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Emilie & Ian | Wedding at Gargonza Castle

Emily and Ian got married at Castello di Gargonza, a beautiful walled village set on a hill dominating the Valdichiana (Chiana valley) half road between Arezzo and Siena. In the long history of the estate, the most illustrious guest has been Dante Alighieri in 1302, as the historian Leonardo Bruni recounts in his ‘Vita di Dante’ and as cited on the memorial plaque at the entrance to the Castle. With its intimate and welcoming atmosphere Gargonza castle provided the ideal setting for this beautiful wedding. The ceremony was set in the garden, the decorations were simple and beautiful with white and pink rose petals scattered along the isle and chinese lanterns hanging from the trees. There was a nice breeze in the shade of the trees which was so relieving in those hot summer days. The ceremony was intimate and touching, and was followed by an aperitif in the garden and dinner reception at the ‘La Torre di Gargonza’ restaurant.

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Felice & Peter | Wedding at Podere Finerri, The Lazy Olive

How you met - We met on a school trip to Rome, when we were 17. We didnt know each other before, but got to know each other on the trip. So high school love. SInce then we had a passopn for Italy and went back together many times for holidays. I (Felice) also studied in Milano for 6 months, during my masters.

The proposal - This was about a year before the wedding in Indonesia, on the island of Lombok. I was quite surprised, always wanted to marry but thought that Peter didnt want to. Until that day, and at first I didnt believe him, thought he was joking, I started laughing at him and took another sip of my wine. Then he asked again and said it was real and showed a ring…I still didnt believe him and told him not to fool with me and that the ring was fake. Then I looked up and saw his face and believed it was real by the look on his face. A real big surprise! And of course I said yes.

Why Italy and Podere Finerri / The Lazy Olive for your wedding - We already knew from the first moment we wanted to get married in Italy. Because we met there, love the country, people, the food and the good weather.(;)) We started to explore some locations in a weekend about a year before the wedding, most agriturismo’s. We got Podere Finerri/ The Lazy Oilve  via a friend, and the moment we got there, even already on the cool road to get there….we knew this was it, it’s so cool! the road, the view, the house…and of course the owners. We met Daniela and there was a click, so we confirmed immediately. We cancelled the other visits that we had planned for that weekend, because it couldnt get any better than Lazy Olive.

The wedding day - In the morning we were really disappointed, it had been sunny and 30 degrees all week long. We stayed there that week with closest friends and family and spent all days at the pool. But that morning it was grey and little rainy, and I cried and Peter was stressed….but after a few hours of dressing up, hairdresser etc, we went to Chiusure, a little village with abou a 100 inhabitants. We got married in a cool small church. The moment I walked in with my dad was very special to me, one of our friends played “dancing in the moonlight”on the piano and Peter and I had not seen each other before that morning. After the church ceremony, the weather had really changed and the moment the doors of the church opened, we saw the rain….we forgot about the bad weather in the meantime, cause we were enjoying the day and the ceremony so much, but now we were worried, because we had ice creams planned at the viewpoint at Chiusure. When we walked out of the church, the nice lady of the caffe came with a good solution and was so kind to give us all their big Umbrella’s/Parasols from their terrace, and off we went, to the viewpoint all of us under the big parasols, quite funny… At the viewpoint we had the Italian icecreams and peter and I took some pics with you in the old village. After that we left towards Lazy Olive. We took some nice and Crazy pics also on the way, we enjoyed running together also the pics in the fields close to Lazy Olive are nice. Then we arrived at Lazy Olive, ans at that moment the sun begun to shine again, it was crzay and perfect timing. We had some drinks and snacks and took some pictures with friends and family and beatiful pics at the pool with the amazing sunset. Good news was that we could eat outside and the table looked stunning. After the speeches of our parents we went for a great meal. In between we took a break and with all guests we lighted the Chinese Lanterns, quite cool in the middle of nature. After the dinner we had a great party until 4 at night, not really planned, but we couldnt stop and everyone was enjoying it.

What’s the thing that some said or did that touched you most - The Speeches that we wrote for each other, in the church during the ceremony, we didn’t know what we had written for each other and it was very emotional. As well the speeches from our parents, it was really sweet of them.

