Kerri  & Tony

When half your family lives in Canada and the other half in Australia, a destination wedding in a beautiful location makes a lot of sense! For Kerri and Tony, they invited their favourite people to make the very long journey to beautiful Santorini to witness their vows, and they added Aussie photographer SvenStudios to make sure every memory was captured. And it turned out to be the best thing they could have done. “Having everyone in Santorini from different corners of the globe was amazing, especially since many of our guests have little or no travel experience and were very nervous.” With hues of the sunset, a rooftop celebration and plenty of sunshine, this wedding is what destination wedding charm is all about!

The pair met while Kerri was in Canada, she lets us in on their story.  “We met while I was travelling through Canada in 2011; Tony employed my friend across from where I worked in Niagara Falls for some travelling cash. He eventually moved to Australia about 8 months after we parted.”

It was another adventure that led the groom to pop the question. “We were hiking Yosemite National Park on the way back to Niagara Falls for a visit about six years later. Halfway up a waterfall climb he knelt in a puddle and yelled the proposal since the water was so loud. I had always said I didn’t want a nice ring or a wedding, but I did want a spectacular proposal, and he knows how much I love waterfalls.”

   

The bride and groom chose to honour their wedding location by creating a colour palette that spoke of the tones of the sunset, shares Kerri. “Decor wasn’t very important to us, the simpler the better. Since Santorini has a lovely all-white with dramatic blue ocean theme going on, we kept all the decor mostly simple and white. The bridal party had a loose theme of “sunset colours” to contrast against the white (yellow, orange, reds), and a few splashes of greenery for freshness.”

The bride carried a simple bouquet of red roses arranged by Bliss Weddings & Events Santorini. She shares “As someone who doesn’t care too much about flowers, we just wanted whatever was the cheapest option in our package! It turned out great with a simple green and red bouquet made mostly of roses, and some “sunset” flowers on the tables.”

 

There was even time for a little champagne on the way to the wedding. “On the (rather long) walk to Dana Villas from our place of accommodation, we got free breakfast at a cafe along the way for being a bride, the unexpected stop to have refreshing champagne before the ceremony was fun!”

Kerri and Tony chose Dana Villas for their ceremony, purely for the incredible view! The bride sharing “We chose Dana Villas as the backdrop to our ceremony as it overlooked the Santorini Caldera during the incredible ceremony! As we hadn’t visited Santorini in the past we had to rely on photographs we saw online to choose a spot, and it just looked amazing!”

The bride walked in with her father to Fyfe Dangerfield’s  “When you Walk in the Room”.

  

The couple chose an Aussie photographer to join them on the day, explaining “Steven from SvenStudios is a wedding photographer we brought with us from Adelaide, Australia. We just liked his laid back approach to weddings that we felt would suit our own day and brought him along! He also has a great portfolio and background in making things look epic, but honestly didn’t even know he was there half the time, he’s very natural and photojournalistic while taking photos, and it’s amazing he was able to come up with such incredible shots in the short amount of time we gave him in between the ceremony and reception!”

There are endless favourite moments for Kerri, who remembers “The scenery was spectacular, the sunset and dancing was amazing. Hearing Tony’s vows for the first time in front of everyone was very special. Also, the food was awesome and there was far too much of it.”

 

Seeing as the couple’s friends and families had flown so far to be a part of the day, it only made sense to include them as much as possible explains Kerri. “We had a lot of our friends help with the day, like asking a friend to be celebrant, making a fun personalised speech. Our vows were our own, and my bridesmaids and friends did my hair and makeup for me. My parents and relatives organised the Loukomades from a local bakery to have as the wedding cake which I loved. Our celebrant got us to play a surprise game which was great fun, and the speeches were all fantastic.”

The couple planned their wedding from afar, with the help of Bliss Weddings & Events Santorini. “Planning a wedding on the other side of the world was super stressful and not at all fun! ” remarks Kerri. “The worst part was probably the fluctuations of currency values making the whole thing cost far more than originally intended. The best part though was that I REALLY enjoyed the planning of the honeymoon! Travelling is what we live for so hopping around Europe for a month after was excellent.”

And the focus when in Greece, is that one celebrates on a rooftop. The newlyweds celebrating with their guests at the beautiful rooftop Ampelos Greek Restaurant. “It had to be within walking distance from the ceremony spot,” explains the bride “while also overlooking the caldera to get a sunset photo. The Ampelos Greek Restaurant worked out great for that, and they fed us so much food! Most of us were full after the second course, and there were like 5 or 6 – can’t remember, there was just so much!”

It was to Gavin James’ “Book Of Love” that the newlyweds took to the dance floor, surrounded by sparklers. Kerri tells of her dream “We planned it so that all of our guests had sparklers as I had always wanted to have my first dance amongst hundreds of sparklers.  Thanks go out to my family for running about Santorini in the days leading up to the wedding looking for an ample supply of decent-sized sparklers on a Sunday.”

SvenStudios even captured this moving film of the celebrations!

A big congratulations to you both Kerri and Tony! Thank you for sharing your wedding day with us. Thank you also to SvenStudios for sharing today’s beautiful destination wedding.