As the years were going by, we knew we’d get married one day but Ian embarked on a change of career when he was 26 and returned to college to study Law. He always said he’d propose when he qualified and the day he officially qualified as a solicitor, we went out to celebrate. We spent the day at the Leopardstown races with Ian’s best friend Ray and his fiancée Fiona and afterwards made our way to the Westin hotel for dinner and drinks. Unbeknown to me, Ian and Ray had a plan and had booked out the atrium area in the Westin where Ian had organised champagne and strawberries and got down on one knee and asked me to marry him! I was completely shocked, I had no idea he would propose on the day he officially qualified as a solicitor...I think it took me about 3 minutes to say yes!
We both wanted to get married abroad so the first step was to choose the country. After a lot of research and a trip away with my mum and aunt, we decided on Malta in June. We wanted something different and not many of our friends or family had been to Malta before. Ian and I then returned to Malta for a weekend where we enlisted the help of a Maltese wedding planner, Sarah Young, who was just amazing and inspired confidence from the moment we met her. Not only was she thoroughly professional but so lovely too. I had always dreamt of an outdoor wedding reception and had come across a castle, Castello, that was tucked away in a mountainous area and after one visit to it I knew it was the venue of my dreams. Sarah was so efficient and before we left Malta the Castello was booked, menus decided on and the photographer was chosen!
There is a beautiful part of Malta called Mdina, the ‘silent city’ which is a medieval walled city situated high up on a mountain. It is so different to anything in Ireland and has an amazing Cathedral in it. It’s very hard to get permission to get married in the Cathedral, even for the Maltese, but our wedding planner Sarah had some contacts and we were granted permission to get married there.
Once the venues were chosen, the search for the wedding dress began back in Ireland with my mum Aileen and my three bridesmaids; my two younger sisters Carla and Ciara and my sister in law Kate. I eventually chose a La Sposa dress from B Couture in Arklow, Co. Wicklow – the owner Bernie is also the buyer and it was so difficult to choose ‘the one’ as there were so many nice dresses! As my dress wasn’t white and we were getting married abroad, I thought it would be nice surprise to have my bridesmaids in white. Finding long white dresses that weren’t wedding dresses proved very difficult so I ended up buying the bridesmaids long white Jovani dresses over the internet from the USA which worked really well.
Our best man was Ray who orchestrated the proposal with Ian and we had four more groomsmen, Ian’s best friends from school and college. The groomsmen’s suits were hired from Tangos in Temple Bar, Dublin - the owner Mark was great, even when one of our groomsmen forgot to return his suit on time! Ian had his suit tailor made by Gieves and Hawkes in Brown Thomas.
We spent five fun-filled days in Malta with friends and family in the run up to our wedding. We stayed in the Westin Hotel in St. Julians; a beautiful 5 star hotel on the sea front where the staff couldn’t do enough for us. I found that of all the Maltese people, they are so friendly and hospitable and go out of their way to welcome you. We held an outdoor barbeque by the sea in the grounds of the Westin the night before our wedding where all our 100 guests mingled and got to know each other. I woke up to blue skies and sunshine the morning of our wedding and travelled to the Cathedral with my Dad Kieran in an open top car in about 35 degrees heat!
We had a tenor singing during the church ceremony; Malta is a very religious country so the church only allowed religious hymns to be sung but Sarah somehow got permission for me to walk up the aisle to Gabriel’s Oboe – what I had always dreamed of! My mum is a florist and although I wanted her to do my flowers on the day, I didn’t want to put that stress on her...sourcing the flowers in a foreign country, preparing them, storing them etc. So my mum made up exactly what I wanted and I sent a picture to Sarah. She then liaised with the florist who made the bouquets exactly as my mum had. So I still had my mum’s input but she didn’t have the stress – the perfect solution! We got married at 4pm and then made our way to the Castello where we partied until 3am...then back to the Westin where the party continued until 7am!
The day after the wedding, we relaxed with our guests by the pool and the following day we travelled to neighbouring island Gozo where we spent a week in the 5-star Kempinski San Lawrenz Spa Resort.
Our wedding in Malta was the wedding of my dreams; I still can’t believe it is over and would do it all again tomorrow. A lot of brides are thankful when the day is over but my wedding was completely stress free which I put down to having a fantastic wedding planner. We are so happy that we decided to get married abroad and Malta was the perfect choice!