“Our theme colour was all white. I’ve always wanted an all white wedding and when I explained it to Richard and our parents they fell in love with it too. We also wanted a garden wedding and I think white looks lovely in a garden.” Shiru adds.

 

Setting the dates
“We wanted to have a day that was sunny because we wanted a garden wedding hence we picked February because it’s a warm month with little chance of rainfall.

In the beginning
Shiru and Richard met through a mutual friend who played matchmaker. “I was working in Nyeri and Richard had just come back from Glasgow, we were both single and she thought we’d be good friends. She introduced us to each other, we talked on the phone for a while, finally had a first date and the rest as they say is history.” Shiru recalls.

Proposal
Richard proposed in the comfort of their living room on a Sunday afternoon. “We’d talked about getting married for a long time. Richard had actually taken me to try different rings, first to know my size and to know which cut or stone I’d like. I didn’t know he’d bought the ring. He proposed then and there in the sitting room. I was so happy and of course said yes.” Shiru says.

“My shoes and accessories were from my mom’s shop, Jayelle.”

“My necklace though was my something old, borrowed and blue, it was given to me by my Mother in law.”

Fashion
“I bought my dress from Pronovias. It’s a bridal shop based in Spain. I’d been looking for dresses on the Internet and when I came across their site I loved every dress I saw. The only problem is that they had not opened a shop in Sub Sahara. I couldn’t shake the dresses from my head though. A month later I surfed the net again and to my happy surprise they’d opened a store in South Africa. My siblings go to school and live in South Africa, so we planned to go see them as we went to the shop. The experience was amazing. I tried on different dresses and finally found one that fit my personality. It was still simple yet uniquely beautiful. So they fit me from my veil, bolero, the dress and even the under skirt.

Richard wore an Italian suit, which he got courtesy of Jayelle. His watch was from Dubai and his cufflinks were a gift from Shiru’s mother. They had diamonds. The couple had five bridesmaids, six groomsmen and one flower girl. The whole bridal lineup was dressed courtesy of Jayelle. The maids had ready-made dresses, coffee in colour. The groomsmen had suits that were from Turkey. The parents wore different outfits, from different places; the bride’s parent’s outfits were from Jayelle while the groom’s parents wore outfits from London.

Guest list
The couple initially wanted a small wedding, which they could afford of 200 guests. But their parents did not want to leave any one out. So they settled for a guest list of 1000 people, 900 of who RSVP.

Honeymoon
“We spent our first night at Safari Park Hotel, then jetted off to Spain for two weeks. The journey was fun and we really enjoyed ourselves. Spain is rich in culture and very beautiful. We visited museums, did city tours and of course shopped and drank lots of wine. We stayed in three different cities and used the train to go around. The food was amazing, a bit different from what we are used to but very nice. The highlight of our trip was the visit to the football stadiums: Camp nou and Bernebeu. We took a picture at one of the football stadium with a champion’s league trophy and Richard was over the moon.” The couple says.

Photography by: Emmanuel Jambo

Venue : Safari Park Hotel

Fashion: Jayelle