Sally Mussared is the designer and founder Mussared design studio creating handmade silk wedding gowns.

Amber Kennedy officiates wedding ceremonies as Amber the Celebrant.

Stunning cover photography by Sam Irving Photography.

Recording by the fabulous Miss Bella Hazelton

Time stamp

0:37 Amber’s Procedure

2:36 Writing vows

4:02 Celebrants ruling photos

7:02 Most precious moment

8:37 Amber’s uniqueness

10:40 Intimate ceremonies

13:32 Amber’s top wedding tip

15:01 Amber’s love story

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Hopelessly Devoted podcast. I’m bridal gown designer Sally Mussared delivering you the inside tips from Melbourne’s top wedding professionals.

Welcome to Mussared studio, today we’ve got Amber the Celebrant who does weddings particularly across the west side of Melbourne, and anywhere you’d like to have this fabulous person. We’ve got her in the studio today to give you some wedding tips on understanding what a celebrant does and what to look for and what to ask for.

So welcome.

Thank you.

When couples come to you, what is the procedure that you step them through?

Amber’s Procedure

So I always meet with couples before they book me, we sit and have a chat, I think it’s always important to get along with your celebrant, and I say to my couples that the reason for that is that I don’t want to be the only person at your wedding who doesn’t know you. So if I have to stand there and talk confidently about you and your relationship, and why you’re standing there, getting married in front of all those people who love you, I want to know you. So, that might be something I do which is a little bit different.

And how long is that for?

So we usually meet for an hour over coffee or beer or wine or chocolate.

Sounds good.

I find that’s a really good time to get a feeling for each other, and then we don’t usually meet again until about 6-8 weeks out from the wedding. We do the legal paper work that has to be done a month before the wedding but I like to get it done so there’s so dramas time wise. We also sit down and start the planning of the ceremony. I give them lots to take away, resources, but then I also like to sit down with them and have a ceremony planning because my couples write their ceremonies with me, I don’t write their ceremonies for them. It’s what they want to say in their wedding not what I want, or what I think they should say. Often couples then choose to have a rehearsal, not everyone, but some people get a little bit stressed wondering what might happen.

It helps reduce the nerves, they know where they are supposed to be and when.

And we can also sign some initial paperwork at the rehearsal as well. And then the wedding. So that’s the meeting process that we have, and there’s lots of emails, phone calls back and forth in between that process as well.

And so you say you get them to develop their own service. How do you encourage couples to develop their vows?

Writing vows

With vows it’s interesting because a lot of people don’t want to speak in public and a lot of people don’t want to gush their love story in front of all those people, so I give them an ideas booklet that they can read through and steal stuff from, and I also say, watch lots of romantic comedies, there’s real Hollywood writers that write that stuff. Or if you’ve got a favourite song, or there’s often a song or a poem or a passage in a book that you’ll read and think; “Oh that’s exactly how I feel about that person!” and there is no reason that you shouldn’t reword it or use it. And I had a bride read that song from Pink “I hate everything you do sometimes and want to smack you in ...