We’re big fans of the Suffolk coast, in fact we visited it on our own wedding day for fish and chips! When we were first contacted by Bina and Max to discuss their plan for the wedding, we knew it was going to be a banger. Here they are to tell us all about it in their owns words.
We live in London with our mini Dachshund Penelope, who has a hat collection (her favourite is the witches hat that she wears on halloween).
Max is a big Arsenal fan and has lived in London all his life. Bina grew up just outside of London and is probably the most organised person you will meet!
We spend our free time taking Penelope all over London to see friends and family – she’s been to restaurants, bars, cinemas, anywhere that will allow her in!
We met at work, it was Bina’s first job out of university and we immediately became friends. Nothing happened between us for a while, but at our Christmas party one year Max confessed his feelings and the rest is history! Luckily we don’t still work together, but we do still both work in finance.
Max proposed in 2021 when we were still going through various lockdowns and travel was more difficult. He had wanted to propose in Florence but wasn’t able to.
We had planned a holiday to the Cotswolds in September and having had the ring since May, Max decided that’s where he was going to do it.
The morning we were leaving we got up early to take Penelope on a walk before the long car journey. It was a gorgeous morning so Max took the ring with him just in case. On the walk we happened across a really pretty lake, the sun was rising and the weather was perfect. Max decided to take the opportunity and got down on one knee.
Unfortunately for Bina (who had her suspicions), she hadn’t expected it to happen that morning so still had a hair mask in, hadn’t washed off her fake tan and was wearing a tracksuit and crocs. Safe to say no one apart from us has seen those photos! We drove down to the Cotswolds on cloud 9 and were able to enjoy the whole weekend as a newly engaged couple.
We got married in a church and wanted it to feel very special and intimate but also not really formal and serious.
Both our Mums did readings, “blessing of the hands” and an extract from the book “Everything I know about love”. These were both so beautiful and completely sum up how we feel about marriage. We also had one of our ushers do a short bible reading.
The music throughout our day was something we spent loads of time thinking about. Bina walked into the church to “the luckiest” which has always been our song but felt too slow to be our first dance. Whilst we signed the register we had some of our favourite songs from musicals playing.
We loved the ceremony although it was a bit of a blur for both of us. The cheer that erupted when we were announced as husband and wife is something we will never forget!
After the ceremony we had 5 minutes to ourselves whilst our guests formed the confetti line. The confetti was absolutely insane. Thanks to Lisa and Neil we’d ordered way more than we thought we needed, but it ended up looking magical. One of our guests actually asked us if we had confetti cannons on top of the church, as there was so much of it!
We really wanted the day to feel joyful, colourful, relaxed and full of love. Both of us wanted everyone there to really be able to just enjoy the day and not have to think about anything. We focussed a lot on the timeline and also on travel logistics.
There wasn’t really a specific colour theme and the bridesmaids all wore different dresses (although all in shades of pink). It felt important to me for them to have dresses they felt amazing in and would be able to wear again. Having our venue on the Suffolk coast definitely helped with the relaxed feeling. Incredibly weather on the day put everyone in a good mood.
We tried to add in as many moments as possible that would feel really joyful. Walking out of the church to Mr Blue Sky, ordered literally kilos of confetti, had a little vintage bus doing shuttles of guests from the church to reception and organised to do a 45 minute ceilidh to get everyone on the dance floor.
We put a note in the front of our orders of service that asked our guests to sing and cheer really loudly, which definitely did the job! The cheer when we were announced husband and wife was incredible and definitely one of my favourite memories. The small details like the confetti and our music choices are the things that our guests seem to remember the most from the day! (Note from L&N – this confetti went straight in as a contender for ‘best confetti 2023’)
Planning started in January 2022 and we got married in June 2023, so a year and 5 months total. Most of the planning took place in the first couple of months when we were booking things. The last few months was finalising details. There was a lot of dead space in between!
Because of COVID there were a lot of weddings that had been pushed back and we were scared of everyone being fully booked already. We just wanted everything done straight away.
Where possible we tried to book local suppliers. Our photographers, videographer, hair and makeup, decorator, florist, transport and furniture rental all came from Suffolk or Norfolk. Supporting local businesses was more affordable as we didn’t have to spend money on their travel or accommodation. That can add a lot on to the cost! We knew we wanted a Ceilidh band so they were the only exception as they came down from Scotland.
