Leith & Andrew

Good One Cafe wedding photographed by Bayly & Moore

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We wanted to have a wedding day unique to us and one that encompassed places and spaces we knew well. We decided to say our vows in a little park across the street from our apartment on Douglas Street in Ponsonby, Auckland, then the after-party at Good One cafe just up the road. We didn’t think you could get much better than getting ready together at home, walking across the road to get married and then walking a bit further to party.

We wanted to do something a bit out of the box in the lead up to our wedding, so we had posters of our wedding invite printed and hung at the top of Douglas Street in the week before.

In between the original plan and the wedding day we bought a house and moved to our old stomping ground, Birkenhead Point, but we didn’t want to change our original plan, so we got ready in our new home (with Andrew outside in the man shed), then drove over the Auckland bridge together and carried out the rest of our plan. One of the most memorable parts was leading the band and all our family and friends on a traffic-stopping walk from park to after-party – we can honestly say we stopped traffic on our wedding day!

Good One didn’t need much help, but we did fill her with yellow lilies and large locally-made yellow and white candles, which we put into different sized Agee jars. We tracked down the hand sign writer Sam who did all the original signs at Good One and had him paint our menus, which we hung from the ceiling.

We were also lucky enough to have Jess from Jess’ Underground Kitchen create an amazing nine-course menu of our favourite food from our travels, everything from sushi boats to cheeseburgers and Nana’s smashed pav.

We loved everything about the spaces involved in our wedding day – our mid-century home, the tiny park in the midst of urban Ponsonby and the open, industrial feel of Good One – so we did very little to change anything, just added a few things here and there.

Our advice for others getting married is do what you want to do and don’t worry about what other people think – you don’t have to walk down an aisle, have a wedding cake, a first dance or a huge bridal party if that’s not you (but if it is you, do it!).