Real Wedding - Tessa & Tom, Melbourne VIC

September 27, 2024 In Black and White, Classic, Latest Posts, Luxe, Most Popular, Real Weddings, Victoria By Ivory Tribe

Real Wedding – Tessa & Tom, Melbourne VIC

For Tessa and Tom, two self-proclaimed adventures who love to fill their lives with upbeat, busy fun, planning their wedding was an extension of this personal ethos and their own signature style. The result was a mid-winter Black Tie soiree encompassing elegant glam and a moody venue, perfectly encapsulating the NYC vibe they set out to create.

Turning to real-life events, activations and venues to find their inspo meant that Tess and Tom’s wedding celebrations feel truly unique and stunningly them. They set out to ensure every touchpoint on the day was timelessly classic and chic, from the drink selection to the soundtrack, martinis, custom matchboxes and a Baby Grand piano featuring heavily.

With a talented team of vendors around them, Tess and Tom’s vision was truly exceeded – and every stunningly sophisticated moment is captured through both film and digital by the epic talent of Rolan John Photo.

The meeting.

We are long-time lovers! We met at school through mutual friends, having grown up in the same area and started dating in our final year of high school.

The one.

We knew we were onto a good thing when we first met. It wasn’t until time went on, careers progressed and an overseas move landed on the cards that we really came to appreciate what we had. Luckily, we were on the same page with the trajectory we wanted our lives to go in – adventurous, busy and fun!

The proposal.

On a beautiful spring morning down at Bondi beach, with just the sun as a witness. We love swimming at Bondi early in the morning before a day of work, and the rush of crowds come on down. It’s so peaceful and our happy place. It also happened to be referendum day – very fitting with the YES campaign plastered all over the Eastern suburbs at the time. Tom popped the question as we were about to dive in for a swim before coming back to our home in Paddington to eat and drink our favourite things – Pancakes and Krug Champagne. We then went to Ursula’s for lunch and a martini, before Facetiming all our family and friends to share the great news – Tessa also ducked off at some stage to get her nails done as she was completely caught off guard when it happened!

Planning process.

We knew we wanted to do something a bit left of field. We’re very lucky in that we tend to have a lot of friends’ weddings over summer – we just wondered why none of our friends had thought to get married in winter. We’d also experienced a number of weddings over the summer months that either poured with rain or were 40+ degrees – classic Melbourne! We figured that if we chose to hold our wedding in winter and create a chic Black Tie winter soiree, we could use the cold weather to our advantage – the colder, the better!

We had always loved a Black Tie dress code and decided tuxedos, coats and gowns were far more conducive to winter – the vision grew from there. From our jazz quartet to olive martinis, woody room scents and a moody venue, we brought our Black Tie NYC-inspired winter soiree to life.

Style inspiration.

Pinterest was our best friend! We struggled to find real-life wedding examples of the vision we were looking to create – brand events and activations were the closest thing. P Johnson’s recent store opening at Bambini Wine Rooms in Sydney was a source of inspiration, as was the Polo Bar in New York – a timeless venue with so much class. We were lucky enough to visit Minetta Tavern in NYC a few months earlier; another great source of decor inspiration!

The ceremony.

The ceremony was beautiful. Our good friend is in training to become a celebrant; she ran the ceremony alongside another family friend who is a registered celebrant. Rather than having our bridal party stand up the front, we wrote introductions for our celebrant to read out before they sat down in the front rows. To us, it was more important to introduce them to our guests and explain why we’d chosen them to be by our side than have them actually standing there. This was a bit different, but all our guests absolutely loved it – they then had context as to who was in our bridal party and what they meant to us.

The outfits.

Tessa had an absolute nightmare with her dress, having been told two weeks before the day that the designer would not be able to give her the dress she’d ordered – but let’s not get into that!

Tessa bought the dress she wore in Boston a few months earlier. She had seen the dress online before travelling over. She attempted to try it on in their NYC store – the queue was insanely long and she famously won’t queue up – so decided it wasn’t to be. We then got to Boston, and lo and behold, there was a Reformation store that had just opened. They didn’t carry the bridal range in-store, but after asking the shop assistant, they mentioned they had received one online return. It was the exact dress in Tessa’s size – she felt this was too serendipitous not to buy. Thankfully, she had it in the wardrobe when the dress disaster unfolded!

For Tom, P Johnson was an obvious choice. We live just down the road from his Paddington showroom and love visiting the store on our weekends. As mentioned, with the store opening providing inspiration for our wedding, we are constantly in awe of the style, craftsmanship and campaign direction of his brand. Our forever inspiration. From there, it was all about the choice of material and size of lapels on the tuxedo – the whole process was a fantastic brand experience.

Favourite moment.

So hard to choose! I think it would be the afternoon – we chose to do our photos before the ceremony which allowed us to come together with all our bridal party and enjoy a champagne at The Royce whilst getting our photos done. This made for a really relaxing lead into the formalities.

Meaning of marriage.

Having been together for over 12 years, all through our teens and beyond, we are so excited to have taken the next step in our chapter. We’ve been best friends for a long time, and now it means we’re husband and wife.

Wedding soundtrack.

We wanted every touchpoint on the day to be timelessly classic and everything to feel classy and elegant – from the drink selection to the songs. For this reason, we chose You Send Me by Aretha Franklin for the aisle song (it also happens to be one of our favourite films – The Holiday), Can’t Help Myself by Four Tops for leaving the chapel, and Everlasting Love by Natalie Cole for our first dance – all absolute classics!

Funny stories (or near disasters).

The dress! It was an absolute disaster – but it all worked out, and I now don’t know how I ever considered wearing anything else! There was also a bit of stress around whether the Baby Grand piano would fit into the venue – thankfully, it did and was a game changer in creating the desired mood and ambience. Another funny challenge was getting the custom matchbooks sent over from the US – given they are highly flammable and we didn’t have time to get them shipped by sea. Again, we got there in the end, and they looked fantastic!

Planning surprises.

None particularly. Tessa is a Brand Manager in the liquor category and has had a lot of experience in events – so we felt pretty comfortable throughout the process. The venue was fantastic to work with (even despite our copious amount of requests/attention to detail).

Words of wisdom.

Enjoy the process! Easier said than done, but we reality tried to enjoy all the little things along the way – go for a drink when you pick up the groom’s suit or the bridal jewellery, and make moments out of the little things.

We planned our wedding with a three/four month lead time which was stressful at times, however we really tried to enjoy the small things as and when they happened.

Last words.

Don’t sleep on winter weddings! They are really great.

Love Tessa and Tom’s stunning style vision? See more of the old-money aesthetic in our round-up of some sophisticated ways to give a nod to this gorgeous trend.

TESSA & TOM’S VENDORS

We found our vendors mainly through Instagram and Pinterest, as well as vendors Tessa had previously worked with in a professional capacity.

Ceremony venue: The Chapel, The Commons Collective

Reception venue: Bar Moubray, The Commons Collective

Celebrant: Denise Gee Celebrant

Photography: Rolan John Photo

Content Creator: Modernday Romance

Florist: Victoria Whitelaw

Hair: Mae Taylor

Make-up: Ashleigh Fenton

The dress: Reformation

Veil: Jane Hill – borrowed from my sister!