Castle Wedding in the Adelaide Hills

Cassie & Danny

For Sydney couple Cassie and Danny, high on their list of priorities was to have their wedding in a castle. However, mindful of travel costs for guests, the couple decided to forgo their preferred European location and search for a venue closer to home.

They stumbled across The Manor Basket Range, a unique and eclectic event venue built in 1935, which is nestled in the picturesque Adelaide Hills. It offered the castle atmosphere the couple was seeking and was a mere two hour flight from their home in Sydney and a five hour flight for Danny’s family and friends traveling from New Zealand. Their day was captured by the very talented multi award winning team from SvenStudios. Their unique style and personalised service ensured, first-class quality images of the couple’s special day.

Dan’s and my vision for our wedding was to have a castle wedding. We both ideally would have loved Lake Bled in Slovenia (something we both mentioned as an ideal location before we started dating) but realised the cost for our nearest and dearest to get there was to much to ask. So we searched the southern hemisphere for any castle like destinations. When we stumbled onto The Manor, it was the only location in Australia that we both loved, and still maintained that appeal of a destination wedding for us and our guests. In fact, before the wedding, my grandfather was the only one to have visited Adelaide. It was nice to be able to encourage everyone to have a little holiday/ trip to a new place.

Cassie (Bride)

Why a Castle Wedding in the Adelaide Hills…

Dan and I are both princesses, so having our castle wedding was a dream come true 🤣 we wanted everyone else to also feel as if they weren’t at a typical wedding location. I think we beat a lot of our guests expectations.

Wedding Attire…

We both had two separate sets of clothing – I (Cassie) had a larger dress for the ceremony by Brides of Sydney and a more subdued dress for the reception. While Danny had tails on his rather stylish tuxedo before changing to a more standard suit jacket later in the night.

Wedding Ceremony…

We had a symbolic ceremony with Danny’s sister presiding so as to best incorporate the rich New Zealand Maori heritage from Danny’s side of the family. We then had a legal ceremony directly after involving just the two of us and our witnesses. These were both held in the beautiful gardens of The Manor Basket Range, our wedding venue.

Wedding Reception…

Our entire wedding was held at The Manor Basket Range, which is a unique wedding venue in Australia due to the fact that it looks like a medieval castle with styled function rooms to match. The venue boasts two separate function rooms, with ours taking place in the smaller of the two. It also has 12 townhouse style accommodation suites, which many of our guests stayed in.

On the Day…

Our wedding day was fairly typical, with both bride and groom getting ready on site in separate rooms, before attending our ceremony in the garden under the main castle keep. We then held our group photos before retiring back to the same spot for our legal ceremony, while our guests enjoyed outdoor canapes, drinks and live music on the terrace. We then staged a rather fun bouquet toss from the back of our red convertible before heading around the gardens for photos, prior to the reception.

Standout Moments…

The bouquet toss form the convertible was amazing! I sat on the back seat as I threw my bouquet to the waiting ladies behind the car as we drove off. The entrance to the reception was also a lot of fun, with each of the bridal party entering in a unique way – two came in with inflatable horse outfits, others came in shooting money from a money gun before we came in riding a ‘magic carpet’ to the tune of I can show you the world from Disney’s Aladdin.

Wedding Décor…

The reception room with open fireplaces, arched French windows and exposed timber beams, lent itself to our castle theme, as did the simple colour pallet and rustic styling.

Advice for Planning an Interstate or Overseas Wedding…

My advice would be to sit down with your significant other and firstly discuss non negotiables. Be realistic with this, it’s important you both know what’s important. My non negotiable was that I needed my immediate family to be able to afford it (hence we cut costs for them where we could with accommodation and informing them of when flight sales were coming on).

Secondly, we wanted it to feel secluded, as if we were away from the public eye. Definitely do research, as there are many hidden gems in your backyard (own country) that might have what you’re looking for. I hadn’t considered Australia, we were beginning to lean towards Larnach Castle in Dunedin, NZ. However, we did a last minute deep dive into Tasmania and SA (as we’d never been before) and we found two potential options.

When we finally visited The Manor, the drive into the hills immediately had our minds racing with ideas of the convertible and driving around in it together, then the castle itself was not only beautiful and secluded, but it was affordable the staff were amazing and the little details including accommodation on site, closed to the public, the little hut in the garden, all these extras that just brought us joy. Having now visited Larnach Castle, although it’s beautiful, it did not offer the same little details. It’s like your dress, you just know when it’s right!

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The Perfect Partners

Wedding Photographer: SvenStudios // Wedding Videographer: SvenStudios // Ceremony & Reception Venue: The Manor Basket Range, South Australia  // Ceremony Musicians & Wedding Band : Rocket Entertainment // Wedding Flowers: Hayley’s Flower Shop // Bridal Dress: Brides of Sydney// Bridal Shoes: Badgley Mischka // Grooms Attire: Ali Express // Hair & Makeup: NatNash Beauty // Wedding Stationery: Estay