Live Illustration At A Creative Wedding at the Hoxton Hotel in London
In August last year I was invited to be a live illustrator for Natalie and Robert’s wedding at the Hoxton Hotel in Holborn, London.
Photo Credit: Caitlin and Jones
I met Natalie and Robert at the Un Wedding Show in 2023, which is such a great event for couples looking for alternative suppliers for their weddings. They wanted to have a London based wedding which reflected their personalities, and the Hoxton in Holborn was a great fit.
The Hoxton is a hotel which I’ve stayed in a few times, and it’s super stylish and comfortable, but also really accessible. The staff were really friendly and accomodating and I loved all the mid century design details in the space that Natalie and Robert booked. I also appreciate the fact that it’s a dog friendly hotel, as I do a lot of dog portraits at events and have my own sweet rescue dog Dee Dee. Plus it’s a fabulous location to explore central london.
They booked out The Apartment in the ground floor of hotel, so they had a gorgeous open plan dining area for their wedding breakfast, as well some seperate cosy rooms, including a lounge area for relaxing, and the dining room where I was set up.
I also invited the super talented Chris from Heart Shaped Films to capture me at work that day, and you can see the beautiful video he created on below. Natalie and Robert were happy to have Chris there on the day, and it was so much fun to be able to document the way I work with guests and the portraits I created live on the day.
Chris works with small businesses to create branding videography and you can find out more about his services on his website.
Natalie had also sourced their wedding flowers from Florae Designs, another small business who were also exhibiting at the Un Wedding Show. They create beautiful handmade floral creations, which is a fantastic sustainable way to have flowers on your wedding day.
I was booked to create live portraits for 5 hours on the day as their reception started in the early evening and this meant I could capture around 50 guests on the day.
When working at weddings I usually take a quick photo of the guests (in couples or small groups) and their names to my list, and then they can continue to mingle and have a drink whilst waiting for their portrait. This also means that I can continue working through the wedding breakfast creating portraits from reference photos. I create a gallery of portraits as I go, so it’s super fun for guests to see each others portraits as well when they come to collect theirs.
I create my live portraits in just 5-10 minutes using watercolours and fineliner pens and they are done in super flattering fashion illustration style which celebrates everyone in their beautiful outfits.
Photo Credit: Caitlin and Jones
Live illustration is such a fun way to entertain your guests on the day and creates a real talking point too. Plus they get a wonderful memento of the day to take home with them too.
If you’d like to book me as a live illustrator for your London wedding you can get in touch via my contact form below.
