The Botanist – One of Auckland’s coolest floristry studios, The Botanist is beloved for its avant-garde and just plain beautiful bouquets. They also do celebration flowers tailored to your style and budget…
The team of five florists like to get to know their customers to ensure the result is a true collaboration. Owner Diana Pan says, “We like to combine brides’ original vision with our own creativity. We strive to make every wedding different, and are passionate about premium flowers. Our favourite weddings use foliage and textures en masse – we like anything rustic; wild but contained.” The Botanist
Flight Path – After six years on one side of the street, Mt Maunganui design studio and store Paper Plane has touched down on the other. A much larger space now houses all the artisanal homeware, lifestyle items and fashion accessories they’ve come to be known for, and some new stuff as well, including the latest issues of Together Journal and the Together Journal x An Organised Life Wedding Planner, plus a gift registry service. Founders Krista Plews and Timothy John designed the store’s light-filled fit-out themselves, giving it a Scandinavian feel, with blond hardwood that climbs from the floor up the walls to meet the high ceiling. Paper Plane
All Class – Feminine (Amélie) and masculine (George), traditional and modern, elegant and playful… new Australian bridal earrings and accessories brand Amélie George embraces contradictions. Founding friends Sarah Turner Woolfrey and Alison Clouston have created an exquisite collection that blends precious metals with materials such as moonstones, shells and crystals. Their pearl hairpins are adorable, and ship for free worldwide from Melbourne. Amelie George
Miracle Worker – Byron Bay babes and BEAR founders Saasha Burns and Sammy Leetham (featured in Together Journal Issue 15) are purveyors of the highest quality wellness products, and their own best advertisement. New to their range of natural potions and pills is this Wonder Face Oil, a certified organic beautifier made solely from the oil of cold-pressed prickly pear seeds sustainably harvested in Tunisia. Whether it’s the vitamin E to improve circulation, linoleic acid to increase cell turnover, or vitamin K to help you age backwards, it does appear to work wonders. BEAR
Sock It To ’Em – A cheeky splash of colour at the ankles suits groomsmen so well, and these calf-length unisex B onne Maison socks also bring some French chic to proceedings. Those who like their fashion with a side of fun will feel like a kid in a candy store choosing from the various playful designs, which are made using Egyptian cotton to prevent pilling and are top quality yet thin for maximum comfort. Buy some for the guys for the big day and you to wear gleefully ever after. You’ll find them at Paper Plane Store
Travel Buddy – Instead of a joyless honeymoon spreadsheet, plan the most romantic trip of your lifetime with a chic travel journal by An Organised Life. Lightweight, durable and incredibly stylish, they’re peppered with useful tips and helpfully split into sections that compartmentalise your itinerary, bookings, budget, recommendations, contacts and more. In founder and designer Beck Wadworth’s signature minimalist style, their leather-look covers can be monogrammed with initials, names, destinations, dates or anything else that might turn them into a personalised present or lasting memento. An Organised Life
Eye Essentials – For those in search of a polished but achievable eye makeup look, the Bobbi Brown Essential Multicolor Eye Shadow Palette combines five of the brand’s most popular and flattering shades into five kits that provide the key ingredients for any look. Use a skin tone to correct and brighten, apply a medium shade to your lids, add definition with darker colours along the crease and lashline, then highlight with a little shimmer. Bobbi Brown
Dapper Developments – Menswear designer Murray Crane established his label Crane Brothers in 1999, and built a loyal following by his dedicated approach to quality and craftsmanship. For Crane, a traditionalist, this has always meant Italian-made. However, with a view to making Crane Brothers accessible to a wider audience, he is expanding his offering to include refined, high quality items sourced from around the world. Alongside Made in Italy, a collection of premium, artisan-crafted pieces fashioned in the spiritual home of menswear, he now offers Contemporary Tailoring, a more trend-focused selection of suits, blazers, trousers and shirts available at a lower price point and geared towards weddings and special occasions. More achievable prices is obviously great news for younger gents and those with large wedding parties, for whom budget is as much of a consideration as wearing a killer suit. While Crane Brothers’ full made-to-measure service is not available for the Contemporary Tailoring collection, it does offer a broad range of styling options, so looks can be customised. “This project has been three years in the making, and is the result of an enormous amount of trial and error,” Crane says. “I’ve searched the world to find great makers and suppliers, and the new collection reflects that. I’m excited by the scale of what we can now produce and the opportunity to introduce the brand to a new audience.” Crane Brothers’ logo has also recently been refreshed using handcrafted, bespoke letterforms, as has the brand’s website, which displays pieces in such a way that you can compare cuts, fabrics and colours, and see how they might look via a gallery of real-life grooms, as well as a stylish and helpful journal of Crane’s best fashion advice. Crane Brothers
