I felt *ever so special* when Miriam told me that she'd flown over from Malaga to visit my showroom! This lucky lady lives in the Moorish influenced, white-washed, village of Casares with Daire. A big thanks to Clíodhna (who's wedding I featured previously) for recommending me to her friend :-) Here is Miriam with some memories from her wedding - this girl knows how to tell a story -
"Daire and I are living in Casares, a gorgeous village in Spain, so deciding where to get married was a no brainer! The reality of getting married started to set in a few days before the wedding, when people started to arrive. My sister Eithne was flying from Sydney, my sister Eimear from London, my brother Ciaran from Vancouver and of course a host of people from Ireland.
The morning of the big day the first thing we did was have a dip in the pool, it was so nice and relaxing! Ciaran then prepared a big fry up so we enjoyed breakfast on the terrace before Kathryn arrived to start on the hair and make up. My dad ran down to the church to open it for the florist and also picked up our beautiful bouquets."
"I am somebody who is so clueless when it comes to hair, makeup etc that I am very grateful I had such good advisors. The hunt for my dress involved a lot of people and trips from Madrid to Malaga to Seville. For hair I had no idea where to start. Luckily my sister in law Clíodhna advised me to meet Aisling before deciding on what to do.
I knew I was going to have a veil and that I didn't want a tiara but that was as far as I'd got. I was actually quite nervous going to meet Aisling as I always feel a little bit helpless but she soon put me at my ease. Once I tried out the hair wires I think I knew straight away that that was what I wanted, but as with dress (which I'd tried on the first day of looking) I felt I had to go through some long drawn out process before making a decision. My hairstylist loved it too and managed to work it in very well (in my opinion!). I also took, for me, the big step of having my ears pierced and could show off the Rangoli pearl earrings on the day too."
"There were a lot of people coming and going. A bottle of champagne was opened. Anna Gazda, the photographer, arrived. She just got on with it, I hadn’t even met her before, but I knew I didn’t really have to tell her what to do. I had some downtime in the hammock while my sisters had their hair and make-up done.
Time flew. Final make-up, dress on, veil on, then we walked out on the balcony to take a few photos. I think I saw my reflection in the balcony window and thought ‘Oh my God, this is really happening'. Then everybody was leaving and it was just my dad, my sisters and the photographer."
"I’d had this idea from the beginning that I wanted to walk down to the church with my sisters, but it wasn’t really practical. Then literally a month before the wedding a new path was opened. It was already 3pm but from the top of the hill I could see that there were still people arriving so we took our time going down.
Then we were off down the aisle. Now that was a blur!
Everything was lovely (I know I’m biased). I’d spent such a lot of time trying to plan the music and it was the part that probably gave me the most stress, but was worth it. We were lucky to have so many talented friends and relatives. My friend Eadaoin was playing piano. Cliodhna was singing some of the songs through the mass and my new sister in law Niamh sang the songs through the signing of the register. The string quartet had been organised by our Spanish teacher and her daughter was playing with them.
We'd organised some drinks in the centre of the village. We were pulled left, right and centre for photos. Then it was time for us to go off and get some more official ones. I had to have some at a beach so we stopped off and I got to dip my feet in the water too! By the time we got to Benahavis, where we were having the reception, it was getting a little bit darker, but we got some fantastic pictures in the park."
"When we arrived the cocktail was in full swing accompanied by some Spanish classical guitar. Then in for the meal, which was as good as I’d remembered from the tasting....and a lot! I was as clueless about decoration but in the end I came up with a few ideas. seaside (shells and stones), cycling (figurines and tour de france markers, bicycle bookends and the cake topper) and books (yup, actual books, preferably older ones and quotes from the authors our tables were named after), our favours were just poems and arty postcards. Oh and lindt spruengli. Our favourites! So a mishmash, from a stylistic point of view it probably looked a mess, but I loved it.
When the band started everybody was up dancing. They played some Irish songs too, which I wasn’t expecting, so that was an added bonus. We had them DJ afterwards as well, though for the last hour or so my sisters were pretty much dictating the music! The DJ had to finish at 4pm, after that my Dad started a bit of a singsong, I’m not sure how long that lasted, we left shortly before 5pm. A long, exhausting but amazing day!"
Miriam, that was a rollicking story - I loved reading every detail of it. That early morning swim sounds amazing and I went Googling 'Lindt Spruengli' - are these what you mean?! Thanks so much to yourself and Daire for letting me share your photos and story. I'll let you know when I'll be over to visit...wink.
Miriam wore my Rangoli Diamond hairwire and matching drop earrings in her newly pierced ears!
Credits:
Photography by Anna Gazda from Limelight Photography.
Hair styled by Kathryn Parr
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