Your dress - Hard to choose in the beginning, I wanted a short one, because I’m not that tall and the weather would be too warm for a long dress, and I chose one. But then I came back on that decision, cause you marry only once and maybe the short one was not ‘wedding’ enough and too simple. So I saw this one of Linea Raffaelli in a magazine and liked it immediately, short & long in 1. So I could be the real bride during the day and walk in the church with my long dress, and later at night undo the long sleeve and party on with my short dress, which was much more convenient for dancing. It was the most perfect dress.

Decor & color scheme – We liked to have it quite natural, so white and purple flowers and natural and vintage decoration, not too much. Thats why we also choose the coloured wooden chairs at the table instead of the real wedding ones.

Your love song – Euphoria from Loreen. This was our opening dance….we practised a few times at home and it was really cool to do on our wedding day, as it was a popular song, everyone was singing and clapping so it was not too formal. It’s still on the radio a lot, and friends keep smsing when it is on, that they think of us and our wedding in Tuscany.

Where did you go on your honeymoon – To Africa, Mauritius and Seychelles, so the romantic islands. We could really relax there and relive the day, we snorkelled and dived a lot, swam with 100 dolphins at sea which was amazing, visited many islands by boat and chilled a lot at the beach or pool with a book and glass of wine.

What’s Love for you – we thought of this for a long time, but it is undescribable….

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Nikki & Matt | Wedding in San Galgano

‘Matt and I don’t seem to do things the conventional way. It took us to travel to the other side of the world to meet even though we both lived in London.
From the early days whenever we talked about marriage we always imagined an outdoor wedding. My love Italy and our mutual love of travelling meant that Tuscany was the natural choice  when we eventually did start to plan our relaxed fun-filled wedding party.
On a rainy October weekend we flew to Pisa and toured Florence and Siena looking for a venue. Just as we were giving up on finding anywhere as rustic and quaint as we imagined, we drove down a dusty track and discovered Villa Podernovo, a stone farmhouse with a big tree and instantly we knew it was where we would have our wedding celebration.
They suggested there was a little medieval chapel down the road were we could get married, San Galgano, but we were short on time so we agreed to book it without seeing it… something that was to become a feature of our wedding planning. It proved to be a dream. We booked caterers, musicians and even yourselves just through recommendations – and lady luck was on our side as everyone was marvellous.
We chose sunshine yellow and real lemons for our colour scheme which added zest and cheerfulness to the day.
My dress by Alan Hannah was the most ridiculous thing I’d ever seen – it made me laugh when I tried it on but little did I know that six months later when I couldn’t get it out of my head, I’d be back in the shop buying it!!  I teamed it with some red shoes – touches of our personalities ran all through our wedding.
On the day, everyone was in holiday mode. The wedding was just as we’d imagined. Our priest made everyone smile when in the 800 year old chapel he pulled out his ipad to read the wedding from. A wonderful juxtaposition of the old and the new.
When the singer in the church ended the mass with the gospel song ‘Oh Happy Day’ and everyone clapped and sung along I thought I couldn’t ever feel more joyful than at that moment but the feeling continued throughout the speeches, the meal and the dancing until 5am.
Booking a wedding abroad involves a lot of trust and a very relaxed attitude – we made a conscious decision not to get hung up on the little things and if parts went wrong we decided they would become features of ‘the story of our wedding’ and we would laugh.
Armed with that attitude our wedding proved to be the most wonderful day of our lives. We thought people exaggerated when they said that but truly it was. Thank you for capturing that for us in your photographs.’

Nikki

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Natalie & Gerome

It was a joyful day with beautifully expressive people.  Natalie and Gerome got married in the Rocca of Radicofani a mighty ancient fortress set on the top of an imposing cliff that dominates the whole territory of the Orcia Valley. After the ceremony we went in the village of Radicofani for drinks and then back to Podere La Casellaccia, an ancient farmhouse restored with elegance and excellent taste and style. This is the icon picture of Tuscany, the views of the Val D’Orcia are sublime, no wonder it’s one of Italy’s most famed areas, a land where the hills’ soft shapes melt one into another. The dinner reception took place at sunset in the garden, the atmosphere was just beautiful permeated by sweet scented breezes, immersed in the harmonious sounds of nature.

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Francesca & Michael

How you met – Michael and I met through mutual friends when we rented a house at the beach in Delaware in 2006. We started dating about a year later.

