A Beaujolais Vineyard Wedding Where the Season Set the Palette

Claire's dress came from Viero Bridal in Switzerland, bought near home rather than sourced for the trip. She wore her hair back in a ponytail, and her make-up by Cécile Teyssier was kept soft. Baptiste wore a green suit chosen to sit with the colours the rest of the day was built around.

The ceremony was set outdoors, around the estate's pool and the circular gardens that ring it, with the valley hills in view. The pool and the circle of garden around it set the shape of the whole thing, so the ceremony had a middle rather than a front.

The flowers were by Villette Floral Studio. The arrangement the studio singles out is the one built around the sofa where Claire and Baptiste sat through the ceremony. Emily worked in seasonal stems, hydrangea in green and brown among them, so the flowers read as part of the garden rather than something brought in.

Wedding planner Noce Machine put the day together around that setting. Nothing was staged against the hillside, because the hillside was the reason they had come to Beaujolais at all.

Dinner was made to measure, and Jeanne of Delicatessen Factory built the menu for the couple rather than working from a set list. The wine came from the surrounding area, which is much of the point of marrying in Beaujolais.

Fruit ran through the table as well as the menu. Pear, fig and walnut sat among the centrepieces, so the season was on the table and not only outside it. The pavlova tower was the high point of the dinner, closing the meal the way a cake usually does without looking like one.

The brief was to work with early autumn rather than decorate over it. The colours came from what was already happening on the hillside, and the fruit of the season was used as material rather than garnish.

Hydrangea in green and brown tones carried the flowers, with seasonal stems worked in around them. Nothing was added that would pull against the vines and the valley, which is what the couple had come for in the first place.

Domaine de Vavril sits in the heart of Beaujolais, a region sometimes called Little French Tuscany. The estate faces due south, so it holds the light for most of the day, and it runs along a hillside with its own vineyards around it and the valley below.

The estate asks very little of any wedding held there. The gardens frame the ceremony, the stone rooms host dinner and the vineyards carry the landscape from morning until sunset. For couples drawn to the same setting, we keep a running edit of vineyard wedding venues in France.