Beccy & Phil

Lake Garda, Italy

This was a wedding like no other for me.

Having planned both Beccy’s brother and sister’s wedding, I hadn’t expected to plan Beccy and Phil’s, as Beccy had always said she wanted a small, intimate wedding. However, plans change and in July 2021 whilst in a planning meeting for her sister’s wedding, I heard those words… ”Andrea would you plan a wedding in Italy?” Well, I thought about it for all of five seconds and promptly said “Yes of course!”

This was a dream come true for me, whilst never intentionally setting out to do destination weddings, Italy is one of mine and my family’s favourite places to go on holiday, so if I was going to plan one anywhere, this is where it would be.

But going on holiday and planning a wedding are two very different things. With my years of experience in planning weddings around the UK and working with clients from overseas, I knew this was going to be quite a challenge.

Beccy thought she had found her dream venue, but before they arranged to go out to visit, she asked me to explore some other options. However, it was clear to see that the fabulous Isola del Garda was going to be hard to beat and it had availability for September the following year!

Beccy and Phil arranged to go out to do an initial venue visit; unfortunately, I couldn’t attend, so instead sent them out with a list of questions and things to look at so they could gather as much information as possible!

They came back completely smitten with the place… it was simply stunning!

So now the hard work started, I had to plan a wedding on an island in Lake Garda, where everyone including guests and suppliers, plus everything for the wedding had to arrive by boat. To say the logistics were complicated, was an understatement, this was going to be very interesting. 

The venue had provided a recommended supplier list and of course they were all Italian. I started some initial work, with Google translate becoming my go-to for writing emails! I soon realised I really needed someone on the ground who knew the Isola and could advise me on logistics and ideally spoke English and Italian. So, I reached out to a local planner Ginny, who fitted the bill perfectly and it was one of the best things I ever did as her knowledge and support proved invaluable.

Then followed all the detailed planning.

Beccy and Phil had decided they would get legally married in the UK, (it is possible to do in Italy but just added another layer of formality) and instead have a celebrant led ceremony on the Isola. They soon realised they really wanted someone they knew to conduct the ceremony and asked Phil’s Dad if he would undertake it, what an honour for him!

I met regularly with Beccy and Phil to discuss ideas and plans for their day, which included a relaxed, informal welcome event the day before the wedding. They choose a local caterer and florist however, one thing quickly became clear, we wanted to take our own musicians out with us; music was too important to them, and we wanted to work with suppliers we knew. In the end we took out a string trio, DJ, singer and videographer. Beccy and Phil also found an amazing roaming band who they loved, but who were based in France. They assured me they would arrive on time on the day!

As plans developed, we had to communicate everything to guests, whose numbers had grown from an initial 60 to 80, Beccy envisaged beautiful hand painted invitations which would show all the locations for the day and I found a talented artist who could create these.

One of the highlights of the planning was our visit in April 2022, when we went out with parents to see the Isola for ourselves. We had to make the most of this visit, so I had a detailed itinerary for the weekend which included a detailed venue visit, meetings with the lighting and production company, the florist, a menu tasting as well as looking at possible venues for the welcome lunch. For this we found in a gorgeous restaurant overlooking the lake, with views of Isola! It was a very successful trip as we all fell in love with the location, though it also made me realise the sheer scale of the logistics involved.

With a destination wedding one of the key things, you are relying on is the weather, I had a plan A, B and C depending on what it did, but the dream is always going to be having the perfect weather. We had boats to arrange not just for guests, but also the bridal party who were staying in a fabulous villa a 40minute boat ride away. As the date got closer, we were all obsessed with the weather apps!

The time finally came when we would all start to make our journey’s out to Italy with the bride and groom flying out a couple of days ahead of me and the news on the weather wasn’t reassuring, it was looking uncomfortably changeable. I had packed a few small brollies in my hand luggage and had ordered some heaters to be delivered as a precaution.

