Cat and Dave’s love story started like the beginning of a rom-com.

“Dave and I met at a party and I thought I made a terrible first impression! I woke up the next morning and thought to myself, “Why was I such a dick to that guy?!” But apparently, he wasn’t put off, and on his way home from the party (which was due to be one of the last he attended before moving to Auckland), he said to his friend, “Don’t let me talk to that girl again or I’ll never move away.

“A few months later, I ended up getting a job at his work, and my first day was his last before his move to the Auckland office. They took the whole team out to lunch to celebrate, and we ended up wedged next to each other; he was so cute and funny, and I remember thinking, “Damn, I’m gutted this guy’s leaving.” After he left, we started messaging at work, which turned into texting on the weekends and eventually culminated in the world’s greatest first date weekend on Waiheke Island.”

Cat says the proposal was low-key, with Dave proposing during an Air BnB weekend away while they were watching the sunset.

The couple married on February 25th in Dunedin. “Dave and I spent a lot of time talking about our wedding before we started planning, about what was important to us and where we wanted to put our time and effort. For us, the most important thing was how people felt. We wanted to be generous with the things that matter to us – great food and drink, lovely flowers, good music – and not worry too much about things that fell outside of that.

“We were married in St. Paul’s Cathedral in the Octagon, and then the reception was over the road at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery, followed by an after-party at the bar WOOF! My dad was the bishop of Dunedin before he retired, and the Cathedral was his church – he’s even in one of the stained-glass windows – so it was incredibly special to have our ceremony there.”

The couple chose a timeless and classic theme, blending Daves’s cool minimalism and Cat’s romantic colour palette. “Dave’s a designer and loves a minimal aesthetic, and I’m a hopeless romantic, so we were always going to go with something quite classic.”

Cat says her top tip for couples starting their wedding plans is to keep the communication open. “Like most couples, I did the lion’s share of planning, but it all worked so much better when I shared with Dave and let him support me. We’d sit down on the couch every Wednesday night and chip away at things, picking a song here, working on invites there.

“And then I think the final thing is don’t lose sight of what it’s all about – beginning a marriage. We took time to enjoy the loved-up feeling of being engaged, but we also spent a lot of time talking about what we wanted our marriage to look like, how we’ll manage problems in the future when we want to start a family, and what goals we want to work towards. The wedding itself is amazing, but it’s nothing compared to the marriage and the life together that comes after it.”