Fanny and Andres’s gorgeous Italian wedding was held on 12th October 2023 at the breathtakingly beautiful Italian wedding venue, Locanda in Tuscany.
The couple were inspired by the simple, natural beauty of the Tuscan country-side and really wanted to inject the essence of Italian culture into their wedding day. They didn’t hire a planner – choosing to do all the planning themselves, with assistance from their venue.
This beautiful bride, who looked incredible in her Pronovias gown, has shared so much information – go grab a cup of tea and enjoy her gorgeous story, told through these exquisite photographs by Stefano Santucci.
Venue & Location
Our venue was Locanda in Tuscany, located in Castiglione d’Orcia, Italy near Pienza. Andres proposed to me when we were traveling through Tuscany. He had been in love with the Val d’orcia, particularly Pienza and its Duomo area since traveling there for the first time almost 10 years ago, and we always dreamt of going there together. We looked into venues the day after our engagement and found Locanda in Tuscany.
It looked incredible, but we knew it was something we’d have to see in person. So we planned a spontaneous drive there for the next day. As soon as we arrived and saw it for the first time, we knew that if we were going to choose Italy, this would be the place. The panoramic views of Tuscany were breathtaking and it truly felt like a private little corner of paradise. After seeing Locanda, we really never considered doing it anywhere else.
Italy is known for its rich cuisine, culture, architecture, and timeless natural beauty. We wanted our wedding to bring all that to life. The flowers, decor, food, and overall aesthetics were centred around the beauty in simplicity and detail. We also added vintage details like the 1960’s Fiat 500 car we rode in to match the architecture in the cathedral and venue. It made a difference in the overall romantic mood we wanted to set.
We didn’t hire a full-time event planner as we wanted to make it a personal experience to handpick our vendors and design the overall style/details of our wedding. Since it was in Italy and we live in Tennessee, we chose to hire Francesca and Claudia from Locanda in Tuscany as our soft coordinators. They really helped us narrow down the vendors we chose and provide support with the logistics of getting everything ready for our day. They made the day-of flow smoothly and the experience much less daunting despite a 7 hour time difference and language barrier.
I love creating and gifting flower arrangements to my family and friends. It is my creative outlet, and I knew my dress and accessories had to encapsulate that.
Since my dress had a flower motif with the Mikado flowers and pearl details draping the front, I wanted to keep the accessories minimal. Therefore, I fell in love with the Megan Therese Couture wildflower pins that were gifted to me by my sister. They were hand-made pearl pins that again tied the pearl details on my dress and veil.
Since my wedding dress had a slit on the leg, I knew it would be a perfect moment for the shoes that I chose as they would always be seen. I wanted to keep my look classic and sleek so I looked for a close-toe shoe that called that but still keeping it fun and modern. I have always been drawn to European fashion, particularly that of Spain (maybe it is because of my Venezuelan-Spanish background).
Through my search for wedding design/inspiration, I found the Casilda Se Casa blog. Cristina , the creator, is a Spanish creator that blogs about weddings and fashion. This is where I found the Spanish shoe boutique FlordeAsoka, where artisans hand-make every shoe. I instantly fell in love with the timeless design and velvet fabric they used on the Tilda shoes I chose to wear for my wedding. A perfect combination of textures for my Fall wedding.
I wore a cathedral veil by Pronovias. I decided to wear one as it was a traditional Catholic church ceremony at Il Duomo in the small town of Pienza, Italy.
What I loved most about my cathedral veil was the small pearl detail that ran along the edge. It matched beautifully with the pearls and Mikado flowers draping the front of my dress. I wanted my veil to be classic with a touch of modern detail.
For the day of my wedding, I mixed ‘Une Tonne de Roses’ and ‘Flavia Vanilla’ (my favourite everyday scent) together for that perfect blend of fresh and romantic.
Both fragrances are from the French boutique parfumerie Parle Moi de Parfum. I discovered them on a trip to France with my sister and then-boyfriend, Andres.
Natural Wedding Flowers
We chose to have Sartoria Floreale create our dream flower arrangements. Since flowers are a personal passion of mine, we wanted our wedding flower to be clean, sophisticated, and timeless. We really wanted to highlight the natural and simplicity of the beautiful Tuscan rolling hills and architecture.
