L: We used to work together at Foxtons in Shoreditch, where we were estate agents. We worked together for about a year, but we didn’t actually talk to each other.
B: We didn’t even acknowledge each other for about six months even though we sat opposite each other–a classic love story! It was a bit of a slow burner.
L: He looked about 15 at the time. I was just like, “yeah, nah.”
B: She thought she was cooler than me.
L: Yeah, I thought I was cooler than him!
L: We got quite drunk at staff Christmas party, as you do! The rest is history.
B: She followed me around that night and she’s been following me around every day since.
L: That’s how we like to describe it. It was a very romantic beginning at the Christmas party.
B: A couple of months after that, she moved in. Everyone in the office found our love very annoying!
L: It was after a work night out in Wapping and we cycled Boris bikes home, drunk, in the middle of the night. When we got home, he made me scrambled eggs. It was the nicest, sweetest thing ever. A midnight scrambled egg. I just thought, yeah, this is me now!
B: I think it was more of a gradual thing for me–I don’t think there was any point. I think I was always pretty infatuated with Laura.
L: People say that what you’re looking for is always right in front of your face, but you can’t see it–that’s exactly what it was.
B: Our first trip together was special to me. We went to Switzerland because my dad lives there and it was our first trip abroad together, our first mini holiday. That was pretty memorable because it was the first time she met my dad.
I also loved when she met my mum and my sister. That was special as they’re very important to me. Seeing how easily Laura fit in with my mum, sister and family and how quickly she became close to them was nice.
L: My favourite memory was when we went to visit Bobby’s mum and stepdad at their caravan in Oxford. We went up there together, just the two of us, and bought snacks and wine and just had a really nice time together, in a pretty area with nice lakes.
At the time we lived in this dreadful flat in Whitechapel, so it was nice to get out of the city. I’m from Kent, which everyone knows is the garden of England. I love to get away from London and be amongst the greenery of the great outdoors. So that was really nice for us to be out there together, just relaxing. Obviously, it wasn’t a big grand hut over the water in the Maldives or anything like that, but it was just really nice to be there together.
B: Yeah–it was my brother in law. When he wanted to get engaged, he got his rings through Taylor & Hart. I did a jewellery course at Holt’s academy and completed a level four certificate in CAD design so he took me along to his consultation, because I knew a little bit about jewellery and design. He went there first and then obviously I came to you guys afterwards, as you did such a great job.
L: It’s the best because now mine and Caroline’s rings both feature rubies, so we call them sister rings because now we are sisters!
B: I actually designed it years ago, when I was 21. I designed that ring when I was on my jewellery course at Holt’s. The ring I designed for Laura isn’t exactly the same, but as soon as I knew that we were getting married, I had a strong idea of what I wanted and how I wanted it done.
B: Well, she doesn’t really have any taste. I’m the one with the taste so she likes whatever I like because she knows I have better taste then her!
L: Bobby considers himself very fashionable individual. He describes his style as “scandi cool” and in comparison, he finds me very unfashionable!
He’s very lucky because as per the scrambled egg story, I’m a very cheap date. I’m not fussy about bags and shoes and jewellery, so I knew what he designed would be absolutely perfect–and it was!
B: Her personality. Everyone that she comes in contact with falls in love with her straight away. She’s got amazing energy, which rubs off on everyone. I hate to admit it but she’s very funny as well.
L: I am very uptight but Bobby is so unbelievably particular that it makes me laugh. He’s so immature and funny and it’s nice to just laugh about stupid things–it puts a smile on your face. It’s like being with a big kid.
B: Well it changed from what it was originally. I like the idea of movement in jewellery so I originally designed the wedding band to be attached to the engagement ring so the rings could actually fold in on themselves so it could be worn either way.
I still think that idea works with this one–you can wear it in several ways. You can point the pear diamond either way on the finger. I like things that are interchangeable.
B: Well, I wanted to do something grand, but to be honest, by the time it came to proposing, I had less money to spend on the proposal because I spent more on the ring than I’d originally budgeted for. Lucky for me, it doesn’t take a lot to impress her, so I was pretty safe there.
I got the idea for the proposal when I was staying with my dad in Switzerland. I saw this idea on Instagram, it must’ve been Instagram or Facebook listening to what I was saying–they targeted this advertisement to me. It was a love book with stick men characters. You can enter your names and then you could pick pages of things that you do. I thought Laura would like that. So I bought that book and it had all the stupid things that we do together.
Since we never really celebrate Valentine’s Day or go on dates or anything, we decided to make a thing out of it this year. We were going to go out for a slap up meal and I was going to take her on the Greenwich cable cars, the ones above the Thames.
Unfortunately Laura was in a bad mood that day and the weather was really bad, so it didn’t look very promising.
Once we got up there, we got up there, with the champagne out and the entire cable car to ourselves, and it was time to open the book.
On the last page of that book, a stick man was kneeling down and it said, “will you marry me?” And that’s when I got on one knee. The cable car was violently swinging, 300 feet over the Thames, it was freezing cold weather–I completely forgot I was scared of heights.
Some people said they cried over the videos, so I think it did the job. It was quite a simple idea but I thought it worked quite well.
L: He could have knocked me down dead–I could not believe it!
I had been very female about being engaged and I pestered Bobby for years that he must propose. We had just bought our flat so he said “it’s not going to happen now, just give it some time” which I really believed. I had always said to Bobby that I would know if he was going to propose because like he said, we’re not one for grand dates–we’re more of Nando’s type couple. So I said, “if you ever ask me to go anywhere nice I will know straight away.” But it was Valentine’s Day and we don’t normally do anything on Valentine’s, so I just thought he wanted to go out.
L: I was so happy because we don’t really do gifts either. We sound like such a bad couple here! So he wrapped it up, in true Bobby style, in newspaper because he didn’t have any wrapping paper.
B: But that was part of the guise!
L: So I opened the book and it had all these different pages for all things that we like to do together. As we’re simple people, it was things like cuddling on the sofa, eating and sleeping. I just thought it was so sweet. So I was already crying and then he kept saying, “cmon, hurry up, hurry up!” So I was just trying to get through all the pages. Then the last page was, will you marry me? I couldn’t believe it.
B: Well we got married earlier this year, so the next stage is just for us would be to have kids. I think we will be in London for a few more years, but we hope to move out of London, and get a big house out in the countryside to raise our children.
L: I want to start a property empire, which I’m working on as well, so yeah. That will be us, King and Queen of our castle with many children and a large London portfolio!
Thank you Laura and Bobby for sharing your wonderful, heartwarming story! We wish you the best in your future endeavors as the Watsons!
