Talented friends and industry contacts helped Myken Stewart, brand manager for New Zealand Fashion Week, pull off her 170-person, four-day wedding to Jamie Mclaughlan late last year.
The couple roadtripped around Northland in search of a venue before discovering the Whatuwhiwhi Top 10 Holiday Park, which they booked out for friends to stay in tents, campervans, and units on-site - the parents staying off-site in a resort.
The perfect location for a mini music festival, the relaxed schedule included yoga classes, paddle-boarding, barbecues and all-night dance parties (along with a final night's visit from Kaitaia Noise Control).
"The whole idea for me was to get my friends away somewhere where they could all be together and there was nowhere else to go," Stewart says, adding that "Being an event organiser really helped me with the big picture.
Everyone got involved to help set it up and take it down and do stuff during the days as well. All my friends helped make it come together."
It helps when your sister is a makeup artist, your best man a hairdresser, brides-maids include a DJ and a chef, and fashion designer Adrian Hailwood is a friend - he designed the dresses, but declined to help Stewart cut hers shorter at 1am - her sister had to help with that task.
New Zealand Fashion Week backstage manager Keporah Torrance was enlisted to co-ordinate the group effort, which included a highly technical roster of chefs working on three giant salads, 20 barmen staffing two bars and 14 DJ's rostered on the two DJ setups. Then there was babysitting (of the couple's baby Storme and other guests' children) decorations, teaching of yoga classes and of course, cleaning up.
Myken Stewart's festival style wedding.
Noting that some complained initially about the BYO-style event, Stewart found working together on the event ended up bringing people closer.
The catering was pulled together by Mint Kitchen, caterers to New Zealand Fashion Week, who incorporated a seafood haul supplied by friends and family (paua from Kaikoura, crayfish from Akaroa and West Coast whitebait) in the four-day feast.
Another friend, a barista from Waiheke, arrived with an Atomic Coffee caravan in tow, a godsend during the almost non-stop party. A Whitestone cheese tier cake was another handy solution to the ongoing hunger, with cheese boards lasting all weekend.
"It was all about planning for the longevity of the event, and not getting there and going, 'well we're in the middle of nowhere and we've run out of bread'," Stewart says.
Considering the giant, military effort, would she recommend a festival to future brides?
"It was all 100 per cent worth it," Stewart says. She points out, though, that any more days or guests would have been too much.
"It was a great experience, a great party, just amazing. It was pretty relaxed, two days before the wedding, Jamie and I went out on our boat and told everybody, 'look after our child, we're going out for an hour to write our vows'.
And I don't know if everyone says it when they have been to a wedding, but so many people said 'this is the best wedding I've ever been to'."
