My Wedding Day with Sabina Brennan: 'We had our reception in the most beautiful room at Clontarf Castle'

Irish Examiner

08-07-2025

We got married on August 19, 1987. We're coming up to our 40th anniversary in a couple of years! I lived in Clontarf at the time so we got married in St Anthony's Church in Clontarf, and we had the reception in Clontarf Castle.
As part of the package with the hotel, we got a huge gold Rolls Royce, and I remember the driver saying to me 'you're not getting any use out of the car!' because the church was only 100 yards away from the hotel.
We had around 80 guests at the wedding. Back then, it was very much a family event, and I remember we only had a handful of friends each at the wedding, it was mainly family, and extended family. But that was the norm.
I love design. If I didn't do what I do I think I would have been a dress designer. So I designed and made my own wedding dress. It was quite classic and looking at it now I think the design has held up well. At the time it stood out really, it was quite modern.
Sabina Brennan and her husband Dave
I knew exactly what I wanted in my head, and I made it in Japanese silk. There was yards and yards and yards of material in the dress because I added ruching. The silk was so delicate that when I started sewing the ruching the machine kept pulling the threads, so I ended up having to sew the entire dress by hand.
On the morning of the wedding, myself and my dad were the only ones left in the house, and we were waiting for the car to arrive. My dad was halfway up the stairs so he could see the car arriving and I was at the bottom of the stairs. When the car arrived my dad hurried down the steps and he accidentally stood on the train of my dress just as I stepped forward to the door. My dress ripped.
Now because I had made the dress myself I was confident I could mend it and I had a needle and thread with me, but I remember when we got to the church news of the accident reached my mother. She may have thought she was whispering discreetly but everyone in the church heard her giving out to my dad!
A television crew filming the bride and groom
Then I remember seeing my husband at the top of the aisle and thinking 'would no one have fixed his hair!'. It had all fallen forward like a fringe. When we were at the altar together we were holding the mass booklets and I heard dripping water and then I could see drops landing on the booklet. I knew my husband couldn't be crying and when I looked at him I could see he was dripping with sweat!
His best man lived in America at the time and had only come home the day before the wedding. Now my husband is not a drinker but he had a few drinks that night and hence the sweating, and why his hair had all fallen forward. He always looks at the photos to this day and gives out that nobody fixed his hair for him.
After the ceremony we went to the Rose Garden in St Anne's Park for the photos. There was a TV camera crew in there doing a segment for Newsround about the garden, and they were delighted to see us. So they filmed us and we appeared on the news.
Sabina Brennan with her father on her wedding day
Then we went to the hotel and had our reception in the most beautiful room that was part of the original castle building. We had a band for the evening, no DJ as it wasn't really a thing back then.
The tradition at the time was you had your first dance, and then you were joined by your parents for a second dance. After our first dance, which was to Lady In Red by Chris deBurgh, Dave's father Paddy was nowhere to be found. He had these greyhounds at the time and they had to be walked at a certain time and hadn't he gone off to walk the dogs!
The newlyweds with their parents
It's different now, but we had to leave the hotel then at around 10.30pm. We had to get into our going-away outfits. I had a gorgeous cream silk dress with a peplum and it was really beautiful, and Dave had a jacket from a real trendy brand at the time. We'd been saving so hard to marry, and being able to splash out on those outfits was really special.
The first dance was to Lady in Red by Chris deBurgh
Then we got into our banger of a Fiat Ritmo and off we went. We stayed in the Marine Hotel in Sutton that night. Everyone else was still partying, and we just went back to this quiet hotel room. It was really weird.
After that, we went off on our honeymoon for two weeks. We went to Sardinia, which was an unusual choice at the time but it was so beautiful.
Sabina Brennan's book, Still Me: a neuroscientist's guide to caring for someone with dementia, will be published on July 17.