says Grace. “After the party, I added Ben on Facebook. After several attempts and last-minute cancellations, we finally went on our first date 18 months later. The thing that attracted me to Ben was his sense of humour. I left the date with my jaw aching from how much I’d smiled and laughed the entire evening.” For Grace, the proposal was a complete surprise. “He popped the question three weeks into lockdown in April 2020,” shares the bride. “Every year, my family have a big Easter egg hunt, and the more obscure the hiding place, the better. I was sad that we weren’t able to get together, so Ben suggested we do our own hunt, get dressed up and make the most of the day. After finding my Easter egg, I realised it was already open, and there was a small letter inside the egg telling me to turn around. Behind me, Ben was down on one knee in our garden. To make it even more special, he had FaceTimed my parents so they were able to be there (virtually), and he recorded the whole thing from our bedroom window, so we can look back on it forever.” SETTING THE SCENE “I always knew I wanted to get married at St Mary’s Church in Kingswinford as it’s just around the corner from my parent’s home and has special meaning to me,” explains Grace. “We didn’t want our guests to have to travel far from the ceremony to the reception, so when we found Brockencote Hall Hotel and saw they had accommodation, we knew it was a winner. As soon as we were able to visit in person, we fell in love. The sweeping drive, grounds and stunning exterior were an absolute dream and fitted in with everything we envisaged for our day.” The couple gave their guests scratch cards as favours that doubled as place names. “We placed them in small black envelopes and wrote each person’s name in silver calligraphy with a penny attached,” adds the bride. “My dad loves scratch cards, and every Christmas, he would use them as place settings, so it felt like a fun nod to a family tradition. Plus, if someone won big, the bar tab was on them!” “Our table plan was a large white acyclic sheet with the same font that we used on our invitations,” recalls Grace. “For our centrepieces, we continued the monochrome theme with black candlesticks with extra-long tapered candles to give the table some height. We paired these with floating candle glasses and three bud vases with a selection of white flowers in.” Grace and Ben chose to have white and green flowers from The Secret Garden Weddings. “Ben is from Leeds, so I knew I wanted lots of white roses to tie in with his hometown,” reveals the bride. “We had the most stunning top table arrangement and chose climbers for outside the church door with lots of greenery, which made a fantastic entrance. The florist also did a beautiful gypsophila wreath for my mum’s front door, which lasted six weeks after the wedding.” “Our cake was a last-minute purchase as we had always said we weren’t too concerned about having one, but I’m so glad we did,” says Grace. “We chose a three-tier design made up of buttercream and raspberry jam. It was covered in white icing, but the bottom tier had individually piped flowers to give it some texture.” The lovebirds hired transport from Class Act Wedding Cars. “I chose to walk from my parent’s house to the church, and our driver crawled alongside on the other side of the road,” shares the bride. “When we did eventually use the white Mercedes to transport us to Brockencote Hall Hotel, the service was top notch. We had a glass of champagne and got to enjoy half an hour alone.” “Behind our top table, we had the most fantastic moongate, which was complete with a neon sign,” explains Grace. “As we sat in front of the windows and the sun started to set, this proved a great backdrop to our meal and made the perfect photo opportunity later on in the night.” REAL WEDDINGS 33
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