Romantic Maleny Manor Wedding

Brisbane couple Edwina and Dan chose the glorious Sunshine Coast hinterland spot of Maleny for their uber-romantic wedding. The old-world theme for the wedding evolved from the colour and style of Edwina’s divine white gold dress (a perfect match for her complexion). The couple really embraced “handmade”, ordering most of their wedding accessories through online handmade marketplace Etsy, as well as making their own wedding stationery and bonboniere. The result was a wedding that was as fun as it was breathtaking. Enjoy!

Couple:  Edwina and Dan
Date:  18th September, 2009
Location: Maleny Manor, Maleny, Queensland
Photography: Jonas Peterson; for more beautiful photos from Edwina and Dan’s wedding, see Jonas’ blog.

Gown:  An ex-display gown from Fiorenza.
Suit:  Dan and the groomsmen hired them for the day.
Wedding Party: We had three bridesmaids and three groomsmen. One bridesmaid lives in Hobart, one in London and one near Toowoomba so organising their dresses was challenging. In the end, I picked a design and the colours from Alfred Angelo online and they ordered them. Then I had matching boleros made by MaryandAngelika – dressmakers I found through Etsy online – to finish them off.
Accessories: I wore a beautiful deco head piece with matching earrings from EMBridal, another Etsy find, based in Melbourne. I also had Dan some cufflinks made by Eternally Linked.
Flowers: The flowers were put together by a friend of ours who is a florist. We had five lots of cream roses in different sizes for me, the bridesmaids and the flower girl. She also used yellow roses and made them into little posies on the tables.
Ceremony and Reception: Maleny Manor in the Sunshine Coast hinterland. We wanted an excuse to get everyone out of Brisbane for a weekend and both love Maleny. Plus, I had family flying in from overseas and interstate and we wanted to show Queensland off a little. Dan’s stepsister has just qualified as a celebrant, so she married us.
Music: We got lucky with the music by having a few musicians as friends.  My friend Briohny played the cello before the ceremony and as I walked down the aisle. During the reception, our friend Mark DJ’d.
Decoration: Little yellow and white posies, pillar candles and white table cloths.
Stationery:  We made the stationery ourselves. Instead of paying a printer, I just bought a printer and some beautiful paper to use. We also got a name stamp from Rubber Stamp Press on Etsy to decorate our bonboniere and thank you cards.
Cake: Our friend Elissa made a beautiful stack of yellow and white cupcakes which tasted as good as they looked.
Budget Tip: We relied a lot on the skills of our friends and family to do everything from marry us, make the cakes, provide the music and the flowers and make our jewelry. Also, instead of going away for honeymoon, we went over to our shack on Karragarra Island and spent a week there: eating, drinking, lying on the beach and playing cards. Perfect!
Handmade Tip: We made our own bonboniere and invitations. The bonboniere was little gingerbread men and women, wrapped up in brown paper bags with our names stamped on them.
I wish:  … that I hadn’t hired an expensive camera for the weekend. It broke when I took it out of the box and I spent the weekend using my normal camera anyway.
Something Special: The Photobooth we hired for the night from Photobooth People. It was really popular all night, a great ice breaker and I now have hundreds of great photostrips of our friends and family.