The decision to live together and spend the rest of our lives together was completely natural, and there were never any doubts in our minds. We are each other’s person.
Tell us a little about yourselves, what you do, what you love…
We both work in the construction industry. Rayan is a Project Manager/Engineer, and Jessie is a Safety Advisor.
We have a beautiful fluffy cat named Sabrina, who is the light of our lives.
We love to travel; we spent 4 months living it up in Europe in 2023, visited some magical places and made so many beautiful memories together. We are also currently celebrating our honeymoon in México.
We are both huge foodies, so we spend a lot of our time cooking, trying out new restaurants, dining at Michelin stared restaurants, exploring street food or trying cooking classes We love spending time together with everything that we do, whether it is watching TV shows/ movies, going on road trips, shopping etc.
How/where/when did you meet – and what were your first impressions?
We met at work when it was Rayan’s first day starting at the company we worked for. I pronounced his name wrong after mentally preparing myself to say it correctly.
There wasn’t much of an impression that day. However, the sparks started to fly during a work Christmas breakup about one year later. Since that day, we have been inseparable.
We were both surprised by how well we got along, considering we didn’t have too much in common and came from completely different backgrounds. Falling in love came very naturally, and it’s hard to believe there was a time when we weren’t together. We had to keep our romance a secret for quite some time at work. It made being at work quite interesting and fun, and the rumour mill started. But eventually, we wanted the world to know.
When did you first realise that this was someone you’d like to spend the rest of your life with?
We realised pretty quickly that our relationship was something special. People would say that things were moving quite fast for us, like moving in together, engagement and marriage, but we just knew it was meant to be. Our love came really naturally, and one day, I convinced him to let my cat Sabrina stay for the long weekend as a trial…He had been previously worried about what she would do to the house. As soon as she came to the house, she was completely comfortable, which had never happened before, and Rayan had the biggest smile on his face. Sabrina and I never left after that day.
The decision to live together and spend the rest of our lives together was completely natural, and there were never any doubts in our minds. We are each other’s person.
Was there a proposal? Tell us a little about it…
The proposal was planned to be in Capadoccia (Turkey), on a romantic hot air balloon ride. However, Rayan saw another great opportunity to do the proposal in a more private setting.
It was day 4 of our 4-month trip. We were in Singapore overlooking Marina Bay Sands at a beautiful lake we had previously visited. We were taking photos with the glamorous backdrop, and Rayan secretly turned the camera on to video mode and got down on one knee…
He was really nervous and shaking and sweating from the humidity. It was an incredibly beautiful moment, and it really started off our trip in the best possible way. However, due to the heat and humidity, we had to rush back into the Marina Bay Sands hotel and get some air conditioning after the proposal! Jessie was in awe of her engagement ring and still couldn’t stop admiring it.
Tell us about the vision you had for the mood or style of your wedding.
We knew we wanted to get married quickly, and we wanted to do things our way. We didn’t want to wait 1-2 years like many people do after their engagements. So we made it happen, we were married 6 months later & planned a lot of the wedding during our holiday. The vibe of the wedding was a civil ceremony, elegant, minimal, modern, relaxed, and simple colours (blacks and whites). We know we wanted to incorporate our love of fashion/style & good food and drinks (we even used a cookbook as our guestbook) and the ability to spend as much time with our friends and family as we can. We both had seen videos and photos that we loved and moulded into our own. But the most important thing for us was that we and our family/friends could have fun and remember the day forever.
What was one element you were happy to splurge on?
For the food and drinks, we wanted to make sure that our guests left extremely satisfied and ate some incredible food. The food and drinks were something to remember, and the staff at the front looked after us really well. We hope we can go back to the venue for future celebrations and life milestones!
Did anything happen on your wedding day that you laugh about in hindsight (even if it was stressful at the time)?
We were worried we would be very awkward during our couple’s portraits. We both didn’t feel confident in posing in front of the camera, but it ended up being the highlight of the day. Our photographer, Belin from Belos Photography, made us feel extremely comfortable and also gave us a lot of confidence, so we got really into it and just had a lot of fun while walking the streets of Melbourne taking photos together.
Tell us about your main outfits, what was unique, is there a story?
I always knew I wanted to wear a mini dress, I had spoken to my mum about it when I was young. I think she always pictured me in a mini dress, and we always wanted to do things a little less traditional, and I’m so glad we did. I know my mum would have loved the dress I chose.
We also wanted to accessorise our outfits with some flashy designer items. We found a pair of Prada Sunglasses in Florence that we both loved, so we decided to buy matching pairs for our wedding day to add some flare to our outfits. These sunglasses also complimented a Prada black leather handbag we purchased in Italy to contrast against a white wedding dress.
We were both in love with how we looked in our wedding attire, especially because it looked so sophisticated and was a little bit unconventional.
RECEPTION Frontside Food & Wine, @frontsidefoodandwine FLORIST Artificial Calla Lillies by Hitomigift PHOTOGRAPHER Belin Bator, @belosphotography MAKEUP + HAIR Stephanie Nguyen Artistry, @stephanienguyenartistry BRIDAL DRESS Tia Mini by Popovski from Bluebell Bridal, @_popovski SUIT Men’s Suit Warehouse Melbourne – Gibson ACCESSORIES Prada VEIL The Petra Veil by Popovski, @_popovski ENGAGEMENT RING Temelli Jewellery, @temellijewellery WEDDING BAND Joseph George Jewellery, @josephgeorgejewellery SHOES Ginger White Hi Shine Heels – Tony Bianco, @tonybianco; Patent Leather Dress Shoe – Aquila, @aquila_est1958 GETTING READY HQ QT Melbourne, @qtmelbourne