One For All – Known for the kind of high-end pens you keep in a special drawer for signing special documents, Montblanc also makes colognes that confer a sense of timelessness and craftsmanship. For their latest fragrance, Explorer, the German brand asked three perfumers to translate their experiences of adventure, and the results takes wearers around the world, with woody and leathery notes, hints of Italian bergamot, Haitian vetiver, and patchouli from the Indonesian island of Sulawesi. The set, which would make a classy gift for groomsmen (ensuring a cohesive scent at your head table), contains an eau de parfum spray, aftershave balm and a pocket spray. Smith and Caugheys
Cause & Effect – As the New Zealand Breast Cancer Foundation enters its 25th year, Juliet Souter of Marle has designed a limited-edition capsule collection and will be donating 10% of its sales to the cause. Called Blush, the pretty-in-pink range includes two charming looks for bridesmaids or guests at a laidback outdoor event, not to mention the bride on her honeymoon, while the shorts and tee would make a super-cute getting-ready get-up. They’re all cut from natural flax linen, except the cotton hat, and come to you in compostable packaging. Marle
Curiouser and curiouser – Curionoir makes fragrances as layered and thoughtful as a good novel. Wearing them is a journey of discovery, and while you’ll probably end up with a firm favourite, exploring the moods and nuances of each one is very satisfying. “For the curious of heart, mind and nose”, the New Zealand perfume house is offering a Curiosity Set containing pocket-sized bottles of five of its extrait de parfums (a concentrated form of perfume made with premium ingredients). Founder Tiffany Jeans launched her business after hand-casting skull-shaped scented candles wrapped in tulle for guests at her own wedding. Her darkly glamorous, eternally romantic vision is stamped on each of these scents, which are inspired by experiences as evocative as eye contact, lingering pipe smoke, the undergrowth of a citrus orchard and “the bewildering emotion of clarity”. The Curiosity Set is available from October, in store and online at Curionoir
SO Luxe – You may have heard about new hotel SO/Auckland and its interior by design partner WORLD, but have you heard about its spa? Send the lift from the glittering lobby to the dedicated wellness floor, where you can explore an amazing treatment menu that uses Skin Regimen’s multi-sensory Modern Plant Chemistry formulas to reduce the effects of stress on body and mind. There are couples’ rooms so you can be pampered with your beloved or your besties, and you’ll enjoy complimentary snacks and therapeutic herbal tea, as well as access to the lap pool, sauna, jacuzzi and fitness centre. SO Auckland
Easy Like Sunday – Not only is Waihi Beach store Sunday located next to a classic Kiwi dairy so shoppers can be assured of an ice-cream on the way home, it’s also filled with a very well-refined selection of homeware and lifestyle items. Pieces from talented local makers (including owner Alana Broadhead-Fryer herself) rub shoulders with international finds, predominately with a pared-back aesthetic that helps them blend easily with your existing décor. There’s also a handy wedding registry. Alana’s wonderful edit is testament to her stylist’s eye, which you might recognise from her online magazine The New (see page 30) and contributions to togetherjournal.com, where she shares ideas for gifting. Sunday
Heaven scent – Could we have just found you the perfect bridal fragrance? Soft as a caress, gentle as a kiss, Van Cleef’s Santal Blanc is intended to evoke a “white material” by enhancing the most delicate facets of sandalwood. “I wanted to recreate the sensation of a soft, soothing wood oil,” says perfumer Michel Almairac. “Sandalwood, with its creamy texture, was an obvious choice in my mind because it subconsciously evokes the idea of a pure and tender white.” Lifted by mandarin, a mist of musks cloaks powdery violet and tonka bean to create a cottony, enveloping trail. This romantic scent comes in a gorgeous, high-quality heavy card box featuring a pull-out drawer with silver embossed foil, cut-out white paper flowers and white petersham ribbon. Smith and Caughey
