He came as a cowboy. She came as Dolly Parton.

Their story

Gavin messaged Martha in June 2021 with what he considered an absolutely cracking opening line. Martha did not notice it for three weeks. He was raging. He turned to his flatmate and said, and I quote, "that was a great icebreaker, what the hell?"

She did eventually reply, and within about five questions Gavin had confessed to an obsession with The Cat in the Hat. Not the book. The 2003 Mike Myers film, which is so catastrophically bad it has become a sort of cult object for people of genuinely questionable taste. Martha is obsessed with exactly the same film. That was the spark. Then they swapped Spotify accounts and found their most-played songs were practically identical, and the late-night messaging began, the pair of them turning up to work shattered like a couple of teenagers.

The first date was the Left Bank, here in the West End. They had been joking about turning up in fancy dress and there was genuine jeopardy about whether either of them would actually go through with it. Gavin arrived dressed as a cowboy. He stood outside convinced he had been stood up, because Martha was running late. Then he looked up, and round the corner came Dolly Parton. I am proud of them both.

On the third date they buried a rat. Specifically Roger, one of Martha's two pet rats, Kenny and Roger, named after Kenny Rogers, because the Dolly Parton connection runs deep here. Roger had lived a full and arguably chaotic life and come to a dramatic end. Martha painted a wee Subway box as a coffin, they walked the Kelvin Walkway together, and they played "The Gambler" as they laid him to rest. Third date. I knew straight away these two were going to be fine.

There is one more character in this. The Cowboy of Kelvingrove, an immaculately dressed man who parades round the West End in full cowboy gear every single day, kept materialising near them on that first date. They have never spoken to him. They just take it as a sign that good things are coming. He turned up again the week of the wedding, and I have reached the point of photographing strangers in cowboy hats on Great Western Road and sending them over to check.

They moved in together inside six weeks, which was character-building. The toilet broke. They photographed the disasters, not all of which were suitable for the landlord or indeed any audience. Then they drew up a shortlist of three places to move to: Vienna, London or Bradford, which tells you everything. London won. Martha got a job at the BBC, and within nine months of meeting they had moved country, taking Kenny the rat with them on the train in a handbag because the removal firm would not have him in the van.

Three years later the West End pulled them home. They have a first flat down the Charing Cross end, double the size of the London one, and Martha reports she no longer walks into things. The renovations are paused on account of a wedding. There is a hole in the kitchen floor. It is fine. It is absolutely fine.

The proposal, eventually

Gavin had a plan, and the plan did not survive contact with Glasgow. He wanted a big proposal day touring everywhere that mattered to them, complete with an elaborate fake walking-tour guide. He had the date booked. But the night before they flew to Gran Canaria they went for dinner at The Chip, one of the best meals he says he has ever had, and he had the ring in his pocket just in case.

So he tried for a rooftop. Closed. Tried another. Broken. Martha kept saying it was fine. Gavin kept saying no, he really wanted the rooftop. How a whole rooftop can be broken I do not know. They ended up in Curler's Rest, where he scanned the room, spotted an Operation game and briefly considered proposing beside it, until he clocked that the bit he was standing next to was labelled "Bits". Thank goodness.

Martha just wanted to go home and pack. So home they went, packed, had a wee Baileys in bed, and Gavin, having spent an entire evening hunting for something cinematic, simply went for it. She said yes. They were up two hours later texting everyone.

And because the big day was already booked, they did the whole thing anyway. Back to the Left Bank, where the same waitress from their first date was working. They explained they had got engaged already but were doing it again properly. Free pudding, naturally. Then, at the gates of Kelvingrove, Gavin faked a phone call cancelling the tour guide he had been inventing for weeks, turned round wearing a fake moustache and announced he would be their guide for the evening. The Cowboy of Kelvingrove turned up that day too.

The ceremony

A piper brought the bridal party in, and Martha walked in with her mum and dad to Wild Mountain Thyme. Her gran read Burns, A Red, Red Rose, which in that room, under that ceiling, did exactly what you would hope.

Then the quaich, and this is the detail I keep telling people about. Gavin's dad carved it himself, out of wood, by hand. He brought it forward, and Martha's dad poured. There is something about drinking from a cup one of your fathers made that no amount of hired silverware gets near. We did a handfasting too, the cords carried up by Martha's sister.

The rings were brought up by Gavin's sister, and both of them carry a bit of family in them. Gavin's is two rings melted into one, both of his papas'. Martha's belonged to her great grandmother. They went out to Pitbull's "Fireball", which after all that Burns is exactly the correct decision.

What makes these two work, in Martha's own words, is an endless capacity for games. They turn everything into a quiz, and if you are in the room you are in the quiz. Every Saturday morning Gavin wheels the office chairs out and they watch Mastermind. They were both independently obsessed with the same cactus in the Botanic Gardens, which Martha's pal took as evidence that Gavin had been going through her Instagram. And they make each other laugh so much that Gavin had to get an inhaler for the first time in his life three weeks after they met, and Martha then had to go and get a stronger one.

Marrying at Cottiers yourself?

Cottiers is a converted Victorian church off Hyndland Street, and the ceremony hall is one of the most characterful rooms in the city: painted organ pipes, a gallery running round three sides, and enough decoration already on the walls that you genuinely do not need to add any. Martha and Gavin put flowers in jars along the aisle and left it at that, which was the right call.

Two practical things. The room is dark and beautifully lit rather than bright, so talk to your photographer about it early. And the venue runs the sound, so get your music to them in advance and be clear which track is which, especially if you are going from a piper into a playlist. Use the garden if the day is kind: the gate onto the lane makes for a good arrival, and guests spill out there naturally between the ceremony and the meal.

There is more on the room and the logistics in my Cottiers venue guide, and if you are marrying round here my West End of Glasgow page and Glasgow wedding celebrant page are the place to start. I live in Kelvinbridge, about five minutes away, so couples booking me for Glasgow weddings pay no travel fees. If the handfasting or the quaich caught your eye there are full guides to handfasting in Scotland and the quaich, and more on my handfasting celebrant page.