Katarina & Michael

To say I love this super luxe white on white Tuscan wedding wouldn't be doing it justice. Not even I really, really, really LOVE it is getting close. I feel completely and utterly spoilt by all the stunning views, the greenery and white flowers, and then there's the incredibly stylish fashion which I think deserves a post all of it's own. Katarina's Mira Zwillinger bridal gown is pure heaven. Embroidered with delicate leaves on divine tulle and finished with a gorgeous pair of Louboutin pumps. This was only outfit one! There was also a swift change into a short Oscar de la Renta gown and Dolce Gabbana shoes to dance the night away in. Until 4am I might add! I'd certainly want to dance the night away at the gorgeous Salvadonica too. Especially as it was all lit up with romantic candle and festoon lights and you could enjoy cool cocktails by the pool and indulge in ice-creams from the vintage cart. This destination wedding was a joy to put together and is a real treat from start to finish.

The Dress

Katarina The Bride: Knowing the weather in Italy in August, I knew my dress had to be light and needed to flow. I browsed almost all designers’ websites and couldn’t find anything I liked and so I decided to go to London’s Browns Bride and hoped for the best. And I was amazed; the staff was so nice and helped me with my decision. I tried ten dresses and I liked all of them but still none of them felt like the One. Then my Dad came with this dress made by Mira Zwillinger. I tried it on and my Mum and Dad burst into tears. I knew I had found it! It gave me that special feeling of being a bride and it represented me perfectly. I love nature and those little hand stitched leaves were perfect for our Tuscan wedding. Just before I went to the salon, Michael had suggested to look for an A line dress, not a fitted one, because it would have been be the only and most important day in my life to have a dress like that. I am so thankful that I listened to him. My shoes were Louboutins simple pumps so I could walk easily without getting stuck in my dress at some point. My second dress was Michael’s choice, it was an Oscar de la Renta dress. I wanted to change for the dancing as soon at the end of the cocktail reception. We both love to dance and I knew dancing in a long gown wouldn’t have been easy and I wouldn’t have enjoyed it as much as I wanted. I wore a short fun dress with Dolce Gabbana shoes, which were the closest ones to professional dancing shoes.

The Grooms Attire

Michael is a cyclist and before our wedding he did the Tour de France so knowing his weight would have been quite different the week before our day, he didn’t opt for a tailor-made suit. Because we were having an Italian wedding we wanted to be an Italian designer so we went straight to Dolce and Gabbana and found the suit, which he felt comfortable in it and it was his style too. The way Italians help you with the whole outfit is just one of a kind, they just know how to dress up. His shoes were Louboutins, which he likes because of its comfort, and the famous red soles, which definitely got the attention during church ceremony. He was the best looking groom I ever saw!

The Venue

We are always away from our families and friend the whole year and our wedding was finally a great occasion to see them all and spend some quality time with them. As our guests were from all over the world we wanted to show them our favorite country and its most beautiful region. Our main goals were finding a country estate with lovely modern rooms, where all our guests could be accommodated for 3 days. Plus it needed to be accessible from airport and close to a church. Moreover we wanted the whole wedding to take place outside, including the party until morning. In many venues, due to curfew, this was not possible while, surprisingly, at Salvadonica all of this was possibile! Our amazing wedding planner Francesca Simoncini from SposiamoVi, gave me around 20 options from which we selected 5 preferred locations online. Since Michael was racing at Giro d’Italia, I scheduled to visit the venues on my own. Francesca proposed to stay overnight at Salvadonica before visiting the other 4 venues the next day. While driving to Salvadonica, I received messages that Michael had won a stage of Giro d’Italia, I was so excited as I arrived at Salvadonica. In the evening the atmosphere was intimate and gorgeous, and during my dinner there that night I knew this was The Place. On the next day I immediately informed Francesca we didn’t need to go anywhere else as this was it. And that one was of my best wedding decisions I made besides choosing Sposiamovi! Slavadonica is just stunning. The views and Italian surroundings are just one of a kind!

