This wedding was featured in So You Want To Get Married wedding blog. Check it out here.
How Was Yeldersley Hall as a Wedding Venue?
Yeldersley Hall in Ashbourne, Derbyshire is a privately owned wedding venue in a rolling Derbyshire Countryside. To be honest I’m not really sure what ‘rolling hills’ are, but that seemed like the right word to use, so I’m going with it.
I often judge a wedding venue by the team who runs it on the day. Ultimately that is all I really get to experience because I’m not usually involved with any of the pre-planning. At Yeldersley Hall you get Andrew, the proprietor. Again I cannot comment on before or after the wedding, but on the day he was always available making sure everything was as perfect as possible. He kept checking with Connie and Gary throughout the day, making sure they were happy and had everything they needed. For this reason I cannot recommend Yeldersley Hall enough.
Of course, Andrew is not the only reason I would recommend Yeldersley Hall as a wedding venue. The buildings are stunning, the grounds are beautifully kept, and there is a wheat field across the road for those beautiful sunset photos.
All photos are videos in this article were taken by JLM Wedding Photography.
You may remember seeing Connie and Gary on my blog before. I wrote about their engagement shoot earlier this year. Usually when couples get amazing light on their engagement shoot they are not allowed similarly stunning light at their wedding, but this rule does not seem to apply to these two.
The weather was beautiful. Bright, warm sunshine made the amazingly colourful dresses and flowers pop. You could see Connie’s bridal party from miles away. There was the slight matter of how appealing they looked to wasps, which did crop up as an annoyance from time to time. This gave Connie a great opportunity to demonstrate her wasp-catching abilities.
I spent the morning moving back and forth between the gals getting ready in the main building and the guys in a separate house near the entrance of the estate. It’s always great when both parties get ready on the same site, so many opportunities to capture the full story of the day. Plus in-between the two sites I could get a few snaps and some footage of the guests arriving, which I’m pleased about.
Speaking of footage, here is the video of Connie & Gary’s wedding day at Yeldersley Hall. Watch to the end because there is also a slideshow of the photos.
The Wedding Ceremony
The ceremony room at Yeldersley Hall was quite compact. It gave the proceedings an intimate feeling, as if everyone was part of the ceremony rather than observing it.
It dawned on my early in the service that I was not going to be able to do my usual trick of lurking about in the sidelines unnoticed. At that point I realised that I was just as much a part of the ceremony and everyone else, so instead of trying to pretend I wasn’t there I decided to be proud of my presence and unashamedly get the photos that I was there to take.
As a result of this closeness I ended up with photos that really convey a sense of what it was like to be there. I feel like this could be a turning point in the way I approach photographing ceremonies. I will still remain discrete, I could never be one of those attention seeking photographers who would disturb the proceedings, but I think I will be less concerned with being invisible and just a little closer to the action.
The Grounds of Yeldersley Hall
Since pictures are worth a thousand words I’ll let them do most of the talking. What is worth mentioning is that the grounds in and around Yeldersley Hall are beautiful. The walled garden is very neat with bags of character, just watch out for the falling apples.
There is also the wheat fields I mentioned earlier, which are well worth crossing the road for. As you’re coming back don’t forget to grab a snap in front of the Yeldersley Hall sign too, so you don’t forget where you were.
The Winning Team
- Venue: Yeldersley Hall
- Photos & Video: JLM Wedding Photography
- Flowers: The Lily Pad
- Dinner: Chris the Chef
- Evening Pizza: Nether Edge Pizza Co. <— Comes with a personal thumbs up from me, beautiful pizza!
- Bride’s Dress: Nine by Savannah Miller
- Bridesmaids Dresses: Flounce London
- Bar supplier: Bar-2-U
- Make up: Make up by Alex
- Hair: Alice and the hair
- Macrame Arch and cake stand: Wrap in Wood
- DJ: Bliss Wedding DJ
If you’re getting married at Yeldersley Hall and like the look of the photos and video on this page why not find out if I am available.
