Your London Wedding - Page number 43 - September/October 2021 (Issue 79)

A FOR LOVE recipe A kingfisher colour palette of blue, teal, coral, red and gold was the picture-perfect combination for Paul and Helen’s nuptials Images courtesy of Michael Newington Gray P aul Cowling and Helen Walker met at a friend’s birthday party and hung out the entire night, although, a relationship at the time was not on the cards, “It went so well that we didn’t see each other for almost three years!” says Helen. “We met again at Paul’s 30 th birthday party, he asked me out and from there the rest is history!” Paul tells us how the big proposal came about, on the other side of the world, in Australia! “We were in Australia for Helen to present at a medical conference and we made a holiday out of it for a couple of weeks. The conference was in Sydney and we stayed on for an extra day after it had finished so that Helen could see some of the city, (I’d been wandering the streets and eating my way across the city centre whilst Helen was hard at work!). “We went to see the Sydney Opera House and I couldn’t miss the opportunity to propose with such an iconic backdrop. I caught Helen completely off guard when I started talking about our future together and then went down on one knee – her reaction was...different to what I had expected. An expression of confusion was suddenly followed by one of total shock and then she sprinted away. So fast. I never knew she had such amazing acceleration! I got up and went over to where she was standing crying. As we hugged a group of inquisitive Aussie octogenarians walked past and one man called over ‘Did she say yes?’. At that point Helen technically hadn’t, so I gave the hand signal for ‘gimme a minute’. Luckily she then did and I was able to pass on the happy news to the now circling pensioners, who, to their credit, gave us a great cheer!” Following the engagement – and celebrations – the wedding date was set for 25 th April 2020, but the world had other plans. “We went from a list of 180 to 30 to 15 at very short notice,” shares Helen. “When it became obvious that our wedding was not going to go ahead just after Paul’s stag do (March 2020), we poured several large glasses of wine and spent two very stressful weeks rearranging everything hoping COVID-19 would have ‘blown over’ by October. As we all know, it has been the most devastating thing to happen to us as a global community since World War Two. I’m incredibly grateful to our friend Megan for whipping me into shape and telling me to re-organise when she did, because I was holding out hoping for the best and she convinced me to get ahead of the curve – lifesaver!” The new date was set, 10 th October 2020, with St Marylebone Parish Church, London, followed by Chelsea Old Town Hall, London, setting the scene. Here, Helen tells us more about their special day... REAL WEDDINGS 43