Prohibition theme, speak easy / swing party for this Art Deco London wedding at Queen’s House, Greenwich

Amy + Phill

From time to time our love is like a sail
and when the sail begins to alternate
from tack to tack, it’s like a swallowtail
and when the swallow flies it’s like a coat;
and if the coat is yours, it has a tear
like a wide mouth and when the mouth begins
to draw the wind, it’s like a trumpeter
and when the trumpet blows, it blows like millions…
and this, my love, when millions come and go
beyond the need of us, is like a trick;
and when the trick begins, it’s like a toe
tip-toeing on a rope, which is like luck;
and when the luck begins, it’s like a wedding,
which is like love, which is like everything.

Alice Oswald

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I believe in love and I am a true believer there is a special person for everybody out there. Sometimes, we need a little help to find them, sometimes we need to grow into loving or be loved. It definitely took me some time to realise who I am and what (who?) I needed in my life. Since I met Amy and Phill I have been super impressed with their love story – it made me realise that sometimes there are no needs for rules and when you know this is the ONE what’s the point in waiting to move forward with the relationship. They bought a house within 6 months of meeting each other, engaged a year later, travelled the world, then got married. Yep, true love simply waited for them to meet. You can read more about their love story below the photos so make sure to scroll down. But before that, let me tell you a bit more about their wedding – it was simply amazing! Queens House is an iconic London venue and a former royal residence located in beautiful Greenwich. The Great Hall offers panoramic views over Thames skyline and something all wedding photographers like – a balcony!

Amy and Phill came up with a superb theme for their wedding too – a speakeasy, prohibition era party!

They planned and came up with ideas for decorations, table styling and the party later themselves. The wedding was all about having a relaxed time and good fun. The evening party was super secret and guests were entertained by an amazing electro swing DJ Jamie Berry. Amy and Phill did their first dance to an energetic version of a Charleston and it was a hit! Read more below.

I loved their plans and very original ideas. When we got referred to Amy and Phill we found that we live less than a mile away from them here in London. How great is that! We met in our local pub and clicked instantly. We then met again before their wedding for a relaxed engagement shoot in Peckham that you can see here.

Here is what they said about working us:

Joasis have been amazing! We booked because we loved Jo’s style and when we met initially to talk things through she was so relaxed and really understood what we wanted. She helped make us feel really comfortable in front of the camera – which was something I was super nervous about. Our photos from the day are incredible – we have had so many comments from guests too about how much they loved the photos! Out of all of our suppliers, Joasis would be who we would recommend to friends/anyone planning their wedding.

Thanks for that! If you are looking for a documentary Queen’s House wedding photographer do get in touch!

Our love story

We met online and our first few dates were lots of fun – cocktails then a couple of gigs. After about 6 months we knew it was the real deal and decided to buy a place together…we got engaged a year after that. The proposal was a massive surprise as it happened when we were out on a run, in front of a beautiful castle where I grew up…with just a few cows watching! Between getting engaged and getting married – we took 5 months out to travel the world. Which may not seem the way round that people normally do it but it worked for us!

Why did you choose Queen’s House as your London wedding venue?

Our starting point was that we wanted one venue for the whole day to avoid everyone having to travel across London. We wanted to get married in South-East London because that was where our home together was – rather than choosing where one of us grew up. I also liked the idea of being able to be at home the night before…just wake up in your own bed and say “I’m off to get married today!” Greenwich itself was significant because we had one of our early dates there – it was an incredible Sunday spent exploring around Greenwich. We viewed another venue first with our caterers but it wasn’t quite right…it was them who suggested looking at the Queen’s House. It was actually being renovated when we went to view it so we had high vis jackets and hard hats on when we looked around – we had to use a bit of imagination but even then we still fell in love with it.

The outfits & accessories 

Phill wanted a tailor made suit and so this was the perfect opportunity. Beggars Run were amazing – they had lots of fun fabrics and gave great advice. He wore a pocket watch that finished the suit really well and tied in with the theme.

My accessories were all very sentimental and so were obviously all special to me. I wore a necklace that my mum wore on her wedding day and I had a brooch of my Grandma’s on my bouquet. I bought an Art Deco hair slide to go with our prohibition theme.

The theme, decor and styling

A lot of our efforts went into the evening party and we planned a surprise prohibition style party downstairs in the venue. After dinner our MC told everyone it was 1920 and if they wanted to party they had to follow him! Once we had this idea all the decor was tailored towards prohibition/vintage/elegant and it was easy. Lots of searching Pinterest, Charity shops, flea markets and eBay.

We wanted to do as much of the styling ourselves and spent ages coming up with ideas on our travels. We created our table numbers by writing onto glass photos frames with a gold pen and our table plan was written onto an antique mirror – really simple. We opted not to have favours – but instead we had a huge fancy dress box downstairs with loads of 1920’s accessories…everyone was really involved.

One of my bridesmaids helped out lots with printing and created our invitations and place names/menus which were Art Deco style and gold to go with the table decorations.

I loved our flowers! We wanted something with colour and nothing “perfectly arranged”. Karen Woolven, our florist really understood this and even helped incorporate a tropical looking flower that was inspired by our travels earlier in the year.

We chose to have indoor palm trees for decorations in the hall where we had the ceremony instead of more flowers. This was so we could keep them afterwards – they are now in our garden.

Favourite part of the day

The actually getting married bit! We took 5 minutes out, just the two of us straight after the ceremony and had a “did that just happen?!” moment. We loved those moments through the day where we would catch up with each other, both just being happy that everything was good so well and people were enjoying themselves. I always imagined it would be overwhelming to have all the focus on us, but when it came to it on the day… we had all of friends and family around us, there to celebrate with us and that felt amazing. There wasn’t the pressure that we had anticipated.

The inspiration board:

Venue: Queen’s House – chat to Samantha Anderson (she is super nice and helpful)

Dress: Mikaella via The White Boutique

Shoes: Rachel Simpson

Accessories: Vintage

Suit: Beggars Run

Florist: Karen Woolven, Greenwich

Hair & Makeup Katrin Rees

Catering – Suzanne James

Champagne – Charlier & Fils

DJ – Jamie Berry

Joasis Photography is London and Greenwich documentary wedding photographer offering modern and creative wedding photography.