Secret Garden vintage wedding

“Hiring Good Day Rentals was one of the best decisions we made for our wedding. The furniture was stunning and the styling was super cool. The service we received from Kate and her crew was second to none. Kate gave us detailed plans of her ideas, was available to be contacted easily in the lead up (which helped when I was stressing about forecast rain), and she was there early on the day performing her magic. So many of our guests commented on the furniture and how beautiful it was. It really enhanced our venue and added a super special touch to our day! Thanks Good Day Rentals!”

Jill

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐, via channel name

Jill + Jon’s wedding

Private Property, Dandenongs

Photos: Alana Holmberg

We definitely go ON about this a lot; we get the most rad customers. Of course, there is the occasional pain in the neck, but on the whole (like 99% of the time), we love them, understand them, want to hang out with them and most definitely want to go to their rad weddings!

I find it SO hard to keep event and wedding styling consultations to one hour (or even two for that matter!) because all the couples are super interesting and funny and warm and just plain rad. Jill + Jon are all of these things and they also brought along their (at the time) five month old Austin, who is just the cutest.

Jill + Jon met online and hit it off over a shared love of music and travel. So this is where we started our journey into what would become their wedding design and styling.

Ceremony

But first we must talk about the location! As the saying goes, ‘location, location, location’. And usually it’s thrown about by less than upstanding real estate types so who bloody cares what they say, but in the instance of Jill and Jon’s wedding, the location – Jon’s family property – is just so beautiful, tranquil and special. The long driveway is lined with Chestnut trees so old and special, that they’re heritage listed. Who even knew this could be a thing for trees?!?

The property is made up of several beautiful interconnected English style gardens, so of course we made the choice to use a few of these areas, so guest would feel like they were going on a journey through the secret garden, starting with the driveway, where the ceremony was held.

Set amongst the aforementioned amazing trees, the ceremony seating was placed on either side of the stone lined driveway. Using our most beautiful and classic vintage velvet dining chairs for ceremony seating, the area was sprinkled liberally with fairy lights because twinkly lights are life. Fun fact: the below photo was one of our most popular on Instagram last year!

Reception

Under the trees, we created gorgeous lounge clusters that make the most of the leafy shade and gave guests a cosy canopy to sit under. We added other seating in both lounge and table/chair formats in the marquee, while there was also bar tables and stools out in the open. Lots of types of seating to match the many moods of the party goer.

Making a focal point of the join in the L shaped marquee, we created a rad DJ booth and dance floor, which also doubled as a lovely backdrop for speech photos. Hot tip – get a cordless mic or have a long enough cord so that you can do your speeches in front of one of the features of your wedding – you want that loveliness in your photos, rather than having to stand next to the toilet door because that’s as far as the cord stretches!

Here’s where we added some small nods to Japan – a place where Jill + Jon made their favourite memories ever on a trip together. Strings of paper cranes were added to the DJ area, and being handmade by the couple gave it that extra personal touch, which we love.

Along with the fairy lights, we also used festoons to light the large outdoor reception area, as well as tiny fairy lights that we wound around the legs of the bar tables, to create twinkles and sparkles in unexpected places, which makes people so thrilled!