Valentina & Danny

This beautiful Anglo-Italian wedding held in the magical surroundings of Southern Sardinia with its gorgeous bright florals and sophisticated fashion, has really set my pulse racing. The light and love captured by Greg Funnell and RMW's The List videographer Gione Da Silva is off the chart, and so are all the details and decor. I'm positively sure you'll be reaching for your pinning button and bookmarking this gorgeous destination wedding, so I'll keep you no longer and let you enjoy.

Location

Valentina the Bride: We chose to get married in the south of Sardinia because my father Raffaele was from Sardinia originally and given he is no longer with us we thought it would be the closest to having him there. Plus it was a good excuse to get married in a truly beautiful part of the world. We chose the venue Is Morus Relais as we liked the idea of having a very intimate private wedding – it’s a serene boutique hotel overlooking the sea, secluded with a private beach. It was also lovely to have everyone out there and spend time before and after the wedding with a lot of our guests making a proper holiday out of it. We had a rehearsal dinner the night before at an authentic Sardinian restaurant Su Furriadroxu in Pula, which almost felt like another wedding in itself and 'brunch' the day after the wedding with pizza and Prosecco on the beach.

Proposal

Daniel proposed in Rome, my home city, and had chosen a beautiful art deco teardrop diamond ring from vintage jewellers Berganza, which he presented in a bespoke ring box with my initial V embroidered on it.

Wedding Morning

On the day of the wedding I wore a La Perla blue robe (my 'something blue’!) while getting ready with my mum and bridesmaids in the hotel suite - and my engraved Annina Vogel pendant Daniel bought me for our first Valentine’s day together. We had a nice brunch from the hotel and a bottle of Champagne and chocolates Daniel sent up. My makeup was done by a good friend and wedding guest, Stacy Wodu who is a professional make-up artist. The whole preparation in our suite was a really lovely moment of being reunited with friends who had come from all over Europe, lots of laughter and happiness.

Dress

My dress and veil was made to measure by a tailor in Rome, which I paired with shoes by Charlotte Olympia, and a tiara by Agnes Hart. After dinner I changed into a more comfortable Ellery dress (for dancing!). I also wore a lovely Monica Vinader bracelet - a gift from Daniel on the day, matching a pendant we had bought for my mother - and a vintage sapphire ring given to my mum from my grandmother (something borrowed!)

Bridesmaids

The bridesmaids wore matching silver Debut dresses, and the maids of honor wore Jenny Packham. It was such a treat to have all of them come all the way to Sardinia so I really wanted to treat them with their dresses, and also bought some starfish shaped earrings for everyone! For the maids of honour I bought some lovely handmade hairpins which my mum and I also wore. My niece Federica also looked incredibly pretty as a flower girl, she had a flower crown and wore a lovely silver and pink dress to match with the bridsmaids and maids of honour's dresses

Groom

Daniel wore a Saint Laurent blue dinner jacket, and a bow tie from Lanvin, with vegan black derby dress shoes from Bourgeois Boheme, with the ushers all wearing black dinner jackets. Daniel bought engraved hip flasks for Jack and Carl his joint best men, and some nice long Falke dress socks for everyone - much to everyone’s amusement apparently given it was such a warm day by the beach (I was insistent on not having anyone wearing short socks with their ankles showing! - it’s an Italian thing!)

{Watch The Film}

Videography

Colour Scheme & Decor

There wasn't really a colour scheme, all I knew was that I wanted to have something colourful yet simple and classic so for my wedding party I went for silver as I like a bit of sparkle and for the flowers I asked our florist to use a mixture of local flowers and plants - the fauna is so rich there!

Ceremony

Given my father couldn’t be with me I chose to walk myself down the aisle accompanied by the cellist and harpist playing Hounds of Love by Kate Bush. The ceremony was both in English and Italian, with Orders of Service printed out for the guests with translations of the readings. My friend Silvia read Waiting by Raymond Carver and Daniel’s father Kim read an excerpt from Captain Corelli’s Mandolin by Louis de Bernieres. We wrote their own vows (also read in Italiano and Inglese!) and at the end the whole congregation sung Stand By Me by Ben E King which was a lovely moment to share with all of our guests.

Entertainment

While the wedding party disappeared for photographs, the guests enjoyed an Apperitivo on the lawn accompanied by a jazz quartet playing swing music and bossa nova... I have a vegan cafe Lele’s in Hackney and we’ve catered a few vegan weddings so Daniel did joke about Lele’s providing the catering with me cooking at my own wedding… but thankfully we decided against it! The food was all true to the local region, but specially prepared as vegan, our own wedding being the first wedding Lele's vegan wedding planning business Little Blue Tree had organised start to finish! The band played on as the guests made their way inside to the dining area overlooking the lawn - and for a bit of fun we entered to The James Bond Theme by John Barry!

Decor

The tables were named after a mixture of song titles, and the places were set with an individual hand calligraphed name card, a menu, and a lyric card with a couple of lines from the song the table was named after with a link to the Spotify playlist of all the table song names.

Readings

We had a very moving speech from my mother, our Master of Ceremonies James who had introduced us in the pub in Hackney only a few years ago, both of us, and of course, the best men Carl and Jack… Daniel also treated us to a bit of a shaky but funny rendition of an Italian song by Rino Gaetano Ma Il Cielo e semipro piu blu (but the sky is always blue), and our friend Lloyd recited The Owl And The Pussycat by Edward Lear, one Daniel's grandfather used to read him!... Then after the best man’s speech various past bandmates of Daniel’s from bands he had been in over the years took over from the house band to play a slightly disheveled tongue in cheek version of ‘White Wedding’ by Billy Idol.

Cake

We then decamped to the terrace via a pathway illuminated by fairylights to cut the cake and dance the night away under the stars, overlooking the sea. The cake was a traditional local variety – crunchy caramel and vanilla sponge. We also had gluten-free cakes and a table of traditional biscuits and sweets from the region ‘confetti’ – which in Italy are almonds covered in sugar icing with different flavours. We also had a gelato stand made using liquid nitrogen, which was quite a spectacle!

First Dance

Our first dance was This Must Be The Place by Talking Heads, and by this point some of the plastic flamingoes had joined the party and there is a little less clarity around the details :)