Matt and Kris met through Twitter, but really hit it off over a conversation about Eurovision! Kris says “I think we both instantly knew that we had similar interests – Matt was at Eurovision in Kiev at the time having spent a few weeks travelling through Eastern Europe, and I was currently on a UK tour with a singer. Within a few weeks, we were inseparable.” Matt is originally from St. Neots, Cambridgeshire, and Kris is from Maldon, Essex, but they now call London home. We chat to them about their stylish London wedding and magical honeymoon to India, made even better with generous gift list contributions from family and friends.
How did you get engaged?
In keeping with our love for travel, Matt proposed in New York only 4 months after we met. We were both actually there for work, but Matt took the day off on a whim and we took the ferry out to Governors Island where we were completely alone, and Matt popped the question! It turns out he had been planning this since very early on in our relationship. I woke up to him measuring my ring finger one morning, and turns out he had collected the ring whilst in New York and had been carrying it with him all the time, waiting for the right moment!
What kind of wedding did you plan?
From the outset we knew we wanted to keep the ceremony small, and London based, so that we could have a big party in the evening and all of our friends could join. We had both made our lives in London and made our “friends for life” so it seemed odd to travel out of the city we call home to have a wedding that people may struggle to come to. It was a priority that the important members of our families (from all over the world) would be able to join us, and of course they were happy to make the effort to travel into London! We wanted to be quite traditional, but also being a same-sex wedding, we knew we could make our own traditions and have something quite fun!
What was your first dance?
Our first dance was an acoustic version of “Symphony” by Clean Bandit and Zara Larsson. I’m a musician so we called in as many favours as we could on the day, so it was sung by a good friend of mine. We had a live band play and even a string quartet! Matt is a very good dancer too, so we had even lightly choreographed it and involved both our parents, before the music picked up for the final chorus and we got everybody up dancing! It was spectacular!
What was your favourite part of the day?
Seeing everybody in the same room was really the best part of the day. Never again will we get everybody from both sides of our families, as well as all our friends in the same room, so that was really special. So many people had made such an effort, and having them sharing their love was everything we could have asked for!
Why did you choose a Patchwork honeymoon fund for your gift list?
We wanted to find a way to include our guests in our honeymoon that wasn’t just them giving us some money. As travel enthusiasts, we had already planned our perfect trip and so we were really able to tailor our gift list to our trip. The Patchwork gift list allowed us to include options for people to contribute towards hotel stays, restaurants, monument visits and day trips we had already picked out. We were then able to thank our guests personally by posting on social media with pictures of what we had been up to and showing them what their gift money was spent on. It also meant that different budgets were easily looked after – some friends were able to club together to buy a big experience and others could purchase a couple of smaller items if they wanted to.
What was the best bit about using Patchwork?
Patchwork was the best gift list we found for its personalisation, and the website was super simple to use. Even the most technophobe family members found it easy! They also enjoyed seeing what we were planning on doing and then feeling like they were part of the fun! We cannot recommend it enough!
How did it feel to set off on your honeymoon?
Matt and I like to travel a lot, but having everybody chip in made it so much more perfect. We have both lived in London for a long time, and so we didn’t need a normal John Lewis wedding gift list of lovely presents for our house! We already had everything we needed, and people were asking what they could offer us. Having people contribute towards our honeymoon was the perfect option, as it meant we could really travel in style, and afford to do everything that we might not have been able to do, considering we were away for a month!
Would you recommend your trip to other couples?
We travelled to India for our honeymoon. We wanted to go somewhere that felt magical and substantial enough for a honeymoon, as well as somewhere we could spend a chunk of time. Having a full month off meant we could travel through Rajasthan, Mumbai, Kerala and Goa – there’s still plenty that we didn’t see and would go back in a flash! It was also important to us that our honeymoon should be somewhere that was LGBT+ friendly, and some of the tropical destinations we wanted to travel to were not. India was super friendly, and has open arms to all of its travellers – we had a fantastic time.
Thank you so much Kris and Matt for sharing your gorgeous wedding and honeymoon photos and memories with us!
If you’ve been inspired to create your own honeymoon fund patchwork we have templates covering destinations from Argentina to Zanzibar and everywhere in between. It’s easy to get started with one of our beautiful readymade templates, or if you’re feeling super creative, you can build your own from scratch.
Kris and Matt planned their itinerary in India based on a few travel guides and then booked their honeymoon accommodation through AirBnB, booking.com and privately. They even set up a blog so you can see more of the amazing journeys they’ve had together!
If you’re looking for some amazing suppliers, here are some of those who made Kris and Matt’s day even more special:
Cake: Etoile Bakery
Venue: One Whitehall Place
Flowers: Floral Design House
Photographer: Libby Christensen
Videographer: Michael Tsim
p.s listen to Kris and Matt’s first dance on our Spotify playlist, made up of lots of our Patchwork Couples’ first dances.