Colorful Wine Country Wedding at a Private Napa Estate

Lauren Megerdichian
May 23, 2022
Categories: Real Weddings, Romantic, The Blog

Proof that wine country wedding dreams do come true! Julia and Kyle chose a venue that was already filled with an abundance of natural beauty, and the result was a sunsoaked celebration offering stunning alfresco moments with a dress to match the vibe. A Savvy Event and Vignette Floral Design made the most out of the landscape with fun seating arrangements and fresh floral motifs. See the love and energy of the day unfold in the full gallery, captured by the talented Rebecca Yale Photography!

From Rebecca Yale Photography… Julia and Kyle met when they were both living in NYC and two of their closest friends were dating each other and they decided to set them up. Kyle reached out and organized drinks at Apotheke – a very cool speakeasy in Chinatown – and Julia was impressed with the choice! Soon after they made the plans, Kyle texted back saying he had a conflict that night and would have to postpone. Julia wasn’t free for a few weeks, so Kyle quickly changed his plans to make it work. Soon after, Kyle started keeping a calendar…

Julia and Kyle were married at a private estate in Napa, CA on August 28th. Like many 2021 couples, their wedding was originally scheduled for 2020 and had to be pushed a few times due to COVID, but the celebration was well worth the wait! They were joined by nearly 200 of their closest friends and family for a garden celebration with sprawling views of the Napa Valley.

The couple chose to skip a traditional wedding party and invited their friends to casually join them for getting ready and told them to wear whatever they felt best in! Their “Napa valley chic” dress code resulted in guests showing off in their best floral prints, which perfectly suited the bright florals designed by A Savvy Event and Vignette Florals.

The bride had a dress mishap a week before the wedding with her original dress not being tailored properly and luckily with the help of her stylist, Gabrielle Hurwitz, was able to find a gorgeous last minute replacement that perfectly suited the garden-vibe of the wedding. The bride has a love for jewelry and in addition to her traditional silver band for the Jewish ceremony, she wore her grandmothers vintage ring and had a sapphire and diamond band made. The bride honored the memory of both her mother and grandmother through the ring and by wrapping a piece of fabric from her late mother’s gown around her bright floral bouquet. Her mother had a love of foraging mushrooms and Vignette florals surprised the bride later in the day with some white mushrooms on the head table interspersed amongst the flowers in her honor.

The bride had an emotional first look moment with her father before having a first look with her husband-to-be, who wore a casual chic open-neck shirt with no tie under a beautifully tailored blue suit. The couple were joined by their families for their ketubah signing in the beautiful grand room of the private estate pre-ceremony. The ceremony took place in the front garden and the couple modernized the Jewish tradition of the bride circling the groom by both circling one another.

Post ceremony, guests enjoyed cocktail hour and their signature drinks on the lawn next to the ceremony before making their way over to the side of the property for dinner and to take in the stunning views of Napa valley. Guests feasted on delicious farm to table cuisine and local wine before making their way over to the dance floor, where the couple shared a first dance and then after a quick traditional mother-son dance, the bride and her father opened up the dance floor with Lizzo’s Juice, inviting all their guests to the floor so they could start the horah. Guests danced the night away and took home miniature babkas made by the bride’s friend, “the babka bitch.”

From Julia… We went away for the weekend to spend time with Kyle’s extended family. We arrived a day late and met them on the beach for lunch. Once we arrived and saw no cars in the parking lot, Julia started to realize…the weekend with the family was all a ruse! Kyle proposed on the beach, and then we spent the rest of the weekend celebrating just the two of us.

When our initial Healdsburg, CA venue had fire damage, we couldn’t find another venue we liked for months. Our wedding was approaching and we thought we would have to settle. Luckily, Julia mentioned to a family friend that we were having this predicament. As we were boarding the plane from NYC to SF for a final venue search, we got an email that this family friend happened to sit next to someone at a holiday party that just got married at a exclusive private estate in Yountville, Napa. By chance, our planner and designer, Kelly McLeskey-Dolata of A Savvy Event, knew the only planner allowed to do events there. She got permission for us to view it on Sunday en route back to NYC and with a huge sigh of relief, we had *finally* found the perfect venue. Little did we know there was actually *no rush*, as we postponed our wedding due to the pandemic from September 12th, 2020 to August 28th, 2021. Luckily, all of our venues, beloved vendors, and friends/family were able to make it in 2021.

Although we were disappointed that we didn’t get to have our wedding in 2020, we kept perspective as we paused planning – a wedding is a blessing and is not a curse – whenever it happens, it will be what it will be. The world was going through so much pain that it felt small and we treated it as such. However, 22 months is definitely too long to plan a wedding – We would much prefer less time to anticipate it!

Pro tip – We asked our loved ones not to mention the pandemic/covid in their toasts as our marriage is not defined by it, and as we relived the day in our wedding film by Sean Kenney, we were really happy that we did this. It could have easily been 2019!

Julia’s favorite moment was walking down the aisle with her dad and seeing her community merged with Kyle’s community looking back at her. In that moment, she described “I felt overwhelming gratitude and joy for all those that came before us, the present moment, and a huge amount of relief that we were able to pull it off and have almost everyone we wanted there celebrate us as we step into our marriage.”

Kyle’s favorite moment was when dinner was starting and they announced our entrance – all of our family and friends got up from their tables and started cheering and high-fiving us. The love and energy was palpable and made the start of dinner a total blast!

Another pro-tip: if you want this to be modernized, tell your MC! The default can be very gendered to “Mr. and Mrs…”)

Julia’s advice to future couples… Don’t sweat the small stuff and it’s *mostly* all small stuff. Know that you’re in control. Invite who you want, set boundaries with those you don’t want to include (be it your bachelor/bachelorette party, the getting ready portion, or the entire event), and remember that it’s about you as a couple and not anybody else. Most importantly, keep finding each other throughout the celebration so you can enjoy moments together! Since our wedding celebration was spread out in 4 days, every night we went back to our room to debrief, relax and set the tone for the following day. This was one of the highlights for both of us! Also, we highly recommend beginning your wedding day with a meditation – it’s important for grounding and to walk into the day present. The goal is to feel PURE JOY! Lastly, wake up a few mornings before and simply surrender and trust that your months of planning and (if you have one) your planning team has got this. It makes it 100 percent more enjoyable to feel almost like a guest and not responsible for the details!

Lastly: Julia had bought her wedding dress right after their engagement from Romona Keveza’s Flagship in NYC. Unfortunately, 8 days before the wedding she had to make a challenging decision not to wear that dress after shipping it to California because it wasn’t fitting smoothly and looked undone – a style that doesn’t work with the fabric, she learned from The Wedding Detailors founder, Heidi. Julia thought to herself: if this is the worst that’s going to happen, this is pretty good. She found a last-minute dress in California, had it altered at a Dry Cleaner, and didn’t look back.