I had a meeting arranged with Ginny for the Thursday evening and she had been speaking to our boat captain. He was worried, there was a storm due on the Friday evening which would last into Saturday (Friday was set to be glorious of course!) and the temperature was going to drop by at least 10 degrees, which would cause a big swell on the lake. This meant it may not be possible to collect guests from our original port as it wouldn’t be safe getting them on board and they may all have to be transported to a more sheltered port, same for the bride and groom! I also had the venue telling me I needed to decide by 12.00pm on Friday where we would use for the wedding so the kitchen could be set up in the right location. To top it off, a French air traffic controllers strike was announced for the following day and hundreds of flights had been cancelled, which potentially affected all my suppliers and some guests who were  arriving the next day… this was going to be even more challenging than I thought.

But I wasn’t doing this alone, Ginny and I were busy making contingency plans and I decided to hang fire until the Friday morning to review the weather with the venue before making a final decision on location.

As predicted Friday dawned glorious and we were soon on our way to the restaurant, which had been prettily decorated and set up as we wanted, our guitarist had arrived and the view was stunning. Guests enjoyed Aperol Spritz and local beers along with a feast of pasta and pizza and delicious desserts. As part of Phil’s speech, we gave guests a heads up that they had to plan for the following day’s weather by bringing jackets in case they got cold and to follow any instructions from me in case we needed to change port. All very hard to believe when it was bright sunshine and 28 degrees.

That evening I went over to the Isola to check on set up, I had decided when reviewing the weather forecast and listening to the advice from Alberta at the venue, that there was enough chance it was going to turn in time for us to have the day as we planned. As we left the Isola that evening, we could hear the thunder in the distance and the lightening was illuminating the mountains around us, the storm was on its way! Thankfully though, despite some flight delays, all my suppliers had managed to make it.

I would now love to say the storm passed overnight and the next morning was clear blue skies, but it couldn’t have been further from the truth.

The view from my window was of sideways trees, grey skies and heavy rain. Beccy was messaging me asking if even the suppliers would get to Isola as she had never seen the lake like this, it was like the sea!

But we knew it was going to clear, it just depended on if it would clear in time. Ginny and I were reviewing our plans and I decided to see if we could firstly change the type of boat the bridal party would be arriving on; I wanted my bride to arrive looking like she had had her hair and makeup done!!!

We agreed to review things again an hour later with the boat captain as I started to see the first signs of a blue sky, this was more promising. To cut a long story short, we managed to keep all the transport plans as they were, other than the bride’s boat; Phil was still able to travel over on his original speedboat, thank goodness.#

I made my way to Isola with my raincoat on and brollies in hand, we weren’t out of the woods yet and sure enough set up was way behind as the wind was causing a lot of ceremony set up problems as the type of chairs we had, couldn’t get wet.                         

But it was at least staying dry and the grey clouds weren’t looking quite so ominous. Gradually things started to take shape and I was able to communicate with all the suppliers onsite making sure they set things up to the standards I was wanting. (As they tend to do things a little differently in Italy). Soon musicians made it safely over and completed their sound check, welcome drinks were set up and with 30 minutes to go we could finally set up the chairs for the ceremony, everyone was excited to see this day finally come together.

Phil arrived by speedboat looking like a blond James Bond and all the planning and preparation kicked in as guests arrived from their boats ably guided by Ginny. As they got their first glimpse of the stunning setting, we all knew this was going to be an incredibly special day.

Some of my favourite highlights included the ceremony conducted by ‘Big Phil’ which was so emotional and heartfelt; the drinks reception in the Italian Gardens overlooking the lake as Beccy and Phil went past waving to guests from their gorgeous Riva boat; the music throughout the day especially the roaming musicians who had guests up and dancing during dinner and all of the speeches, which were funny and touching in equal measure. Then of course my stunning bride and groom who looked like movie stars, which our fabulous UK videographer and super talented Italian photographer captured so beautifully.

The evening ended with a fabulous party down at the boat house, with the port lit by candles and festoon lighting, creating the perfect setting. The boats glided in to whisk the guests away and I could hear them say, “Best weekend ever” and “Andrea, we feel like we’re in an episode of Succession, but better!” this just made my heart sing.    

It had been a challenging wedding to plan and implement, but would I do it again? Yes, in a heartbeat… it was just fabulous.