Colour Scheme/Decor

Michael loved organizing the wedding and was really involved in the decision making process. As a matter of fact he was the one that decided to go for the colors of grey, coffee brown and light blue! We didn’t want to go for typical rustic décor, we wanted to wedding to elegant yet match the Tuscan atmopshere so we opted for a country chic style. We used light blue touches here and there, like for bridesmaids dresses and table nametags. Michael and I love candles ever since we met in The Netherlands and we wanted as much candles and fairy lights as possible. This kind of lightning enhanced the feel of the location.

Flowers

Flowers were an easy choice as I wanted all flowers to be white with a touch of natural green. While selecting table materials we came up with the idea to incorporate traditional Italian herbals and vegetables in the décor. So we opted for greens like artichokes, broccoli and basil. My wedding bouquet was something I wanted to have from my parents wedding, my mum had her bouquet made of white freesias so I wanted exactly the same. They are so beautiful in full blooming and their smell made my day even more magical. We chose natural wooden long tables, the centerpieces alternated groups of florals and greenery to groups of candles in glass containers. We decided to keep height of decorations controlled so guests could still see each other without visual barriers.

The Wedding Party Fashion

I wanted my bridesmaids to look stylish and beautiful, not too romantic but definitely more elegant and sexy. When we started shopping for their dresses we knew we wanted to go for the light blue option, it was just hard to find a cut that fitted all the girls. In the end dresses were ordered from ASOS, luckily it was easy to send them to my girlfriends because they are living all over the world. I am not a big fan of white shoes, but the simple white sandals matched the dresses perfectly. For boys we went with navy blue suits from Zara, which were slim fit and looked really stylish on them.

Entertainment

Our MC was Michael’s good friend Tom and we couldn’t have made a better choice. He was so funny and knew the family and us really well so he had perfect jokes and entertained all of us. Our DJ was Fabien Koufach. We were really stressing about having very good music; it was on top of our wedding list because our families love to dance. We trusted our planner SposiamoVi who suggested Fabien, a talented professional who knows how to make a great party. As soon as he started to play, all our guests were asking us where we had found him as they fell in love with his style. We danced all the way from 11 pm till 4.30 am and honestly our wedding was one of the best parties we ever been to. We gave him around 10 our favorite songs and he nailed our style straightaway and exactly what to play to attract people to keep them on the dance floor.

Food

We were looking for high end Italian cuisine. Our planner, Francesca from SposiamoVi, recommended Galateo Ricevimenti based in Florence. We went there for a tasting and we were amazed by their skills and professionalism. Michael chose the whole menu, which was a selection of the best and finest Italian specialties with a modern twist. For desserts we wanted a desert table and Gelati served from a traditional vintage Italian cart. This was actually a highlight of the wedding, everybody loved to cool down with delicious ice cream scoops in cone. Around 1 am we served hot pizza for guests, which got hungry after so much dancing for some extra energy to carry on the rest of the night.

Photographer

Michael and I agreed that photography was a very important element of the day but we weren’t keen in spending so much time posing for pictures. We rather preferred actually enjoying the wedding and quality time with our guests. So we looked for photographers able to naturally and beautifully capture the best and most meaningful moments. Francesca introduced us to Independent Pictures and as soon as we saw their style we decided they had the eye for detail that we loved. They focus on natural details and are able to capture the best moments of the day like a sunset for our portraits, exactly what we were looking for. We didn’t even notice they were there the whole day as working with them was so easy and comfortable and made us feel natural in front of the camera. Independent Pictures captured the atmosphere of the wedding so authentically that every time we see the photos we think we are taken back to the day again.

Wedding planner

We started the whole planning of our wedding in Italy by choosing a wedding planner to work with. Proving that it was be quite difficult to organize our wedding in Italy since we don’t speak Italian we started to browse on the internet. There were few wedding planners we were initially considering so we set up a skype meeting with 3 of them. As soon as we finished our skype call with Sposiamovi we knew we wanted them to help us with our special day. It was an instant connection! We met with Francesca from SposiamoVi who was our wedding planner in Italy and she understood straight away what we wanted. She was the best wedding planner we could have imagined. She was not only our wedding planner but a good friend too and we couldn’t have hoped for anything more! We would have been lost without her and the day wouldn’t have been so special without her and the whole SposiamoVi girls help!