Yesterday I joined Sally & Jamie for their big day at the lovely Middleton Lodge near Richmond in North Yorkshire!

It’s not the first time I’ve photographed at this lovely country house wedding venue – I’ve been in sun, snow, rain & all the gorgeous colours of autumn! Use the link in this sentence to check out my special category page showing all my wedding photos at Middleton Lodge.

In spite of the drizzle, it was a magical day to finish my year of wedding photography, with a fun couple, a great venue and a cool crowd…

Middleton Lodge is a charming, family-owned Georgian country mansion, nestled up near Richmond, conveniently close to the A1. It’s a great venue to shoot at, whatever the season, and the guys that own and run the place have done a fab job at restoring it to its original splendour, while keeping an intimate and relaxed vibe to the proceedings, so guests feel like they’ve got their own country home for the weekend!

As we arrived, I spotted these little faces watching us from upstairs!

Being a fan of Downton Abbey (though don’t tell everyone), I love the original service bells in a servants hall near the back stairs

Upstairs, our blushing bride Sally was chilling with a few of the many flower girls.

Sally was delivered a sweet card & some flowers from Hub-to-be, in another wing of the mansion.

The wedding gown, from Limelight Occasions in Huddersfield, was waiting to play out!

A few little details of the ace shoes & bridesmaids dresses, including beautiful flora by Twisted Willow

Nice to have a little blast of low winter sunshine filling the bridal suite

Beautiful little cherubs, working out interesting ways to make their dresses dirty!

Meanwhile, in another wing, Clare joined Jamie for his morning’s preparations

He seemed pleased for the distraction when his chaps arrived!

Before jumping on the bus to the church, Clare caught a few relaxed teamshots with the boys by one of Middleton Lodge’s ancient oaks

Sally looked stunning in her wedding gown

It’s interesting, Sally and Jamie were quite late enquiring with me, only making contact last October.  After getting engaged, they’d been to a Middleton Lodge wedding fair and fallen in love with the place. But being a popular choice, weekends were booked up for pretty much all of 2014!  However, a weekend in December was available, so they went for it and – in my opinion – organised one of our favourite weddings of 2013 in only 2 months!  Goes to show it doesn’t need to take 2 years in the planning…

I like this one of Sally having a moment looking out of the window before heading off

Here comes the bride!

Love this shot!

The Priest was ace, and said his church was our oyster!

This is music to our ears and makes out telling of the story so much easier.

One of the page boys read a poem he’d written and another sang Aled Jones’ ‘Walking in the Air’ un-accompanied!

Good effort lads…

Sealed with a kiss

I was more than a little pleased that the forecast was off about rain as we emerged from the church!

A quick shot of everybody…

…then a blast of confetti!

It was drizzling a bit when we arrived at the lodge, but after their practice round of pics in Leeds (blog here) Sal & Jamie were good sports and up for a few pics outside!

They’re such a lovely couple together. Jamie is hilarious.

One of the reasons I was asked aboard this wedding was because Sally’s family are very close to the family of a couple I photographed in June 2012, Vicky & Rob.

It was great to see them and catch up.  We’ve stayed pals on Facebook and they’ve had a lovely baby in the interim, but they were on good form enjoying a night off!

I love this super Regal full-wedding party shot around the sofa!

The marquee looked brilliantly wintery, set for the wedding meal

Speeches were hilarious and wonderful, and Jamie made a good proportion of the guests cry (including Clare!)

Then it was his turn…

After the meal, everyone headed back to the house for a comfort break, so I took the opportunity to do a few more relaxed portraits with the happy couple

Love these backlit shots in the drizzly doorway!

When the room was ready and the band soundchecked, everyone headed back down for the evening knees up…

…kicking off with the ceremonial cake cut.

Then the first dance was danced to Sinatra’s ‘Somethin’ Stupid’

Awww.

The band, Quantum Class, were a class act, delivering a pitch perfect journey through from the 60s to the present!

They certainly got the floor bumpin’!

After a fun day, we bid our farewells to the happy couple and left them and the gang to their partying!

It’s simply amazing that it was all organised inside a few months! Top work to Sal & the mums for a job well done!

Here’s wishing the very best Sally & Jamie and hope they have a wonderful life together,

x Barns & Clare x

If you enjoyed this post, check out these similar posts: