Washingborough Hall Country House Hotel

O.K. This is exciting for us. Really, it is. Lincolnshire has so few really good wedding venues that it’s depressing at the best of times. And this year the closure of one of them and staffing problems at others has left the County really short of venues we can recommend. But now there’s very definitely another one on the scene.
Of course, Washingborough Hall is not new to weddings. But in the past it was not only one of those venues we could not recommend, it was one of those venues we felt we could not cover. We hate seeing brides in tears or unhappy guests and that used to be the scenario at Washingborough.
But we’re now two new owners on from the bad old days and,my, how things have changed!
Gone is the squalid motel-style reception area, gone are the tired old carpets and furnishings, gone is the smell of decay and damp and – most noticeable of all, gone is the who-gives-a-damn attitude which pervaded every aspect of the ‘service’ at the old Washingborough Hall.
Visitors now walk into a beautifully decorated and renovated Reception Area which exudes both style and friendliness. The whole of the downstairs area maintains this immaculate, tasteful theme and exudes an atmosphere which makes guests feel at ease and at home. The renovation of the bedrooms (these were never as bad as the groundfloor) is already underway and should be completed by the end of winter.
I could rave on about Washingborough Hall now. The owners have set the standard for all their staff. Everyone is keen to help and determined to offer only the very best service, whilst he food is simply excellent!
If yours is a smaller wedding ( I believe the Dining Room holds 50 guests) and you are looking for an exclusive – and impressive- venue, then I can think of no better place to hold your reception in the Lincoln Area.

Visit Washingborough Hall’s website at www.washingboroughhall.com

Even more apologies!

Back in July i apologised for not keeping the blog up to date. A combination building work at the studio and other time constarints meant that I had been very lax in posting. But, I assured everyone, the builders had gone and I would be posting regularly from then on….

Ermmm. That was my last post until now, 3 months later! This has been our busiest summer ever and I had simply underestimated the amount of work I had to do. We’re obsessed with keeping up to date with all our clients’ work and never allowing ourselves to fall behind. But in doing so I had to make a decision – keep up to date with the blog or go quietly insane through lack of sleep. Well, the sleep ( and near-sanity) won. But as a result the blog suffered and I simply haven’t been able to post about the super weddings we’ve been doing this summer.

And there have been a lot of them. It’s all my fault, I’m afraid. I made a basic mistake last year when the bookings were coming in fast and furious and I’ve had to work through the consequences over the past few months.

Actually I put some of the blame on the media. There was so much hype on the News and in the papers about how serious the recession was going to be and how many businesses would fold! And in fact I know of several well-established photographers who did have to close down last year. So I chickened out and changed my booking policy. I’ve always been lucky in that we’re oversubscribed and have to turn away about 100 weddings a year. It’s been like that for the past 6 or 7 years now, so what I’ve always done is to ensure that my weddings are spread out throughout the year. I’d never accept more than two bookings a week and only do two concurrently if I really liked the couple and their wedding sounded different in some way. So, with plenty of gaps between weddings I’ve always had plenty of time to ensure that each one gets our special attention ( normally about 100 hours work is involved for each wedding!) and that I can genuinely go to each one fresh and excited, ready to give my all for my clients on the one day when everything is so special to them.

But last year I wasn’t so sure that the oversubscription would last. I panicked and decided that, so long as i really liked the client,that we clearly gelled and that I still wasn’t doing more than two weddings a week, I would simply accept the first 30 wedding enquiries we got. The result – July, August and September have been truly hectic.

With hindsight I can see that I totally over-reacted and need not have worried.  In the end we had to turn away 85 serious booking requests ( some of them from truly lovely couples who we would dearly have loved to cover) because we had met our targets already. We’ve still given our all and the work has been lovely. But we are now completely shattered and looking forward to the much, much quieter winter period.

Which means that – finally – I’ll be able to start getting up to date on the blog. We’ve got a fantastic new venue to tell you about, we’ve got to report on the closure of one of our recommended venues – and we’ve met some sup, dedicated wedding suppliers and want to pass their details on to you. Oh, and of course we want to tell you about some of the great weddings we’ve done this year.

Hopefully next week I’ll start getting you all up to date.