Amelia & Joe
Saturday 21 June 2026. 120 guests. Ceremony under the oak at four, drinks in the courtyard, dinner on six long tables, band from nine.
How the day was planned
Amelia and Joe booked eighteen months ahead for the longest Saturday of the year. They wanted the ceremony outside and were happy to take the risk, so we set 120 chairs under the oak on the Friday and kept the Long Barn dressed as the wet-weather plan. It stayed dry. The registrar arrived at three, the ceremony ran from four, and by half past we were pouring in the courtyard.
The room, the tables and the food
Dinner was six long trestle tables down the length of the Long Barn, which is how it seats 120 comfortably with room for a top table across the end. Their caterer used our kitchen and our crockery; the flowers were grown twenty minutes away and dropped at eight that morning. Speeches ran late, as they always do, and we pushed the band back twenty minutes rather than rush the puddings.
How the evening went
The party ran to midnight with last orders at half eleven, and the sixteen beds in the Granary meant the people who mattered most did not have to drive anywhere. They came back the next morning for bacon rolls in the courtyard, which is the part they still talk about.
