Pippley Walled Garden | Wedding Venue Guide
Three weddings in now — Fran & Jack, Joanna & Tom, and Helen & Ben — and Pippley is firmly cemented as one of my favourite places to photograph anywhere near Nottingham. You might know it as The Walled Garden at Beeston Fields. Same venue, new name.
It’s a Victorian walled garden behind a country house in Beeston, brought back from a fairly forgotten state, with a marquee sat on the lawn in the middle of it. Old brick, old doors, a Bramley apple arch strung with lights, and a bandstand you can get married in.
Three weddings is enough to start noticing what’s true about a place rather than what was true about one day. So here’s what I’d tell you if you were thinking of getting married here.
Real Pippley Walled Garden Weddings
“We would highly recommend Dave and Amy as wedding photographers. We love every single photo they took on the day and we had a lot of fun working with them on our wedding day and during the engagement shoot. Getting a second shooter is definitely worth it, we would have missed out on so many great photos without Amy there.”
Fran
Why I love Pippley Walled Garden Weddings so much
The staff first, because it’s the thing that’s held up across all three weddings and it’s the hardest thing for a venue to claim about itself. They keep the day running to time without anyone feeling like they’re being moved along. When something does need changing — weather, a delay, a bit of hurrying — they talk it through with the couple rather than making the call over their heads. That’s a small distinction right up until it’s your wedding.
Then the walls. A walled garden keeps everybody in one place, which sounds obvious but genuinely changes how the day feels. Guests drift between the marquee, the bar and the flower beds with a drink in hand, and nobody ends up marooned at the far end of a field. You see everyone, all day, without having to organise it.
And then there are the flowers, which are the reason the place is called what it is. It’s a working garden, not a lawn with borders around the edge — beds that change completely between April and September, so a spring wedding here and a late-summer one don’t look remotely alike. Practically, that means you can walk your couple photos straight into colour without going anywhere, and it’s worth asking what’s likely to be out around your date, because it genuinely changes the pictures.
The rest of the garden gives you just as much to work with. The Bramley apple arch, the old doors up by the lean-to, brickwork the whole way round that’s been weathering since long before anyone got married in front of it. You can walk two minutes here and get four completely different backdrops.
Essential information:
Where is Pippley Walled Garden?
Old Drive, Wollaton Road, Beeston, Nottingham NG9 3DA — tucked behind Beeston Fields Golf Club on the western side of Nottingham.
How many guests can attend a wedding at Pippley Walled Garden?
Their website says 180 seated with a dance floor, 220 seated without one, and up to 300 standing if you’re using the garden as well. Worth confirming with them directly, as numbers like these tend to move.
Is catering included at Pippley Walled Garden?
Their listings say catering is in-house, with a kitchen team using produce grown on site, and that outside caterers are allowed too. I’ve never asked about it on the day, so treat that as their word rather than mine — but a walled garden feeding its own wedding breakfast is a nice thought.
Is there parking at Pippley Walled Garden?
Plenty of it, on site. Not something you’ll need to think about.
Getting ready spaces:
The bridal suite, or the golf club next door
Fran and Helen both got ready in a room at the golf club next door, which works perfectly well. Pippley’s own listings now mention a bridal suite, and one couple’s review describes it as having good light for makeup — I haven’t been in it myself, so ask them what’s available on your date.
Ceremony options:
Pippley is licensed for civil ceremonies in three spaces — the Bandstand and the Loggia out in the garden, and the Marquee if the weather turns. You book the registrar separately through Nottingham register office. Worth picking your spot for what you want to see on the day, not just for the photographs, because the two garden options give you genuinely different ceremonies.
The Bandstand
Out in the open with the garden behind it. The advantage is the angle back towards you — I can shoot from behind the bandstand and get you and every one of your guests in the same frame, which is great for catching all the emotion of your friends and family as you say your vows.
The Loggia
The lean-to at the other end, which lifts you up higher than your guests. That means everyone can see you better, which isn’t always true at an outdoor ceremony — the trade-off is a bit more distance between you and the front row. Both spots are open enough that I can move around freely while you’re getting married, which isn’t the case everywhere.
Confetti
The wide path leading out of the garden is where it’s happened at the weddings I’ve shot here — plenty of width for guests to line both sides, and the walls and planting behind them do the rest. I’ve not checked whether that’s Pippley’s preferred spot or just where everyone naturally ends up, so worth asking them about their current confetti policy when you book.
Suppliers from these Pippley Weddings
One name comes up at all three of these weddings: Old Bricks & Blossom did the flowers every time. Ella ran weddings at the garden for seven years before setting up on her own, and she works out of Gardener’s Cottage inside the grounds — so if you book her, your florist is already on site on the morning of your wedding.
Confetti – Shropshire Petals | Music & DJ – George Simpson Music
Suits – Empire Menswear | Evening food – Big Melt
Hair & makeup – Claire Makeup and Hair | Laura Stafford Hair
Top tips from a Pippley Walled Garden photographer (aka me!)
– A bright day makes the Bandstand harder. You’re stood in its shade, your guests are in full sun, and that’s a big gap for a camera to hold in one frame. Nothing for you to plan around — that one’s mine to sort — but it’s one of the few venues where I don’t mind a bit of cloud.
– Don’t build your evening around a sunset. It’s a walled garden with trees beyond the walls, so by the time the light drops low enough to be interesting, it’s behind brick. Use the Bramley apple arch instead. It’s lit up after dark and it’s thirty seconds from the marquee, so you can slip out mid-party, get ten minutes of something that looks nothing like the rest of the day, and be back before anyone notices you’ve gone.
– Group shots go on the big lawn outside the walls. A minute’s walk, the best shade on the site, and big enough for the everyone-at-the-wedding shot if you want one. Every wedding I’ve photographed here has been sunny, and that lawn is the reason it’s never been a problem for the groups.
– The old doors and the best brickwork are up by the lean-to end. Worth knowing if you want a few couple photos without flowers in them.
Looking for a Pippley Walled Garden Wedding photographer?
If you’re getting married at Pippley, I’d love to hear about it. As a documentary wedding photographer I’ll be in amongst the day from the moment I arrive documenting your day, and letting you get on with getting married.