Hansley Beard

Summer’s Christening Cake Bar in Winter!

Last week we had the pleasure of creating a beautiful cake bar for the christening party of Summer Keira in Chesterfield:

We wanted to share some of the photos of it here from all sorts of angles as there are so many different details to see!

Here are some nice words from her mum Laura:
“I contacted Jennie for assistance for my daughter’s christening. I’d booked a venue, and I was making cupcakes instead of a traditional cake.”

“I had an image of how I wanted it to look and the theme colours of pink and green that I wanted to use - it was just the main element of physically doing the display.”

“Jennie suggested we could do a feature table with the cupcakes with some of her hire items including numerous cakestands and some teacups and saucers. I also bought a few matching sweets ~ bon bons and alphabet letters.”



“The items used gave the table a girly vintage feel with a modern twist.”

“Jennie made labels and wrote little messages on them such as ‘Summer’s Cake Bar’, ‘Made by Mummy’ and ‘Please Take Me, I’m Yummy!’


“What the display looked like was amazing! Everyone commented on how lovely it looked.”


“I’d be more than happy to recommend and work with Jennie again for any party or special occasion whether this be venue decor or hiring vintage crockery items. Thank you so much, Jennie, for all your help.  The display looked fantastic!”

This was a great opportunity for us to show how you can use modern and vintage together to make something unique.

We used a candy striped cloth and finished off the table with beautiful bunting by ‘Bloom’, based in Sheffield, and made from pink gingham and rose fabric from the Amy Butler collection.



To add a little twist we placed whirlypop lollipops in the flowers.

If you are organising a christening party, baby shower or children’s party and already have your ingredients (cakes, cupcakes, desserts or sweets) but want an ingenius way to display them and wow all your guests, get in touch with us at Hansley Beard to see what display items we have available. We offer partial to full styling and design services, just set-up or you can hire the vintage crockery or modern display items yourself and set it up yourself.

If you don’t have the edible items already we also have contacts with excellent cake makers, cupcake companies, sweets and chocolate suppliers and can work with you to create all of the perfect cake bar, dessert bar or candy buffet for your child or baby’s event, including theming, colourscheme, menu choices, design and set-up.

Flowers bought from Swallows and Damsons
Images by Jennie Beard

Posted Sat, 04 Dec, by Jennie Beard in Candy Buffet, Candy Station, Christening, Dessert Bars, Flowers, Pink, Vintage Crockery Hire, Vintage Styling | 1 Comments

Window Dressing

No sooner had we packed away our vintage boudoir after last weekend’s Wedding Show at Magna, than we were getting it all out again to dress one of the empty shop windows in the city centre Sheffield Showcase project. All the windows have to be ‘themed’ and provide a showcase for local businesses and designers to display their creative talents. Organised by The Source at Meadowhall in association with Sheffield City Council, the project includes working alongside Visual Merchandising students and the two girls from the group who helped me to put the window together were an inspiration to work with.

We decided to make the window look like a lady’s bedroom, featuring a central dressing table, a clothes and dressing area and a living room area. We then created a story around the main female character. “She has just come home from a late night party, wearing her party dress; she throws down her feather boa and handbag on the settee and goes over to her dressing table, which shows evidence of her ‘getting-ready’ routine earlier that evening”.

Richard Smith from Rich Smith Illustration introduced me to the project and his vintage style caricatures feature prominently in this vintage boudoir window (see below).

Styling and display is a huge part of what I love doing. I like starting with a theme or colour scheme, gathering inspirational ideas and researching and sourcing the props and items to build the ‘set’; so creating a window display is not much different to me from decorating a wedding venue or designing a dessert bar. For this project, I already had lots of the right coloured vintage items in my hire collection. Then I found the wonderful chandelier wallpaper from Wallpaper Direct.

As I would when theming a wedding or event, I pulled together the right suppliers and businesses to produce the final look. For this theme, I sourced items and products from ten different local businesses and suppliers, some of whom had also been involved in the Ultimate Brides Wedding Show the weekend before (full list of suppliers below).

The key is knowing how to put together a collection of beautiful things, recognising when it’s working - and when it’s not working! - to create not only the right visual effect but the right experiential effect too. When we were working in the window, a lady saw what we were doing and commented, ‘That takes me back!’ The display seemed to connect with her own past, making her feel warm and nostalgic. ‘You’ve brought some happiness into my day!’ she said, as she walked away to continue her shopping.

If you’re able to go and see it, let me know what you think. It’s on Pinstone St, Sheffield (walk down from the Peace Gardens towards the top of the Moor and the shop is on the right). It’s very pink, and it’s there for 3 more weeks only!

Suppliers:

Window Theming and Design: Hansley Beard
Candy Jar Design: Hansley Beard
Hire of Decorative and Vintage Items: Hansley Beard
Vintage Boudoir Sign: The Happily Ever After Project
Caricatures: Rich Smith Illustration
Vintage Hats: Tricia Cox Millinery
Bridal Lingerie: All She Needs
Jewellery, Cameo Brooches, Soaps & Umbrella: Valentine & Whicker
Vintage Dress, Cape, Jewellery and Handbag: Tasty Vintage, Sheffield Antiques Centre
Central Dressing Table Mirror: Mirror Mad
Perfumes & Beauty Club: Debenhams, Sheffield
Dress on main model: Alice Takes a Trip
Rose Petals: Nature’s Larder

All Photos by CandM-Photography

Posted Wed, 16 Sep, by Jennie Beard in Lingerie, Pink, Shops, Stationery, Themes, Vintage Accessories, Vintage Clothing , Vintage Crockery Hire, Vintage Styling, Window Display | 3 Comments