If anyone has the inside track on wedding planning, it would be these two. Shelley and Greg own and run marquee and event hire specialists, Festival Hire, and Shelley is a professional wedding and events manager.

Where did you hold your wedding, and why? We had our beautiful day at Orui Station run by the super-amazing Angie and Glen Meredith. I was always keen on an away wedding and Greg was more for a wedding at home so it was a perfect compromise! We both have so many fond memories of Riversdale growing up and we work very closely with Orui so we knew it would fit with what we had in mind.

How would you describe the style of wedding? We both have very large families, so we knew a small wedding wasn’t an option. We ended up with 150 guests which was a manageable number but even then we never got the chance to chat with every guest. Luckily we knew where to find a couple of marquees…. we had a marquee wedding with a 12x24m Electron for our main area and seating, a 9x9m for our dance and band area and a 6x9m for our catering tent.

Orui boasts a beautiful Olive grove where the marquees were set up, so our theme with our Italian wooden family tables with old oil lanterns, fairy seed lights and olive wreaths worked well. We were very lucky with the weather so we had an indoor-outdoor feel with an open area lit with festoon lights and outdoor furniture to join the two marquees.

As a wedding planner, was it harder or easier to plan your own wedding? This is a hard question. We think it made it harder as you had to really switch off the ‘work’ brain and kept reminding ourselves we are the clients. Let’s just say, it’s much easier helping with clients weddings than our own!

What were the most important things for you? Making memories! Anything can (and probably will) happen on the day, but it is how you react to it that really sets the scene. We had a wee miss-hap with our wedding cake, which lead to our three-tier becoming a two-tier, but we chose to have a laugh about it and gave us a chance to taste test before everyone else had a go.

What was the best thing about your wedding? The whole day and lead up was just magical! We got to run away just after dinner, for some photos of just us two which was really special. It gave us a chance to look back at the set-up and our family and friends and take it all in.

Top Tips

Sit down together and note three really important must-haves for your day. Do the same for your ‘wish list’ – things like amazing food, great photos, a marquee or venue. Work out your budget to fit with it and be willing to compromise on some of the items.
Don’t stress the small stuff.