Tara & Matt needed to look no further than their beautiful venue of CHATEAU LA DURANTIE for the inspiration behind their wedding style. “We wanted to highlight all the beautiful elements of the building, the gardens, the interior, and the history of the incredible venue without any of our décor or wedding items overshadowing the natural beauty of the venue itself. We started planning our wedding with the mindset ‘less is more’ and ‘let the surroundings do the talking’. Small touches with big impact. The shutters of the wedding venue – a very pale duckegg blue – was also the inspiration behind the colour of our wedding. I wanted to everything white and crystal with the hint of blue of the shutters.” Cape Town wedding photographer LIZELLE GOUSSARD was on hand to capture their day.
WHY DID YOU CHOOSE THIS LOCATION? We knew we wanted to get married abroad. Matt is from England and I’m from South Africa. We wanted to choose a location that is neutral but also special to us. France was a clear winner as that’s where we met and a lot of the early stages of our relationship was built traveling and exploring the countryside. We started our hunt for a chateau in the French countryside. We booked the venue without having set foot on the grounds. We were mesmerized by the images of the building & gardens and the video call with the owner that took us through every square meter of the building and grounds convinced us. The fact that it could house so many of our guests was also a big plus. The venue offered a range of options for us to set up all the events taking place over our wedding weekend. A full 12 months later we were only able to get to the venue to see it in person, and the nerves settled the instant we drove through the gates and this breathtaking, limestone almost castle-like building was in front of us with the most perfectly trimmed topiaries welcoming us. IT WAS PERFECT and even better than we dreamed of it being.
HOW DID YOU MEET? We worked on the same superyacht as stewardess and engineer. I didn’t really want to take the job, but the yacht was based in Nice, I always wanted to visit Nice and the South of France so I took the job with the thought to leave again a few months after. Matthew and I met and on the second day of me joining the yacht we went on our first date. We’ve been together ever since.
TELL US ABOUT YOUR PROPOSAL: We were in South Africa at my (Tara’s) family beach house on the most Southern Tip of Africa. This holiday home and holiday time is an incredibly special time for me with my family and Matt knew some of my best memories growing up and spent to this day, is here. I was oblivious to Matthew getting a ring made and leaving the beach house to go collect it 2hours drive away telling me he’s meeting one of his yachting friends. Two days later I had my best friend come to visit as well, it was beautiful weather, we were outside taking sunset pictures with the Southern Tip & ocean as backdrop. Matthew didn’t plan to propose then, but he confessed afterwards that it all lined up for him. I was in my favourite place, I had my family with me, I had my best friend there, I was dressed up for the night, and a beautiful sunset. Matt grabbed my hand after the photos and asked to walk with him down to the beach. I was confused as we had guests and everyone was walking back home. And then it clicked. I started crying knowing what’s coming. Matt gave a beautiful speech which he had to remind me of afterwards as everything was a blur, and afterwards dropped down on one knee. It was my best decision ever and the easiest yes.
TELL US ABOUT FINDING YOUR WEDDING DRESS/ATTIRE: I knew I wanted to work with the renowned South African designer Kobus Dippenaar. He’s really talented at helping his brides understand their body shape and recommending what works best for them without suffocating their unique style. He gave me so much guidance and advice on things I was convinced would work for me and my body, but with his suggestions and tweaks it always came out better. He also designed my two sisters’ wedding dresses and my mother’s outfits. I knew I wanted to a ‘wow’ moment, I knew I wanted something that was sparkly, I knew I didn’t want lace or floral details….Kobus helped me get all of it. The material was the most important and Kobus got the most stunning Japanese silk with faded glitter details. I always had the idea of a cape, before it became trendy, as it always reminded me of royalty. I think my dress, along with Matthew’s smart style, looked beautiful against the backdrop of the chateau and all the luxury details of the venue.
DID YOU HAVE ANY DIY ELEMENTS? A lot! We splurged on the venue, and we needed to save money elsewhere. We live in the UK, my support system & creatives (mom & sisters) live in South Africa and the wedding is happening in France. A lot of it I couldn’t source in France with the language barrier or lack of suppliers, or simply too high quotes for things I wanted that was unique. In the UK. Things like the trim all around the bridal table was DIY. We got someone that does Macrame to make the tassels, I bought the fringe off-cuts from an upholstery and then convinced a curtain-maker to stitch the two together. The tablecloth of the bridal table was also DIY. I was so specific about what shade of blue I wanted and couldn’t find this colour fabric anywhere. So I bought white cotton and got it dyed myself to be the perfect shade. As we had to save on the budget, we couldn’t afford a gift for each guest. So I thought about an idea that has multi-purpose. So I came up with the idea of an embroided bow with each guests’ name on to serve as a name card, a pop of the blue to form of the table decor and then also something guests could take home and put up in their house, Christmas tree etc. I bought meters of velvet ribbon on a marketplace, then cut it to the desired length. I asked a local embroider to embroid each guests’ name onto it. My mom and I sat for 5+ hours with a glue-gun and hand folded each of the 100 bows that served as the place cards for each guest. All of the above (around 15kg) had to fly with me in my suitcase from South Africa to the UK.
I also wanted big, white vases for my flowers at the ceremony, but my budget didn’t allow me to rent real pots. I bought plastic ones off a marketplace for very cheap, sprayed them with a concrete spray to give them texture, and the sprayed them white. Worked like a charm!
DESCRIBE YOUR WEDDING FLOWERS: Our brief was all white peonies. We didn’t want big, elaborate weddings as we knew it would be hot this time of year and it always make me sad to see flowers wilt and go to waste at weddings. We thought the garden & venue surroundings was our ‘flowers’. So we did a peonies wreath the length of the bridal table for that opulence feeling, and vases with peonies in the center of each guest table.
