The Villa Hotel in Wrea Green is situated in Preston and just 5 minutes off the M55 motorway. Set back and nestled amongst some lovely fields and trees this venue is an ideal location for your wedding. Offering a lovely country theme with wheat fields in the summer and the local pond for some great wedding photos just down the road.

The Villa is one of the few wedding venues that has a dedicated bridal suite, with a large and well-lit mirror, and plenty of space for your bridesmaids and flower girls to get ready 

Within the venue itself, there are a choice of rooms for the wedding reception, one being the ceremony room and the other the large white room at the back of the Villa that leads out onto a secluded lawn. The ceremony room is a lovely large room that will happily seat around 100 guests, and with the large windows and doors to the right of the room, it lets in plenty of natural light which is ideal for the wedding photographer and your wedding photos.

After the wedding ceremony, there is a lovely bar area in the piano room which offer some seating and open doors into the courtyard for the children and guests to socialise and enjoy the lovely warm sunshine.

Moving onto the reception rooms as I have mentioned before there is a choice of two, the ceremony room where you just got married, or the function suite. The large function suite is perfect for large weddings,  bright and light with big windows, offers great photos during the wedding breakfast, even on the dullest of days the room is still a pleasant environment to photograph in. Whereas some others can end up being rather dark and orange in tone due to the lighting.

One of the most important aspects of choosing your wedding venue is the light, natural window light will always, without doubt, provide you with the best wedding photos you can wish for. 

The venue has some good space outside the front and side, offering good opportunities for group photos and the couples personal wedding photos. As dusk approaches the opportunity for sunset images can be gained by going down the driveway and or into one of the nearby fields.

The wedding evening party is held in the same room as the wedding reception with a few changes and the dance floor laid it is time to enjoy the party cut the cake and dance the night away.

As a professional full-time wedding photographer, how does the Villa stand up to be able to get greats shots, from start to finish?

First, of, the bridal preparation room is one of the best top three rooms you could ask for to photograph the bride getting ready in around the Fylde, this opinion is purely only from wedding venues I have visited. Simple light and plenty of space.

Photographing the wedding dress, shoes, flowers etc is also fun and creative, with plenty of areas to take the dress and get some unique shots, if the bride lets you. I do like to hang the dress from the doorways and trees, there is however one hook the Villa is missing, and this to be able to hang the wedding dress from the main entrance doors, but you can, of course, hang it from the ivy on the 19th Century door which makes for a nice photo.

The wedding ceremony room. On a bright sunny day this is simply perfect, plenty of light just in the right spot and flooding in straight towards the bride, on a dull day you may need a flash, but this depends on your own style, personally, I like to have my wedding photos clean crisp and bright.

The reception room again this is great, bright spacious and perfect if they have a wedding entertainer. You can easily get around all of the tables and get some great shots of the wedding guests being entertained and enjoying the meal.

When the wedding breakfast is on and I am not photographing I will use the front bar and order a bar meal generally a burger, this is always good and a comfortable place to relax for an hour before the wedding speeches and evening party gets underway.

The grounds for wedding photos are good, there is plenty of space as mentioned before, and if you are fortunate enough to be photographing a wedding when the wheat field is at full height then sneaking in to get a few photos is always worth it, located just down the road. 

All in all, I like the Villa in Wrea Green as a wedding venue,  it is one of a few places always feel confident and comfortable at, knowing that the photos I get will be good without a lot of effort. 

I always say " when the stage is set right, the performance is magical."