“Simplicity is the keynote of all true elegance”, as Coco Chanel once said. Therefore, we went with white and a touch of blush flowers like orchids, roses, wax flowers, and delphinium. For the table runners, we went with olive leaf branches, eucalyptus, and other greenery. We also chose various vintage furniture pieces, décor, and table settings from Preludio Noleggi event house.
My bridesmaid had the liberty to choose their own dresses! However, I wanted them all to have a different warm Fall colour and for it to be ankle length as the wedding reception would be outside on the hillside. I wanted their dresses to match the Tuscan countryside where they were highlighting their simplicity and minimal beauty.
My two nephews were also our ring bearers. I chose the Spanish hand-made boutique Mama Madejas for their entire look. What I mostly loved about this boutique is their selection of fabrics. I decided on the blend of tweed and linen with the colour combination of sage green and white.
Photography & Videography
Since Andres and I are both into photography, we knew it was perhaps the one thing from our wedding day that we’d treasure for years. As with any other part of wedding planning, you go in with an expectation of what you’re looking for and search for someone that can deliver even half of what you’ve imagined. When it came to photographers, we looked at well over a hundred.
We looked at photographers local to Italy, some from other countries, and others from the US. No matter where we looked, no one came close to what Stefano Santucci offered. His shots were intimate, intentional and understated/minimal. His style was ethereal, romantic and timeless. We fell in love with his work from that very first moment, and no matter where else we looked or who else we spoke to, no one else gave us that same feeling.
On the day of, he was a consummate professional and didn’t just capture special moments with great depth, but even helped create moments that felt intimate and genuine. He coordinated our large, often difficult-to-manage families to masterfully capture each and every shot we wanted, and so many we never could have dreamed of.
Though he was not familiar with our videographer and had never worked with him before, their collaboration was strong and symbiotic, playing off of each other dynamically to capture each moment with great care. We would recommend him to anyone and everyone who cares as much as we do for having their moment captured in all of its beauty and be instantly and effortlessly transported back to that day.
When it came to choosing a videographer, we knew we’d have to go with someone that was local to Italy and had a love for Tuscany’s natural beauty that mirrored our own. We found Mario Albanese while looking through several different videographer options and loved the energy and authenticity of his work. Each of the videos we watched felt personal and intentional and vividly captured what made each client’s big day their own kind of special.
We really didn’t find anyone who’s work accomplished this quite in the same way that Mario did. On the day of, he and his second videographer were extremely supportive and pleasant to work with. They were thoughtful in their direction and made something that could easily have been a bit awkward and stiff, a real joy and truly memorable. He was a great complement to Stefano’s work and was attentive to his and our needs/ideas while also putting forth many of his own. We can’t wait to see the finished product soon!
How They Met
Andres and I moved to Memphis from the same city in Venezuela over two decades before we’d meet. It doesn’t seem all that rare, but practically no one was leaving Venezuela for the US at the time, especially not to a place like Tennessee. Nevertheless, our families did just that within months of each other.
It would be another 20 years, in 2017, before we were introduced to each other by Andres’ brother, Alex, who had just moved to Washington DC at the time and began dating a great friend of mine who, funnily enough, was also from Memphis and had started at the same university.
It took them moving across the country to finally meet and open that door for us. Fast forward a few months, and I had just finished studying abroad in Sao Paulo, Brazil for a semester.
I decided at the last minute to stop in DC when flying back to the US. I was excited to see an old friend and meet this guy she’d been dating. She’d told me a lot of great things and had mentioned an elusive older brother who I just had to meet.
While she was in class, I got to know Alex a bit better, and he wasted no time in trying to set us up. “You have to hang out with my brother, he’s the best,” he’d say. He didn’t miss a beat as he pitched me on meeting Andres, connecting any and every dot he could to convince me we just had to meet. Unbeknownst to me, Alex was giving Andres a very similar sales pitch. A couple of weeks later, Andres sent the text message that would start it all. 5 amazing, adventure-filled years later, I was on a plane to meet Andres in Tuscany after his annual family trip.
On our third day there, he told me he’d planned a sunset dinner at a place I would never forget, a little over an hour away. On the way, he put on the most convincing ‘Uh, we’re lost…” act I’ve ever seen. Somehow, we ended up walking up a flight of steps that couldn’t possibly have led to any type of restaurant. What they did lead to, however, was the most breathtaking Tuscan countryside I’ve seen even to this day.
