Sybilla + Liam by Lucie Blake Photography

Greyleigh is such an incredible backdrop that we felt that less was absolutely better than more.

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

Liam is a well-respected veterinarian who has cut his teeth working in country clinics on large animals and native wildlife, as well as honing his small animal surgery skills as a locum vet in Sydney. Syb is a luxury brand events manager, currently working at Paspaley Pearls, one of Australia’s only luxury jewellery brands. As a couple, we’re adventurous, easy-going, and very sociable, relishing every opportunity to spend time with our core groups of friends. We are quite close with both our families and are very lucky to be able to watch our brood of beautiful nieces and nephews, who were an important part of our wedding day, grow up. We both have a keen love for food; we adore hosting our friends and families whenever the opportunity presents. Liam cooks up a storm while I style the setting to feel warm and inviting. Liam grew up on a farm approximately two hours north of Dubbo, where they cooked lamb in all its glorious forms, a few times a week. The whole Ryan family are exceptional cooks, so we’re very spoiled to have an abundance of fresh produce and recipes from back home to aid with our cooking ventures. Our current obsessions revolve around experimenting with Mexican and Japanese recipes, as these are the last places we have visited. Our love for travel and adventure is a huge part of our lives (much to the detriment of our bank accounts). Some of our fondest memories together have been made abroad, including road tripping in Northern Argentina, hiking in Patagonia, Peru or Norway, skiing in Japan or lying on beaches in Albania, Greece and Brazil. We are a great team; we challenge each other but also have a great respect for each other’s goals. We share similar ideas for our future and are both excited for what it holds – likely plenty of good food and plenty of overseas trips.

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

We met when we were teenagers at Syb’s year 12 formal. We were both attending with other dates, but couldn’t help but notice each other across the room throughout the night. It was instantly apparent to me that Liam had a kind soul from a good country family. He was always so willing to put my needs ahead of his and made me feel so safe and important. We instantly fell in love and dated briefly for a year before Liam moved rurally for university, and I went overseas to volunteer and travel. The short time we had together in the early days was enough for us to understand that what we had was the real deal. We loosely stayed in touch over these years apart and always knew that we would one day rekindle. When we did, it was like no time had passed at all, and we picked back up from where we left off, but now a little older and wiser. Everything lined up perfectly for us in 2019 when we finished university and were starting up full-time work. Covid eventually forced our hand, where I moved from Sydney, in with Liam in Mudgee during lockdown, which ended up being the best move of my life. Here, we really found our rhythm as a couple, with a slower-paced country life and plenty of space for our dogs, chickens and a thriving veggie patch.

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).

For us, it was really important that we worked with the natural beauty of the Greyleigh grounds and with the style of The Gables, rather than against it. Greyleigh is such an incredible backdrop that we felt that less was absolutely better than more. We wanted to keep the tablescape super crisp and pared back, so we opted for bistro table lamps, which created a gorgeous, warm ambience. We brought a little colour to the room through the menus, which doubled as place cards. Instead of a classic seating chart, we opted for escort cards designed by The Paper Tales, on which we handwrote personal messages to our guests. These were handed out during cocktail hour, and we had so many guests comment on how thoughtful and personal this touch was. We also found that not having a printed chart meant that we could easily make tweaks to the seating plan right up to the day before, and account for any last-minute drop-outs.

At the ceremony, we focused on classic white ingredients en masse with some statement smoke bush, which could be found around the property and has a beautiful softness to it. I have always loved floral ingredients en masse, so that was the brief for mine and my bridesmaids’ bouquets as well as the ceremony arrangements. It was a miracle that peonies were available as there were none available at the flower markets in the week leading up, but my florist, Caity, stumbled across some on the morning of which we couldn’t believe! Finding the right urns to match my vision for the ceremony was a hustle. Caity and I scoured the internet and Facebook marketplace all year to find ones that weren’t white or didn’t break the bank. I ended up purchasing these from Flower Power of all places, 5 days before the wedding. We were over the moon with how it turned out and loved that they meant it was possible to move the flowers across into the reception and then again at the recovery the next day. We were lucky it wasn’t too hot, so most of our flowers lasted all weekend – we were really able to get the most out of them!

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

We loved finding ways to incorporate both the people we love and the things we love into the wedding to make it inherently us, as well as deciding what traditions we would keep or ditch. My mum handmade my veil as well as dresses for all three flower girls (four, if you include one of the flower girls’ dolls). My sister, who runs a calligraphy business, The Paper Tales, created all our beautiful pieces of stationery. We were lucky to have so many talented people in our inner circle contribute in so many meaningful ways

We honeymooned in Mexico, so guests wrote on the pages of Assouline’s ‘Mexico City’; an idea from one of my bridesmaids, which I loved as it’s now an aesthetic piece that sits on our coffee table for years to come.

Music was also a really important part of the wedding, and we had so much fun selecting the songs for our aisle moments, first dance, as well as some fun songs to introduce each speaker, which set the tone for the night. Now, when we hear these songs, we are instantly transported back to those moments. For our entrance, we picked the 2023 edit of Young Hearts Run Free, which was so fun and started an instant dancefloor before we sat down to start formalities. We had so many compliments from our guests about what a great touch this was.

Tell us about your vendors. Were there any standout suppliers you would like to make special mention of?

