A Modern Persian Wedding: Fusing British and Persian Cultures on Our Big Day

Hello, Natalie here…

Today is my 4th wedding anniversary and I thought it would be a great time to show you some of the Persian aspects we included in our big day.

As you may know Persian culture is all about sharing and a chance to bring loved ones closer together - so what better time to do this than at a wedding?! Fast forward to my wedding in 2018, where I thought it would very important to include some Persian elements to represent Dad’s background and the half of me that is Persian. Tom is English so we didn’t have a full Iranian wedding, however we did have a sprinkling of Persian heritage it throughout. So here’s what we included:

Sofreh Aghd

“The sofreh aghd is a traditional wedding ceremony spread where legal marriage and ceremonial traditions are exchanged. The ceremonial traditions have been practiced for thousands of years and sofreh aghd spreads are usually very customary at Persian weddings.”

To go with the style of our ceremony, I created a modern and simple spread, with a card that explained each element.

On the table

Menu - My Dad (Chef Shary) worked with the catering company to create a menu that had a nod to Persian ingredients throughout. Although it wasn’t exclusively Persian food, it was a nice hint towards the flavours of Iran. This included ‘Roasted lamb fillet with a saffron infused dauphinoise, Persian spiced wilted spinach and roasted carrot, spiced fennel and a garlic and rosemary jus’ and rosewater / pomegranate infused mini desserts.

Persian Phrase Cards - We had little phrase cards of a few words / sayings people might want to say through the day, which included “Enjoy your food - Nooshe Jan” and “To the bride and groom - Arous va damad”.

Persian dancing

Persians LOVE TO DANCE, it’s something that is deeply embedded in the culture (along with food), so we included some popular Iranian dance songs (according to Dad!!) into the first half hour of our evening party. Safe to say this went down very well with everyone with some interesting moves being displayed on the dance floor.

A few other pics, just for a nosey…

As well as being the Co-Founder for MPK I am also a designer and wedding stationery creative - natspaperstudio.com. If you would like to enquire about stationery for your wedding do pop an email over to hello@natspaperstudio.com.

Photography @lincolnpictures & @callumbakerphoto, design, styling & stationery @natspaperstudio, flowers @hannahberryflowers & venue @millbridgecourt