Editor loves and inspiration

Alice and Tom met in the pub on Christmas Eve 2013. Alice was trying to break up a fight between mutual friends at the time, and Tom swept in to pull her away. “He'll say it as my bright orange hair that attracted him, while I love the fact that he just wasn't fazed by the drama unfolding around him and fully focused on me,” Alice remembers. “I also thought he had great fashion sense, although his choice of socks really had me questioning that on our wedding day!”

Tom proposed on Christmas Eve 2020, exactly seven years after they met. Alice had had a busy morning at home, baking for the family, when Tom came home from work with a Christmas Eve box containing all of her favourite treats. At the bottom she found a photo from that night they met in the pub. “It wasn't until then I realised he was on one knee,” Alice remembers.

Little did they know at this point that Alice was already expecting twins. So, their wedding planning had to be put on hold for a while. After a tough pregnancy, a premature birth and a long hospital stay, their original plan of a Vegas wedding was off the cards.

Happily, now recovered and with two bouncing babies, Meols Hall was the first and only venue the couple visited. “I came across it while researching online and initially, the brickwork and layout ticked so many of our boxes, so we knew we had to go and see it,” Alice explains. From the moment they drove into the grounds they both knew they’d be booking their wedding that day! “We had complete goose bumps at how beautiful it was,” Alice continues.

Find out more about the big day - download the Jan/Feb25 issue of Your Cheshire & Merseyside Wedding HERE.

Lucy and Matt met at the MMA Academy in Liverpool where Lucy had joined the Muay Thai class and Matt was a coach and fighter. It wasn't love at first sight and they took a while to pluck up the (Dutch) courage to take things further on a night out in the City. “It was definitely a case of opposites attract,” Lucy says. “Neither of us was each other's type, but somehow it seems to work and within a few weeks we were living together!”

We fast forward a way into the couple's relationship. By this time Lucy and Matt had a number of holidays under their belts, although a trip to Menorca for a friend's wedding wasn't where Lucy was expecting to receive a proposal of marriage. After some stress hiding the ring in his golf bag, Matt overcame his nerves and got down on one knee within 10 minutes of arriving at their villa. “It was perfectly unplanned and spontaneous, just like Matt,” Lucy remembers.

The couple had in mind a secluded location for their big day, somewhere they could enjoy with family and friends in complete privacy. Talhenbont Hall was only their second viewing but they soon decided there was no reason to look anywhere else. They barely made it through the gate before Matt exclaimed: “This is it!” North Wales is one of their favourite places being close to March Loop where they love to camp with their dogs. “So, this felt like the perfect place for us to get married,” Lucy explains. “The whole place was stunning and we could see ourselves saying 'I do' outside in the pagoda. After that it was hard to envisage our wedding anywhere else.”

The date was set for 31st July 2024. To find out more download the Jan/Feb25 issue of Your Cheshire & Merseyside Wedding HERE.