There wasn’t much we disagreed on as we shared the same vision for the day. Max probably didn’t at first see the need for having decorators or for spending much time on how the tables at dinner looked. When he saw it all come together he was glad we had done it all!
We had a tricky time pinning down a Vicar to marry us! For one reason or another we went through three. Two months before the day we still didn’t have someone who could do it which caused a bit of stress. Luckily Reverend Alan stepped in and he did a fantastic job!
We both agree our favourite moment was being announced into our reception as Mr & Mrs Chapman for the first time. We’d chosen for “Love Today” by Mika to be played and we did a lap of the whole room whilst our guests twirled their napkins and clapped. Max was loving it so much. He ended up making us do four laps which was much more than we anticipated. We just didn’t want the moment to end!
The ceilidh was hilarious. The band we used were from Scotland so most of our guests couldn’t understand what they were saying and their instructions were going above almost everyone’s heads. Not helped by the amount of champagne we had drunk at reception and dinner! I don’t think the band were that impressed by our performance but we loved seeing the absolute chaos that was happening on the dance floor.
We didn’t cry as much as we had thought we would,. For both of us it was during moments before the ceremony.
For Bina it was during the getting ready; when the flowers were delivered and the Dad reveal. She also cried during Max’s speech.
For Max it was the moment Bina walked into the church. The energy and the amount of emotions was quite overwhelming!
There was soooo many that we love, we really can’t pick just one.
Our top three;
There’s one of us walking back down the aisle after our ceremony. We both look so overjoyed it makes us smile and takes us back to that moment.
We did bridesmaid and groomsmen photos on Aldeburgh beach at golden hour. All those photos are stunning but there is one of all of us doing our “silly” poses. One of our ushers is captured mid fall as he was launched backwards by another usher. It captures us and our best friends perfectly, as well as being a gorgeous photo!
Lastly, there is a photo of us standing on the famous scallop sculpture on Aldeburgh beach. I’ve visited Aldeburgh almost annually for 29 years. It’ss surreal to have a photo of us on our Suffolk coast wedding day on the shell. The light of the photo is just perfect, we RUSHED in Lisa and Neil’s car to get it! We will treasure it forever.
We also had such a laugh comparing bridal prep and groom prep photos. Bridal prep is girls in matching pj sets, crying over flowers, hugging and holding hands . Groom prep is stupid faces, pints, and making fun of eachother.
Literally nothing changing! Bina would maybe go back and remind herself that weddings are amazing and fun. The guests you invite are all there to celebrate you, so stop stressing so much!
A big thanks to Bina and Max for giving us the down low on their day. Thanks also to the suppliers who contributed to make it an absolute smash! Here’s Bina and Max’s Google review.
We couldn’t recommend Lisa and Neil more highly to any couples looking for a wedding photographer. Having read the tonne of 5 star reviews which come before this one (which we whole heartedly agree with!), you probably don’t need any more convincing, but in case you do:
1. They were invaluable in planning the order and logistics of our day, which is something I found quite overwhelming to even think about! They basically gave us a timeline of what they thought would work and that alone took so much off my plate.
2. There’s 2 of them!!! Not only did this mean that both bridal and groom prep was captured fully, but during the service, speeches and many more parts of the day, we got pictures of not just Max & I but also of our guests’ reactions.
3. We loved having them at our wedding, they were super guests and got on with everyone and all of our suppliers.
4. Our photos are the perfect balance of looking beautiful and capturing the atmosphere of the day and they have managed to make us and all our guests look good too!! We have over 800 photos of the day and we are having a hard time narrowing down which ones to include in our album! There are literally hundreds of photos that we love.
5. They bossed our guests around on the day at important bits like family photos, confetti and the group photograph. Which was so helpful and Max and I could relax knowing that they had it all in hand.
6. The turnaround time was insanely fast and meant that we got our photos whilst on honeymoon!
7. Even after the photos have been delivered that have been so helpful to us and a few of our guests in explaining things like printing options.
Overall, booking Lisa and Neil was one of the best things we did for our wedding and would 10/10 recommend to anybody else.
Bina & Max
Hair – Amanda Steed
Florist – Drowsy Bee flower company
Dress – Jesus Piero
Cake – Beth Haxby
Decor – Boomting Bunting
If you’re planning a Suffolk coast wedding, we’d love to hear all about it, contact us here to chat. We have a heap of real weddings and planning tips and expert views on our blog here too.
