Emma + Luca by The Wednesday Creatives - Together Journal

I wanted the styling to have an organic feel, but also wanted to contrast the wildness with some modern, sleek aspects.

Tell us a little about yourselves, what you do, what you love…

I am a primary school art teacher, and my husband (how exciting to be able to say that!) is a quantity surveyor. Our favourite thing to do together on the weekends is explore Auckland with a coﬀee and a pastry in hand. We are working our way through every bakery we can find in search of Auckland’s best pain au raisin! Luca and I also take pottery lessons together, and used these skills to hand-make some ceramics for our wedding.

How/where/when did you meet – and what were your first impressions?

Like any good modern love story, we met online during lockdown. We couldn’t meet face-to-face for six weeks, so we spent that time messaging daily and building a really strong friendship. Finally, at 1 pm, Jacinda Ardern announced that lockdown was ending, and at around 1:02, Luca messaged me to ask me on a real date. Even though our date had to be masked, Luca made the tough choice to shave his lockdown moustache. Thank goodness for that, or that first date might also have been our last!

When did you first realise that this was someone you’d like to spend the rest of your life with?

Luca claims that he knew I was the one when I paid for all of our first dates. At the end of our dates, I would oﬀer to pay, just to be polite. While I didn’t mind paying, of course, no man had ever actually taken me up on the oﬀer. Until I met Luca. Every time I’d oﬀer to pay, Luca would respond with a cheery, “Okay!” He was thinking he’d met this amazing modern woman who was overturning traditional gender roles. I was thinking I was never going to financially recover from this relationship. It was definitely worth the investment in the end, though!

Tell us about the vision you had for the mood and style of your wedding. (theme, key styling elements, florals, colour palettes, etc.).

When planning the wedding, I found myself in the unfortunate predicament of being very opinionated, while also being very indecisive. Every decision I made, I was haunted by the voices of our future children saying, “Your bridesmaids wore THAT?” Eventually, I had to learn to let things go and not put too much pressure on each decision being perfect. In the spirit of embracing imperfection, I chose a floral look that was very loose, untidy and textural. This decision was the cornerstone for the rest of the styling decisions I had to make. I wanted the styling to have an organic feel, but also wanted to contrast the wildness with some modern, sleek aspects. For example, my dress was quite modern and formal, so I chose to have a tousled, loose aesthetic for my hair. I was constantly trying to juxtapose the wild and the sleek to create visual interest. My stylist, Zoe, was invaluable in helping me through this process. She had so many great suggestions and was endlessly patient.

What styling and visual elements worked best for you? (could be things, the florals, particular hire products or your marquee etc., something the stylist created or simply just the scenic beauty of your location or the existing design of your venue).

I think the element that had the biggest impact was our venue. We tried to style the wedding in a way that felt cohesive with Mudbrick’s beautiful outlook and existing colour palette, which made the job much easier. I think it is important to work with your venue’s visual elements, rather than trying to transform a space that is predisposed to a diﬀerent aesthetic. Mudbrick has so much depth and character, so we wanted to lean into that, rather than overpowering or opposing it.

What did you enjoy most about the planning process and do you have any tips for couples starting their wedding planning journey?

I loved choosing a venue on Waiheke Island because we got to have lots of day trips over there throughout the planning process. Because of this, some of my fondest memories of getting married are from those planning trips, not just the wedding itself.

I also think it is important that your wedding reflects you as a couple, even if your choices might be a bit unconventional. We tried to pinpoint some things that really reflected us as a couple and incorporate these into our wedding. Some of our favourites were swapping our wedding cake for a giant custom pain au raisin, making all ceramic flower vases and name tags by hand, having my nephew serve our favourite popcorn during cocktail hour, having my mum as our celebrant, and in lieu of a flower girl, having my nephew and grandma as our flower boy and flower granny. I think these small changes helped our guests to feel like they were at our wedding, rather than a generic wedding.

In a similar vein, I think it’s great for couples to look for opportunities to make socially and environmentally conscious decisions around their wedding. Weddings produce so much waste, so I was keen to try and cut back where I could. We found this amazing workshop in Whangarei called The Paper Mill that employs artists with intellectual disabilities to make all diﬀerent types of paper by hand. As an art teacher, this was a cause close to my heart. We chose to have our menus printed on seed paper, so that guests could take their menus home, plant them in their gardens and grow some herbs. It was just a small part of the wedding, but I like thinking that it had a wider impact.

Tell us about your main outfits, what was unique, is there a story?

My ceremony dress was from the amazing designer, Lulu Jackson. I actually saw one of her dresses in Together Journal a while ago, but didn’t realise who had made it. It was only when I was looking up Lulu on Instagram that I saw that dress again and knew she would be the one. I felt so comfortable and safe working with Lulu. She took on all my feedback and managed to create a dress that exceeded all of my expectations. She is also just the sweetest person and was so lovely to deal with!

Luca has this weird thing where unrelated people keep describing him as “perfection”. It’s always that specific word. Of course, as his wife, I would describe him that way, but the way strangers keep using that word is a bit unusual. When we went suit shopping, we knew we wanted something a little bit diﬀerent from the norm. We found a double-breasted suit at Politix and immediately loved it, but it was one of the first suits Luca tried, so we wanted to take a bit of time to think about it before locking it in. It didn’t take long for us to decide that that was the one, so the next day we went back to have another look. The shop assistant was glad to see us, saying she was shocked we hadn’t bought it the day before because Luca wearing that suit was, in her words, “perfection”. We took that as a sign and bought the suit that day.

What was one or two elements that were most important to you both that you were happy to spend a little more on? (food, photography, florals, the venue, your outfit?).

We are so grateful we made the decision to hire a stylist. Our stylist was some of the best money we spent. Having a professional as a part of your planning team means you have someone else to pass some of the decision-making on to, taking away a big chunk of stress. You have someone else to lean on who is paid to deal with your nonsense, so your partner and family can have a bit of relief! Plus, having someone set up and pack down your wedding is a dream! You can just turn up on the day and have everything ready to go, and at the end, you can walk away and enjoy your honeymoon without a care in the world.

Did anything happen on your wedding day that you laugh about in hindsight (even if it was stressful at the time)?

Even though the forecast was good for the day, there was a significant rain shower about 45 minutes before the outdoor ceremony was due to begin. I began to feel rather stressed that we would have to move the ceremony indoors, which would not have been my first choice. Since I was getting a bit stressed, my four-year-old nephew, Levi, also began to get agitated about the weather. In an eﬀort to calm him down, my brother-in-law told him that if = he could count to 100, the rain would stop. Levi started counting and, lo and behold, the rain stopped exactly as he reached 100. This convinced Levi that he really had magical powers. For the rest of the day, if the weather started to look a bit iﬀy, Levi would confidently explain that there was nothing to worry about because he had the situation in hand. The rain did stay away for the rest of the day, so perhaps Levi really does have magic weather powers!