WHEN Cllr Alison Eden married Cllr Andrew MacGregor at St John’s Bishopsteignton, on Saturday, May 29 she was a living work of art.

‘I wanted our wedding to include a celebration of the creativity of local artists, craftsmen and women,’ said Alison.

‘A few weeks before our wedding I developed housemaid’s knee. An idle thought that I might need a stick led to my commissioning Paul “Artisanstickman” Williams to make me a shepherd’s crook. I then had the idea to ask a local florist to decorate the crook.’

The crook handle is English Oak from South Molton and the shaft is Hazel from Dulverton that Paul cut three years ago.

‘I decided to put a brass spacer – rather than a horn one. I thought it looked like a wedding ring and therefore remind Alison when it’s cut down of her wedding,’ Paul explained.

Trained florist Alice Wright ‘From the Wild Florist’ created the decorated crook with two wicker baskets for the Matrons of Honour, classical sopranos Sharron Bowen-Davies and Julie Hartley.

‘The baskets were made by Coates English Willow. I wanted my matrons of honour to have something practical, filled with flowers that would have a use well beyond the wedding day’ added Alison.

Florist Alice Wright explained: ‘Flowers really have changed my thinking - at a time when the preservation of our natural world is so very important, I believe that if you can inspire a love for nature in someone, this will also inspire a need in them to protect it. I was so happy to be given a free rein by Alison to just let my imagination fly!’

The bride wore a huge gold-tiered skirt with black velvet bodice by Christos Costarellos, a Greek designer. A fly plaid in the MacGregor hunting tartan was pinned to her dress using a stag beetle brooch made by Quirky Metals of Sheffield. Her outfit was topped off by a gold headdress crafted to resemble twigs. The Dartmoor Soap Company’s product ‘Cantakerous Curls’ were responsible for her hair behaving…

‘The Old Commercial hosted our wedding party and we were very lucky with the weather,’ said Andrew who has survived being poked in the eye by his wife’s headdress.

Reverend Jane Frost conducted the service and read from a John O’Donohue blessing: ‘Awaken your spirit to adventure; Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk; soon you will home in a new rhythm, For your soul senses the world that awaits you.’

Alison said: ‘My husband and I are so deeply grateful that our wedding took place in the church where my parents and grandparents once prayed. The plain glass window behind the altar with its view of nature’s changing landscape feels like a glimpse of heaven.

‘I’m aware though, that bricks and mortar need support and urge anybody who can, to donate to the church so it can continue to be a place where people can sit, think and rejoice.’