When I turned around to give him a bewildered stare, he was holding out a small green velvet box and I was suddenly aware of the random stranger snapping pictures from a bench just a few feet away (a secret photographer he’d hired). The days that followed were incredible, Andres took me to all his favourite spots in Chianti, Siena and Val d’Orcia, and I fell in love with it the same way he had been for years; in such a way that, for the year and a half we spent carefully planning our big day, we never entertained the idea of having it anywhere else.
Andres visited Oak Hall, a curated menswear store in Nashville, one of few Atelier Munro retailers in the US where he’d previously ordered several of their made-to-measure suits. After looking through their catalog to customiSe the jacket design/cut and select from their button and liner options, he settled on a dark green velvet smoking jacket with custom half-liner and velvet buttons, black tuxedo pants and velvet Magnanni loafers.
Andres wore a pair of silver Cartier cufflinks I had given him as an anniversary gift the year prior. He paired those with a silver, blue and gold Rolex Yachtmaster II, a something-borrowed from his oldest brother, Gabriel.
The Reception
A special detail that we made for the table setting was the embroidered napkins. We had each napkin monogrammed in Mexico with our initials in an olive green thread.
This made the table setting more personalised and we were able to then keep each napkin as a wedding souvenir that will be used for special events.
Our caterer was one of the highlights of our receptions. We really wanted to highlight the amazing flavours in the Italian cuisine and give our guests that experience. We chose to go with La Parolina for our five course meal.
La Parolina is a Michelin star restaurant that blends both traditional and modern influences in their cuisine. Their passion and culinary mastery absolutely shone through in our reception and neither we nor our guests could stop raving about their tasting menu.
My mother-in-law gifted us the party favours days before the wedding while in Florence. I fell in love with the Profumo-Farmaceutica di Santa Maria Novella museum/ shop while on my engagement trip and found their story and products fascinating.
This was originally a friar’s convent founded over 800 years ago in 1221, and it is considered today the oldest pharmacy in the world famous for their candles, perfumes, and traditional preparations. My mother-in-law found it best fitting to surprise me with delicate hand creams for all the ladies.
We loved that our caterer, La Parolina, offered to make our wedding cake on site. We chose to have our wedding cake be a Millefoglie cake with white chocolate mousse and fresh berries.
It was carried out by the chefs and placed on the cake table when the cake cutting part began after dinner. The cake was light, airy and perfectly layered with the mousse and berries. Truly another highlight of the night!
The Florence String Quartet did an incredible job of taking songs from different eras and genres that were very personal to us and recreating them as classical motifs. There is a song that is unique to our country (“La Alma Llanera” from Venezuela) that is a treasured pastime no matter which part of the country you’re from.
Though they had never heard of it, they mastered it once we were able to find sheet music and played it beautifully during our cocktail hour.
It was one of the most unforgettable moments both for us and our guests. Locanda provided us with understated bistro lighting that was both functional and minimal.
Being that tethered were many other details that were more intricate and thought out, we wanted to illuminate the space with something that left the focus elsewhere.
Evening & Dancing
We chose ‘Vivo’. by Pedro Capo for our first dance. While it may be a bit of a slow song, its intimate sound and atmosphere and the lyrics are what resonated most with us as it felt very appropriate/in-keeping with the time and setting.
Words of Wedded Wisdom
My advice to anyone planning a wedding is to be overly organised with every aspect of the wedding, especially if you are doing the majority of the planning. For me it was extremely helpful to have the soft coordinators to help me with the vendors and the day-off logistics.
Aside from that, be mindful of getting overwhelmed with too many opinions since it is a very stressful (yet beautiful) moment in your life and ultimately you want to feel that the moment reflects you. Lastly, do not be afraid to ask for help. You will be surprise how reliving it is to have someone (or in my case my mother, mother-in-law and sisters) help so that you too can enjoy the moment too.
We ended up exceeding our budget by about half of the original number, which honestly may have been due to some underestimation on our part. When we first started planning and met with actual planners, they gave us a number that seemed insane to us at the time, which actually ended up being exactly what we spent. But we wouldn’t take any of it back. Every bit was worth it.
