Lisa & Ewoud's 50s style wedding planned from Amsterdam

The offbeat bride: Lisa, content editor and writer

Her offbeat partner: Ewoud Benoist, careworker

Location & date of wedding: Chequers Hotel in Dalton-in-Furness, Cumbria, Uk — 17th July 2009

What made our wedding offbeat: I wore a red, 50s style dress made by Joanne Fleming in Brighton. I also wore a pearl necklace that belonged to my nanna who passed away in 2002. My bridesmaids wore black. The groom wore a black suit with matching red tie and a borsalino hat. And Ewoud and I walked back up the aisle to 'I Walk the Line' by Johnny Cash.

In honour of my grandparents, I wanted to take the bus to the wedding with my dad — my nanna had taken the bus to the town hall to meet my grandad 55 years ago. As the hotel wasn't on the bus route, my dad hired the local bus instead! So a topless double decker bus took the guests and then me and my dad to the wedding.

To make it more personal and cost-effective, our friends volunteered their talents, which was a great way of involving everyone. The best man and usher played guitar after the reception and also played reggae and salso music in the evening. My friends in Dalton also played and my dad did an impromptu version of 'Jumping Jack Flash'! Rock star! My bridesmaid and good friend took photos throughout the day and one of my friends who owns a hair salon in Amsterdam did my hair and make-up.

I handmade vintage wedding invitations and wrote the wedding programmes. I also made button bouquets for the bridesmaids. For wedding favours we gave everyone lottery tickets. We also donated to cancer research on behalf of each guest.

Our biggest challenge: It was difficult to arrange a wedding in my hometown of Barrow-in-Furness, UK, as I now live in Amsterdam, NL. My parents were great in helping to organize things and make sure that we met deadlines for payments.

Skype was my best friend and we also used Facebook to make announcements and invite everyone to the evening party. I also made a wedding website and put up pictures and a description of each of our guests as half were in England and half lived in Amsterdam. It was a good way to introduce everyone beforehand.

We wanted a small wedding with just our nearest and dearest, so editing the guestlist and realising we would be disappointing friends was really difficult. We had a big informal party in the evening to include everyone we couldn't invite to the wedding. It was great to just relax and dance with everyone at the end of an emotional day!

As I wanted to do a lot of DIY, I found it difficult to create things on time and in keeping with our theme. Fortunately my florist stepped in at the last moment and made cute rose bouquets and combined them with the buttons I had made, for a unique twist.

My favorite moment: I have too many! The shortlist would be…

• Walking down the aisle to I Love NYE by Badly Drawn Boy (remixed by our usher!) and seeing friends and family and Ewoud with happy years in their eyes.
• Singing songs on top of the double decker bus with family and friends as we made our way from the hotel to the evening party.
• The first song in the evening being a funk version of Rage Against The Machine's 'Killing in the Name' by The Apples.
• Our friends playing in the bands in the evening and my dad jumping up to join them and sing Jumping Jack Flash….the crowd went wild!
• Sitting on Ewoud's knee in the middle of the party and watching as friends and family laughed and danced and had a good time. And seeing relatives dance to alternative songs like The Pixies and Lemonheads.
• Seeing how happy our parents were with our offbeat wedding really added to the day too.
• My eighty-year-old auntie tapping me on the shoulder at 1am and asking where everyone had gone… errrmmm… home to bed!

My offbeat advice: If you're wanting to include your family in your nontraditional choices and there is some resistance, find time to explain why your choices are so important and also be open to compromise.

I was very stubborn about what I wanted in the beginning and definitely upset some family members at first. When I realised that one of our priorities was to share the day with family it seemed silly to isolate them. In the evening, we mixed up Frank Sinatra, Rolling Stones, Rosemary Clooney and old classics with new alternative stuff and everyone had their moment on the dancefloor.

Fortunately, everyone loved the idea of a non-traditional wedding dress and we made it a lot more fun for people, not knowing what to expect during the day.

Do delegate!! I thought that as we had such a small wedding with just forty guests, I could DIY everything myself. It wasn't possible in the last few days and because I had shared our vision with some friends and family, they stepped in at the last moment to make sure everything got sorted. Everything important to me and Ewoud was in place and made more special by knowing our loved ones had contributed.

Let go of the idea of "perfect." So many things went wrong for us (my mother-in-law broke her foot before the wedding, the wedding was almost cancelled as we were running late) but all this just added to the stories around our day and helped to bond people.

Care to share a few vendor/shopping links?

• My dress was made by Joanne Fleming in Brighton UK. I gave her a budget for the dress and emailed her some pictures of dresses I liked with a vintage theme. She emailed me some designs and I chose them. Joanne was so talented and in tune with what I wanted, that I only had to visit twice for fittings and choosing materials. No hassles at all and a beautiful bespoke dress at the end!
• Ewoud's made-to-measure suit was from Suit Supply in Amsterdam and his hat from the English Hatter.
• I found my shoes at Schuh in Brighton. They didn't have my size but delivered them to the Netherlands within 5 days.
• My pillbox hat and veil was from a vintage shop in Brighton called Harlequin Vintage.
• Our polkadot wedding cake and cupcakes were made by Scrumptious in Ulverston, Cumbria.
• The bridesmaid chose their own dresses. I asked that the dresses were black, knee-length and complimentary of each other. They could then choose something that was most flattering to them and they all felt gorgeous. The dresses were from Debenhams and French Connection.
• I ordered my vintage bag from Steptoes Dog online boutique shop as well as vintage accessories for my bridesmaids.

Enough talk — show me the wedding porn: