Vanessa + Jack by Ashleigh Brooksbank at Sapphire Studios - Together Journal

We wanted our wedding to reflect how summer felt to us.

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

Vanessa: I am dietitian working in the food industry and have a passion for supporting and empowering people with nutrition knowledge to enable healthier relationships with food.

Jack: I am an engineer by background but I’m currently a client-side Project Manager in construction. Vanessa: We are both very active people where we enjoy running and being active together, with Jack taking this a little too far with his obsession with competing in triathlon events – in fact, deciding to do his first full Ironman 3 weeks before the wedding was his best idea yet…

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

 Jack: We first met at Van’s flat in Auckland. She had just moved up from Christchurch a couple of weeks earlier for further study. Our initial interaction was pretty surface-level, but later that evening we ended up on the couch having a proper conversation. What felt like 20 minutes turned out to be over two hours chatting about almost every topic imaginable and eventually it was time to call it a night. When I got home, I sent her a DM with a corny joke that, for some reason, earned me a first date. The rest, as they say, is history.

Tell us about the vision you had for the mood and style of your wedding. (theme, key styling elements, florals, colour palettes etc.).

Vanessa: Summer is our favourite season; it is where we spend most of our time either at the beach or in the ocean swimming or Jack surfing. So, we wanted our wedding to reflect how summer felt to us. When venue hunting, we really wanted to have the ocean prominent which narrowed down our venue options significantly. Waiheke Island has always been a special place to us both – an escape that is hard to believe is only a stones throw away from home.

Jack: We actually stumbled upon Goldie Estate whilst searching for wineries/venues that had that ocean back drop. We hadn’t heard about Goldie as a wedding venue before but after our first visit we fell in love – with the back drop being the glorious Putiki Bay, we knew this would be the perfect venue that felt like us as a couple.

Vanessa: We chose a colour palette of blue, yellow and white to complement the venue, but also to us as a couple these colours felt like the epitome of a summer’s day. Blue and yellow is not often a colour you find together, so we really tried to make sure that both colours were complementary and not competing. The most important part to our day (other than celebrating our love) were the people – our beautiful friends and family who have been part of our journey from day dot. Our wedding guests were at the forefront of every aspect of the day. Destination weddings can be quite an ask for people to come too, and we thankfully have some wonderful friends and family who immersed themselves into the weekend fully. But as a way of saying thank you for coming and making the effort to travel – we wanted to make sure the day was just as much as about our guests as it was about us. From the flow of the day to the beverage choice, to the menu, to the music, to where people would chit chat, to where photos would be taken, to the personalised letters we wrote to each of our guests – everything was an intentional decision to make our loved ones feel special and included. We both love dressing up for events also, so we wanted our guests to obviously join in with us, in feeling as amazing as possible on the day. So, a black tie dress code was encouraged with lots of bright colours to tie in with the summer’s day theme.

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).

Vanessa: As mentioned, blue and yellow are not often colours that are paired together, so ensuring they were complementary to each other was super important. Thankfully we had the most amazing wedding planner, Michelle Gras at Waiheke Wedding and Events, who saw and understood our vision. Hydrangea’s are one of our favourite flowers, so it was important to tie in as many of these as possible. We used the colour of a blue hydrangea as the colour for our fonts on all of our wedding stationary (invites, signage etc) which was designed by a very special, talented friend of ours. To ensure the blue and yellow didn’t compete with each other, we had mostly blue and white elements with little pops of yellow either in the flower arrangements themselves which were made by the super talented Franca at Florienne or the yellow scalloped napkins at the place settings. We had had our hearts set on having blue hydrangeas right from the beginning, but we had to be practical and plan for a backup blue element just in case the weather Gods were not on our side for the flower growing season. We ended up finding these incredible blue tapered candles that were a subtle blue element that would be an amazing blue element on their own. But thankfully we were able to source the blue hydrangeas and so the candles ended up enhancing the blue even more. We also had the most amazing buttery yellow, structured velvet table clothes that Michelle sourced from Table Linen for us last minute that added almost another dimension to our tables, without stealing the show.

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

Vanessa: Our favourite thing about the whole process was imagining we were guests at our own wedding. Visualising how things felt, looked, sounded or what emotions would be evoked. Every time we booked a vendor or chose a song or printed invites or chose a flavour for our cake – we thought about how this would make us feel as a wedding guest.

Jack: We really wanted the whole day to run as smoothly as possible with little thinking needed by our guests and judging by the feedback we have received, it sounded like we may have possibly achieved that!! As mentioned, it was incredibly important to us that our loved ones were looked after and were set up to have a wonderful day that they will enjoy, just as much as we did! Our advice would be to imagine being a guest at your own wedding, this helps you visualise how you want things to look and feel. It also helps you remember to plan and think about things that may get overlooked, but are super important to the wedding guest experience e.g. if it is a hot sunny day with a black tie dress code, will there be any shade for your guests!! Try to do this visualising as a couple together, as it makes you both so excited for the big day and helps build the anticipation even more!