 The proposal – Michael proposed to me in our living room after work one day. I was going through the mail and he told me he had something for me. I saw a bag of Swedish Fish candy on the counter and asked if that’s what he had for me and he said No. I turned around and he was on one knee holding a ring and asked me to marry him!

Why you choose Florence/Italy for your wedding – My parents met in high school in Rome and I have spent a lot of time in Italy throughout my life. Michael and I wanted more of a rustic wedding setting but something that our guests could get to easily. A family friend that lives in Florence told us about Villa Le Piazzole after having attended a wedding there. We visited it (in the snow!) and fell in love with it. We loved the proximity to Florence but the relaxed and beautiful setting and feeling that we were in the middle of Tuscany.

Your wedding day – Michael and I were married in a Jewish ceremony in the evening of October 15, 2011. We were joined by 50 friends and family that traveled to be there with us. We spent the afternoon taking pictures all over Florence before the ceremony and then had an amazing dinner and dancing afterwards. Michael and I were lucky to work with amazing vendors for our wedding. Planning a wedding in Italy from the US seems like a huge task, but we were fortunate to be in the wonderfully talented hands of Nadia and Oleg at Whitethings and Benedetta at Villa Le Piazzole. They helped organize everything from the beautiful candles all over the property, to finding the right florist and caterer, and suggested Michela for our photos (who was fantastic!). The whole experience was so much more beautiful and wonderful than I had been imagining since we started our planning process. I am confident that our magical wedding in Florence would not have been nearly as special had it not been for our wonderful vendors.

What’s the thing that some said or did that touched you most – I was very touched by my father’s toast during the dinner. He said some wonderful things about me and about Michael. It really meant a lot to me.

The funniest thing that happened – The dance party after dinner was so fun. We had everyone from my 6 year old cousin to Michael’s 89 year old grandmother dancing.

Your dress – I loved my dress. It was a Modern Trousseau design, tiered fabric and I had a hand crafted belt that I wore. Probably the highlight of my outfit were my yellow shoes though. I also wore something from both of my grandmothers and both of Michael’s. We each have one grandmother living, but only Michael’s could make the trip. I wore two bracelets from my living grandmother and Michael’s living grandmother, a pin from my grandmother who passed away, and used the wedding ring of Michael’s grandmother who passed away. She used that ring when she got married, as did Michael’s mother. I felt if was important to honor everyone.

Decor & color scheme – My favorite color is yellow, so I had yellow shoes, Michael had yellow socks and a plaid bow-tie with yellow in it. However, since it was fall, I wanted to incorporate fall colors, so my flowers were yellow, orange and red, my maid of honor (my sister) wore a red dress, and the best man (Michael’s brother) wore orange socks and a red and orange plaid bow-tie. The decor was very simple, white tablecloths and napkins and lots of candles because it was night time.

Your love song – Something by the Beatles

Where did you go on your honeymoon – We had an amazing, once in a lifetime honeymoon. After a week in Italy before the wedding where we explored Rome and Florence, we went to Istanbul for 4 days, Melbourne, Kangaroo Island and Sydney in Australia for 8 days, Auckland, New Zealand, and ended in Bora Bora for 5 days. It was incredible.

What’s Love for you – To me, Love is more than a feeling, it’s a state of being. I think when you are in love, more things make sense and you don’t take things and people for granted. (at least that’s how I feel!)

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Matrimonio a Montecito, California

Abbiamo pubblicato le foto del servizio fatto da Carlo e Michela quest’estate per un matrimonio vip a Montecito in California. Si è unito a noi in questa impresa il nostro amico e collaboratore Gianluca ed è stata un’esperienza fantastica.  Per saperne di più…

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At the end of this Summer Carlo and I shot a wedding at La Bandita, a charming small hotel set in the spectacular scenery of the Val D’Orcia near Pienza.  With the complicity of the most beautiful light of the year, the lovely children and the breathtaking beauty of this land, we could take some great shots that we are happy to share here with you .

Michela

Matrimonio alla Bandita, Pienza

A fine estate Angelo ed io abbiamo realizzato questo servizio alla Bandita, un incantevole piccolo hotel nello spettacolare scenario della Val D’Orcia, vicino a Pienza. Con la complicità della la più bella luce dell’anno, di bambini meravigliosi e del paesaggio della Val D’Orcia il lavoro che ne è venuto fuori ci rende orgogliosi di presentarvelo.

Carlo

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