Real Wedding: Shaan & Jeremy - Photography by Amy Kate - Together Journal

Tell us a little about yourselves, what you do, what you love, what is unique about you and your relationship…

Jeremy and I meet at the gym where Jeremy was teaching gym classes! All of a sudden, my interest in the gym increased! Jeremy and I then meet each other again at the Wellington Sevens and our relationship began over a love of a huge dress up party!!!! Over the past 5 years we have travelled, brought property together and we have our beautiful little dog Indy together!

Tell us about your special day, was there a specific theme or style? Tell us a little about the setting, the styling and some of your favourite details…

Our Wedding day was amazing, we wanted to have a relaxed but classic wedding with a focus on spending time with our family and friends so we decided to hire the Pacific Rendezvous in Tutukaka for 2 nights, where we had all of our friends and family stay there and have a fantastic weekend celebration, starting with a casual dinner on the Friday night, which was served from a gorgeous food truck, hired from My little Tea Pot, (Northland based) which served tacos and Mexican beer. Most of our guest were travelling from all around New Zealand so we wanted to make it as easy as possible for them – so that when our guests arrived dinner was ready for them and they could relax into their weekend.

We decided to have our wedding in Tutukaka at the Pacific Rendezvous as it was a place I always visited when I was younger with my grandparents, we spent many school holidays learning to swim, dive and play cards all under the supervision of my Grandad.

My Grandparents then brought a batch in Tutukaka so our whole family could spend the summer holidays together, unfortunately not long after they brought the batch my Grandad got sick with Cancer and passed away out at his favourite place, Tutukaka, Northland. We have since sold the Tutukaka batch but there is a memorial seat at the property “Eddies Seat” which was one of our beautiful photo locations. The weather was meant to be stormy and wild however our day was perfect! The sun was shinning and we could definitely feel my grandad’s presence at the Wedding – my husband and I believe that Grandad would have been so proud to have all of his family in his favourite place on such a special day. Both Jeremy and I are blessed with an amazing group of friends and close family members, we decided to both have an “I Do Crew” and spend our days getting ready with them, then we just had our best man and maid of honour for our photos and ceremony.

Jeremy and his I do crew started the day at the Ngunguru Bowling club, playing bowls having some drinks and a great lunch. This was a great way to include all his friends in the excitement and lead up to the afternoon.

I had my closest girlfriends all over to the bridal suite for the morning of the big day and together we got our hair and make up done as it was important to me that I was able to spend this time with my friends having a relaxed morning and ensuring they were all having an awesome time and feeling involved. For this we had the amazing ladies from the Beauty Hub up from Auckland to get 9 girls looking and feeling beautiful.

My maid of honour was my sister Hannah who was amazing, she is six year younger than me but we are the best of friends and Jeremys best man was his friend Brendon who together we have travelled with and shared some awesome experiences with.

Tell us about your main outfits:

I wore a beautiful Anna Schimmel bridal gown! I knew I wanted to wear a New Zealand Designer. Anna was the first studio I visited, and I knew I didn’t need to go anywhere else!

Jeremy wore a made to measure suit from barkers – they were amazing to deal with he went for a classic dinner suit and it was awesome that it fit him like a glove! He enjoyed the process of making his own suit picking the lining and having it match our wedding colours of white and gold!

Both Hannah (Maid of Honour) and I wore Kathryn Wilson footwear so comfortable and again we were wanting to support and wear another amazing NZ designer.

What were some of the most memorable/unique moments from the day?

Our Ceremony was another way of being able to include all of our loved ones, my parents are not together and I am close with both my Dad and my Step Dad so my Step Dad – Kevin Ross applied to be a marriage celebrant, went through the process and was successful, this meant that my Dad was able to walk me down the Isle and my Step-Dad was our celebrant, I felt extremely lucky and for both Jeremy and I and it added something extremely personal and special to our day.

As I have said previously one of our key goals for the weekend was being able to mix and mingle with all our guests and we wanted a relaxed but classic feel to the reception so we opted to not have a seating plan or a head table, it took a while for people to get the hang of it on the day but once dinner was served and everyone found a seat it was the best idea. Jeremy and I ended up sitting at a table with our close family friends, some older relatives and an aunt and uncle who travelled all the way from America looking back was one of my favourite moments from the day.

Any advice for other couples planning to spend the rest of their lives together?

Weddings do tend to be a stressful time, and although I was told this I thought we would be fine but we definitely feel into the trap of having a few heated conversations about the day!

A great idea that we found helpful was plan conversation times for the wedding, do not let it consume every weekend / waking moment as it can be overwhelming.

I think that it is really important to remember the meaning of the day and don’t get caught up in the small details of the day because at the end of the day it doesn’t matter! The day goes so fast so soak it up before you know it, it is over!

Laugh, smile and relax through the day it is seriously the best time!!!!