Lulworth castle wedding | Nicola & Alex

 

Reportage wedding photography at Lulworth Castle

A castle in Dorset and the setting for Nicola and Alex’s wedding – Lulworth Castle.

A seventeenth-century castle that started out as a hunting lodge, it sits within a 1000 acre deer park. It’s a ‘castle’ after castles were obsolete. Gunpowder had seen to that. It was built not to pacify the locals, like older Norman fortresses, but as somewhere to entertain the king and his courtiers as they hunted in the locality. No hunts now – although the nearby MOD firing range provides a faint popping soundtrack of gunfire. Part of the vast Lulworth Estate, that has been owned by the same family since the 1640s (apart from a bit of squatting by the Roundheads). Nearby is the world-famous Jurassic Coastline, the arch of Durdle Door, where the rolling Dorset hills plunge into the sea.

The fact that the castle was gutted by a fire in 1929 could have consigned it to being just a ruin in the deer park. But the restoration in the 1990s, keeping the ruined walls, installing new floors of warm wooden floorboards, makes it a better space for a wedding, than if the inferno had not happened. It has space, light and warmth. Quite unique for a ‘ruin’. Excellent for a wedding venue.

The end of May the weather was warm, but the vistas hazy. The surrounding hills and the view down to the sea were almost misty. Heavy rain was forecast but didn’t come during the day. I hit that driving back to Sussex in the evening. Sort of rain where everyone slows down on the motorway, as you could barely see. Luckily it didn’t appear during the reception, swinging around that part of Dorset.

Even the peacocks came out in the evening, to be handfed by the bride and groom. The Sun a distinct orange globe on the horizon.

Here are a few images from this Lulworth castle wedding…