Relaxed Cheshire Wedding at Owen House Wedding Barn – Jane & Jonathan

Jane and Jonathan’s September wedding at Owen House Wedding Barn was a proper celebration of family, friends, good food and a very good party.

Bride and Groom dancing in the Secret Shooting Shed at Owen House Wedding Barn.

Owen House is one of those Cheshire wedding venues where there’s always something going on. From the Beauty Shed and its secret dressing room to the BAA-ber Shed, the orchard and the rather brilliant Secret Shooting Shed, there are plenty of places to explore without ever feeling like you're being shuffled from one photo opportunity to another.

Jane spent the morning getting ready with her two best friends in the Beauty Shed. It's a brilliant space for getting ready, with plenty of room for everyone and, of course, the gorgeous little secret dressing room.

Over in the BAA-ber Shed, Jonathan and the lads were making the most of the morning in their own way. They played foosball. Because apparently that's what you do when you're getting married. Eventually, it was time to put the table football to one side and get ready properly.

Jane and Jonathan were married in the beautiful ceremony room, underneath all those twinkling fairy lights and surrounded by their family and friends. It was a lovely setting for the ceremony, with everyone they cared about together in one room.

Once the ceremony was over, we headed outside.

I like to keep the photographs moving at this point. Nobody wants to spend the first part of their married life standing around waiting for photographs, so we took a quick wander through the orchard and made some portraits of Jane and Jonathan. A few minutes, a beautiful Cheshire backdrop and we're done.

Then it was time for the everyone photograph. We gathered the whole wedding party together in the grounds for one big photograph, followed by the family photographs. Jane and Jonathan had their list ready, we worked through the important combinations — family and the people they really wanted photographs with — and then everyone was free to get back to enjoying the wedding.

No hanging around. No endless combinations. Job done.

And then came the canapés. Now, I've photographed plenty of weddings, and I can tell you that Owen House Wedding Barn is very good at feeding people. The food here is always spot on, and Jane and Jonathan's guests certainly weren't disappointed.

With everyone suitably fed and watered, the entertainment got underway. The Brothers of Swing kept the crowd entertained before it was time for the speeches.

There were some lovely words, plenty of stories and, as you'd expect from a wedding surrounded by close friends and family, a few laughs along the way.

Then the dancing started.

And kept going.

Which is exactly what you want from a wedding.

Later in the evening, once the light had changed and the party was well underway, I grabbed Jane and Jonathan for another quick portrait session.This time, we headed to the Secret Shooting Shed.

There was something great about getting a few photographs of the two of them later in the evening, when the formal parts of the day were long finished and everyone was properly into the party. The photographs have a completely different feel from the ones we took earlier in the orchard.

And that's one of the things I love about photographing weddings.

You don't need to spend hours posing for photographs to get a brilliant set of wedding portraits. Give me 15 minutes here and there, make the most of the surroundings and then get back to your guests.

Jane and Jonathan's wedding had everything I love about a relaxed wedding day: two people surrounded by their favourite people, a brilliant venue full of character, great food, good music, plenty of dancing and just enough time stolen away for some photographs they'll want to put on the wall.

And, naturally, a bit of foosball.