We couldn’t be happier with our selection of vendors; they were all best in class, and we spent a surprisingly short amount of time wading through options as we knew exactly who we wanted. Lucy Blake, our photographer, was the first vendor we reached out to. I had been following Lucy on Instagram for many years, and I was so excited to contact her the moment we got engaged to check her availability. Lucy was a true professional with whom we gelled straight away. So many of our guests and bridal party commented on how fantastic she was at blending in at the right times and bringing the right energy to our portraits. Another no-brainer for us was our florist, Golden Hour. I went to university with Caity, and supporting a friend was an obvious choice for me. Caity was a true gem, putting up with my many changes of mind and helping source the right pots to match my vision for the aisle moment. She executed this to perfection, and the blooms were superb. Our celebrant Cloudia was another no-brainer. Cloudia was recommended to us through a friend when we got engaged, and we never needed to send enquiries to anyone else! Cloudia understood the brief to a tee and interpreted our story so beautifully on the day.

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

A lot of brides speak about finding “the one” when it comes to the wedding dress. I tried on a number of dresses, with a strong idea of what I didn’t want, but no idea what I did. What I found throughout the experience is that the dress I ultimately went ahead with was the one I was using as the benchmark to compare all the other dresses. I kept coming back to this dress and eventually realised it was the one I needed to get – overall a simple dress, but the sash bow (a separate piece), and deep V added the right amount of drama for me. I also really love that Frahn is an Australian label based in Tassie, where the dresses are made by hand with intention.

I ummed and ahhed all the way up until the week of the wedding if I would change into a second look, and also received a few dud online orders, but ultimately, I am so happy I stayed in my dress the whole night; I feel like I got the most out of it that I could. I also requested to keep the off cuts so am looking forward to repurposing them for something special in the near future.

The non-negotiable for us was that the wedding was black tie, and Liam knew immediately that MJ Bale would be the place to go for his suit. I personally am not a fan of a big floral boutonniere for the groom and groomsmen, so instead opted to gift a very simple but striking pearl lapel pin as Liam’s wedding gift, which has a beautiful lustre and will have sentimental value for years to come.

Tell us about your wedding and engagement rings.

Liam designed my engagement ring after having a friend do a cheeky recon of what styles I did and didn’t like. It was so special to me that he designed it with the jeweller, without my direct input, and to say I am obsessed with it is an understatement. The ring is a solitaire east-west radiant cut diamond on a yellow gold band. I was confident that I wanted a simple yellow gold band, so as not to detract from the statement engagement ring. Natalie Marie had a great selection of options for different-width bands, and I loved the thickness of the 4mm band as a contrast to the thinner band of my engagement ring. Liam’s wedding band is the first piece of jewellery he’s ever purchased for himself, and so it felt right to get this from Cartier. From our first appointment, the experience was exceptional. I was able to take the band back into Cartier before the wedding day to have it engraved with something personal, which meant a lot to him.

What were 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 outfits?).

Photography was extremely important to us. We curated our perfect day, and it was very important that it was documented carefully. We couldn’t be happier with how these photos by Lucy turned out. Her style was exactly what we wanted; capturing candid and important moments without forceful posing and rotating combinations of people standing next to us. Lucy made us feel at ease throughout our wedding day, and Syb and I always comment on how well she managed to take many of her photos without us noticing – she is a real master of her craft.

The venue was also important to us. We looked at a number of different venues before walking onto the Greyleigh grounds. It was a fairly miserable, drizzly day when we first visited Greyleigh, but Syb and I instantly knew that it was the right place. The landscaping of the gardens and grounds, coupled with the styling and architecture were what blew us away initially. Then the professionalism and kindness of the staff and planning team really put our minds at ease that we had chosen well. The moment Syb and I arrived for our wedding weekend, we felt at ease and relaxed. The weekend went off without a hitch, and all of our guests still tell us how incredible the venue and staff were. Every time we hear a new couple that is looking for a venue, we promptly ask them, “Have you had a look at Greyleigh?”

Was there a favourite moment (or two) that you will treasure always?

It’s hard to narrow it down to just one moment, as the entire weekend felt overwhelmingly special, but there are a few that will stay with us forever. Our ceremony was, of course, such a special part of our day, infused with so many personal touches. Each of our nieces and nephews gave Liam a beautiful big hug when they reached the end of the aisle, i’m so sad I didnt get to see this in person but the photos are so special. My 93-year-old grandfather, Kevin, was the ring bearer, which was really special, as our only surviving grandparent. Liam’s sister read the Irish Blessing, and my 8-year-old niece, Milla, read an excerpt from Winnie the Pooh – there wasn’t a dry eye in the house. Being pronounced husband and wife was so surreal, and we loved walking back down hand in hand under a shower of confetti. The following afternoon, we relaxed in the sun on the beautiful Greyleigh lawn with our bridal party and immediate family. It was so great to have this time to decompress and talk about our favourite parts of the previous day, while one of the groomsmen strummed on the guitar and we had our first pieces of cake for the weekend!

What does being married mean to you, and are there any special rituals you have that you would like to share?

Being married, to us, is about choosing each other every day and feeling deeply grounded in that commitment. Our relationship has already weathered distance, big life changes and plenty of adventure, so marriage feels like a natural continuation rather than a dramatic change. It’s a quiet confidence in knowing that we are a team, that we support one another’s ambitions, and that we are building a life together with intention. We cherish our time together so much, so marriage feels like a deepening of everything we already loved about our relationship. More intention, more gratitude, and an even stronger sense of partnership as we look to the future together.