Radiant in her wedding dress, the bride who will be Britain's first black marchioness

Ceawlin Thynn, Viscount Weymouth, married the daughter of a Nigerian oil tycoon yesterday, but the ceremony was overshadowed by the conspicuous absence of his parents who refused to attend as a family feud rumbled on. Emma McQuiston will make history when she becomes the first black Marchioness in Britain after her wedding to the future Marquess of Bath at the family seat of Longleat. But she claims her relationship with the aristocrat has caused upset among the British elite because of her ethnicity and background. In an interview with society magazine Tatler, the 27-year-old said: 'There's class and then there's the racial thing. It's a jungle and I'm going through it and discovering things as I grow up. 'I’m not super-easily offended but it’s a problem when someone’s making you feel different or separate because of your race. I have never had anything horrible said or happen, but it is something you sense. You can just tell with some people.’ But the Marquess of Bath – famous for his string of ‘wifelets’ – and his real wife, Hungarian-born Anna Gael, 69, boycotted the ceremony, which took place at Longleat House yesterday afternoon. A source told the Daily Express: 'It was an intimate ceremony. Longleat is considered one of the foremost and widely respected traditional British estates in the country. 'With the backdrop of the safari park, estate and house, it was quite special. 'Many people have celebrated that she will be the first black marchioness in the UK, which was widely praised as "about time too".
' Lord Bath has expressed great displeasure at his son’s renovation of the family seat at Longleat, which has involved removing a number of his prized erotic paintings, and said he would stay away from the wedding. The 80-year-old Marquess – wearing mustard chinos and a green velvet jacket – instead went to a wedding in Hampshire yesterday morning, accompanied by his wife, Ceawlin's mother. He saw professional polo players Heloise Lorentzen and Sean Wilson-Smith tie the knot in a lavish affair in Wonston, with the happy couple then celebrating with their guests, many of them fellow polo players, at a wedding banquet for almost 250. Lady Bath, who splits her time between Longleat and Paris, is thought to disapprove of Miss McQuiston, an aspiring celebrity chef.  ‘She has asked her son to call it off,’ a friend of the family said. ‘She seems to think Emma isn’t good enough for him. Emma’s a lovely girl and is understandably hurt by this, as is her family. But Ceawlin loves Emma and won’t be swayed.’

Last month, Emma McQuiston's mother lambasted Lord and Lady Bath for refusing to attend her daughter’s wedding to their only son. Suzanna McQuiston told The Mail on Sunday: ‘They’ve both known Emma since she was three-and-a-half. She’s a wonderful, incredibly beautiful and sweet girl. I just can’t understand it. ‘One thing I would say is that I don’t want people going on about snobbery. Emma has been a regular at Longleat since she was three-and-a-half. 

'Her sister-in-law is Lady Silvy [Ceawlin’s half-aunt]. It’s nothing new to Emma.’

In Therese And Isabelle in 1968, she stripped naked and simulated lesbian sex. She also disrobed for Zeta One in 1969, described as ‘the ultimate erotic extravaganza’. And in Take Me, Love Me Nana in 1970, she played a prostitute. She became known as the ‘Naked Lady of Longleat’ while a newspaper cutting from 1970 called her ‘the most remarkable thing to happen to the English aristocracy since Lady Godiva rode bareback into town’. Lord Bath fell out with his son after discovering he had taken down murals painted for Lord Weymouth and sister when they were children.  

The row is so fierce that the pair live in separate wings at Longleat and rarely meet.

Lord Bath told The Mail on Sunday: ‘It’s my life’s work and he’s quietly binned it. 

'It’s killed my relationship with him and I don’t feel inclined to pay any interest in his wedding.’

It was a day of high society weddings – and a day full of surprises for the guests and the happy couples alike. As the great and the good turned out for nuptials up and down the country yesterday, Prince Harry’s girlfriend had a sudden mishap, one wacky designer groom turned up in a lobster emblazoned suit, while an aristocratic father of the groom appeared to boycott the event entirely. Cressida Bonas, the girlfriend of Prince Harry, had an unfortunate wardrobe malfunction at the wedding of friends in Cirencester, tripping over her colourful floor-length flared trousers which appeared to get tangled in a pair of towering  pink wedges.

She was with Princess Eugenie – dressed in a short summer dress adorned with red poppies – at  the wedding of Lady Natasha Rufus Isaacs to Rupert Finch –  a former flame of the Duchess  of Cambridge. Lady Natasha is the co-founder of eco fashion label Beulah.

In East London, Charlotte Goldsmith, the daughter of the late financier James Goldsmith and his mistress Laure Boulay de la Meurthe, were shocked to see her flamboyant designer fiancé Philip Colbert walk down the aisle in one of his bizarre creations – a black suit adorned with red cartoon lobsters.

The bride also went against tradition with a full Fifties-style skirt, teamed with a cropped cream bolero. There was British interest, too, in one of Europe’s Royal weddings of the year. Prince Edward and his wife Sophie attended the fairytale wedding of Sweden’s ‘party’ Princess Madeleine, to British-born financier Christopher O’Neill. The Countess of Wessex wore a soft pink empire line dress and diamond tiara as she took the arm of her husband, who was dressed in military uniform. And in Wiltshire, Prince William’s friend Peregrine Hood married Vogue magazine’s Serena Nikkah at his stepfather’s estate, Charlton Park in Malmesbury.

Despite much speculation, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge did not attend. 

The new Mr and Mrs Wilson-Smith after their wedding, which was attended by the Marquess of Bath

Emma McQuiston's mother