I also rented topiaries and plinths for the ceremony paying tribute to the French-style gardens of the chateau with plenty of topiaries scattered around the grounds too. Again, all white flowers.
FAVOURITE DETAIL OF THE DAY: Favourite non-decorative detail: The fact that the weather held out and we could dine outside in front of the chateau (something everyone, including the wedding planner, advised us against but we were so adamant that we wanted to have the lit-up chateau as the backdrop to our reception and dine under the stars. Words can’t describe how perfect the setting was.
Favourite decorative detail: Probably the trim around the bridal table. It was something unique, something that paid homage to France, the chateau, contributed to the feeling of opulence & luxury and something I haven’t seen at any other wedding yet.
WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE OUT TO A COUPLE PLANNING THEIR WEDDING? Choose your wedding planner very wisely. Don’t be afraid or shy to ask questions. I made the mistake of thinking ‘it is taken care of’ and didn’t ask questions and really regretted that when it didn’t all go according to plan. It’s your wedding, you’re paying the planner. Ask everything that you’re not sure of.
We don’t want to say “enjoy it”. It’s not enjoyable and no matter how hard we tried, the stress always overshadowed the enjoyment. Our advice would be is to ask for help. Set a clear list of what you would like as a couple and what needs to be done. And then delegate tasks. We were fortunate enough to have a support system that jumped at any opportunity to help. Even on the day when a things didn’t go according to plan, it was such a relief that we were comfortable to ask our support system for their help. When people offer to help, take them up on the offer and don’t try doing everything yourself. Especially when you’re the bride.
MOST MEMORABLE MOMENT? At the end of the party, at 3am, Matt and I was the last to leave the tent/dancing floor. By this point I changed my glittery Mui Mui heels for glittery flip flops instead, and we were walking back to the main building. All day we’ve been praying the rain away as it would’ve been detrimental to our vision of how our wedding played out. As we were walking Matt and I discussed how grateful we were that the rain stayed away and that we got the absolute perfect, most beautiful day. We came around the corner and this big, limestone building lit up beautifully once again took our breath away. We stopped and stared and just took it all in feeling extremely lucky. As we kissed, thunderstruck and all of a sudden the biggest, heaviest rain shower came down on us. We thought we couldn’t feel any luckier, and somehow this perfectly timed rain shower was almost like that final blessing upon us. We didn’t even rush to get to the chateau and under shelter. I wanted this moment of pure happiness and gratitude with Matthew by my side to last forever.
WHAT ASPECT OF THE WEDDING WAS THE MOST IMPORTANT TO YOU BOTH? That we get enough time with each other, with our guests and then also with each other with our guests. We have attended so many weddings where the bridal couple is pulled in so many directions and you barely see them on the special dat. That’s one of the reasons why we made it a destination wedding and a 3-day wedding weekend. We didn’t mind spreading our wedding budget over three days instead and cut on small bits of each day if that meant we would be able to have more than enough time to celebrate our marriage with each and every one of our nearest and dearest and truly build so many lasting memories with all of them over the course of the weekend.
ANY OTHER DETAILS THAT HELP TELL THE STORY OF YOUR DAY? We had guests fly in from all over the world. South Africa, UK, Luxembourg, USA, Australia, Germany, and the Netherlands (yet no one from France which was quite ironic) but that really added to this wedding’s incredible vibe. Even though it was all family & friends originally from South Africa and the UK, a lot of these guests have scattered around the world and our wedding was the occasion that brought many of them back together after not seeing each other for months and even years. It was also the first time a lot of our guests were able to travel again after covid restrictions. So a lot of our guests, especially those flying from far away, made it a holiday and now our wedding will always from part of those happy holiday memories. We loved having my and Matt’s world’s come together for a weekend… coming from different countries, this was probably the only time ever we’ll have all of our family and friends together in our lifetime. We cherished every second of it.
Side note – I really loved my bridesmaids’ dresses. It was made of brocade, a material associated with French garments, and also a fabric that you didn’t see in fashion until the late summer of 2023. It even had the touches of blue in it that was the theme of the wedding and a touch of gold/sparkle like my dress. A nice touch.
TELL US A LITTLE ABOUT YOUR HONEYMOON: We went to the Seychelles. Both of us are lucky enough to have seen a few nice places with our careers in yachting. We wanted to go to a place that neither of us have ever been, that is tropical and offers good watersports, activities and diving opportunities. Seychelles has always tickled our interest and we found a resort that had everything we wanted. Our house was right on the beach, with our own pool and bikes to explore the island and only a stone’s throw away from the beach bar (perfect for Matt & I). We went on deep-sea diving excursions which is something very special to share with your other half. One day we went to a private island and got lost in our books with a bottle(s) of Rose shared between our Stanley cups that did a great job of keeping it cool all day. Every night we dined at a different restaurant at the resort. The food-coma was real. We are already planning on going back to the Seychelles, it was just so incredible.
IS THERE ANYTHING YOU WOULD CHANGE OR DO DIFFERENTLY? I’d make sure we got to eat our wedding meal together. Every time we sat down for one of the courses, we got pulled away and we never go
t to enjoy any of the courses sitting next to each other.
A huge thank you to Cape Town wedding photographer LIZELLE GOUSSARD for sharing this stunning wedding with us. Lizelle has a love for cultures and exploring remote locations all over the world and its this that inspires much of her wedding photography. Make sure you check out this Gorgeous intimate destination wedding in South Africa and you can see more of her work in her portfolio here.
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