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

Vanessa: All of our vendors were absolute standouts and we are so stoked to have worked with so many incredibly talented people, several of which we are lucky enough to call friends of ours!! We are enormously grateful for all of our vendors. We definitely could not have achieved such a beautiful, memorable day without our amazing planner Michelle and our coordinator Kim – the most incredible team. They helped execute a day we could only have dreamt of. From the styling, to the flow of the whole day, to the logistics planning in the lead up, they were hugely instrumental to us having one of the best days of our lives. Victoria from Baby Buck Baking is the most phenomenal talent and we have never had so many compliments on a cake before!! Everyone could not stop talking about how amazing the cake and its flavours were, and not to mention how insanely beautiful it looked being decorated with yellow rose petals – also Vic’s idea!! Our dear friend Mia, an extremely talented graphic designer, brought our wedding vision to life through the most stunning stationery. From the intentionally chosen colour palette and elegant fonts to the imagery and our custom monogram, Mia crafted every detail so beautifully. Paired with the wonderfully talented Samantha at Paper Darling bringing this all to life with the actual printing, it resulted in our wedding stationary and signage to be one of the focal points of our day. My makeup artist was my best friend and maid of honour, Kasia. She’s been doing my makeup for as long as I can remember – what started out as fun practice sessions (and lucky me, free makeup!) turned into something much more meaningful over the years. As her artistry evolved, I became a practice canvas for her, and it felt so full-circle having her do my makeup on our special day. Kasia has an insane talent – the ability to make you feel like the most beautiful version of yourself, without ever covering up what makes you, you. I couldn’t imagine anyone else by my side that morning.

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

Vanessa: When I went to my first wedding dress fitting, I kept an open mind. I didn’t have a specific style in mind and let my friends pick out dresses they thought would look good on me. Much to my surprise, the very first dress I tried on ended up being the starting point for my final gown. I tried on over 30 dresses, each with elements I loved, but none felt just right or me. It wasn’t until a chat with my best friend Caitlin that we seriously considered making my wedding dress. What started as a joke or passing comment turned into a brilliant idea, and it ultimately was the best decision I made. Caitlin used the design of the first dress I had tried on as a base and incorporated the lines from her Rosalie bodice and Lala dress into the final bodice. Together with Noelene, one of her talented seamstresses who had also helped with Caitlin’s wedding dress, they spent six months creating my dream gown. The final dress was everything I wanted – my favourite shape, a luxurious tulle underskirt, and delicate CC bow buttons. The finishing touch was a cute bow belt that sat perfectly on the bodice. I had complete trust in Caitlin and Noelene from the start, and their work exceeded all expectations. Not many brides can say their best friend designed and made their wedding dress, and I’m so proud to tell anyone who will listen!!

Tell us about your wedding and engagement rings.

 Jack: After a long work week, I took Van engagement ring browsing to get a feel for her style. She gravitated toward a classic solitaire diamond. I then used this style as a basis to create a custom ring with The Diamond Shop. We added a personal touch by setting her family’s emerald within the band – something meaningful and unique to her.  For the wedding bands, we used some family gold that had been passed down to me. We worked with Louis the Goldsmith in Parnell to melt it down and create our rings. One of the original pieces of jewellery included a small sapphire, which now sits in my wedding band. Similarly with the emerald in Van’s engagement ring, they are both subtle but special details that connects our rings to our families and to each other.

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?).  

Vanessa: The venue was incredibly important to us, especially where we would hold the ceremony and dinner. We took a bit of a gamble having everything outdoors, but we were fortunately rewarded with perfect weather for the entire weekend. Sharing our vows under the Goldie Estate Pohutukawa tree, with the rolling hills and ocean behind us, was exactly what we had imagined. 

Jack: Another non-negotiable for us was photography. We knew we wanted Ash at Sapphire Studios to capture the day based on her talent and photography style. We have been such a big fan of her work for years now as she just knows how to capture natural and raw human emotion so effortlessly through photography, so it only felt right to have her document such a special day in our lives. Her digital and film images completely took our breath away – being able to see pictures of ourselves and our loved ones and feel the emotion through the images proved that having Ash was one of the best decisions we made.

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

Jack: It’s almost impossible to choose a single moment, we loved it all. But one thing that stands out was the music. We (mostly Van) spent a lot of time curating playlists for different parts of the evening, and it really paid off. There were these special little moments where we’d catch each other’s eye as a song played and think, “Yes, this had to be in the cocktail hour set.” Another moment was after we walked back down the aisle after the ceremony, one of our favourite songs that reminded us of summer days at the beach. We both looked at each other, then the wedding party and then the view and without saying anything knew that that was a pivotal core memory helped by that song. Now, when specific songs start playing either at home, in the car, at a restaurant or a store, we’re transported right back to that day and to that very moment. It’s surreal how music can take you to such specific memories and emotions, those little musical time capsules are something we’ll always treasure.