Three magical days in Athens A company retreat is always...
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Shani Sheleg & Sean Shore
Got married in Evia Island
Shani & Sean have always dreamed of getting married in Greece, on the beach. Their dream wedding came to life in October 2021- in a magical, intimate wedding celebration at Evia island surrounded by family and close friends. We asked them to share some of the thoughts, steps and process of planning their perfect Greek wedding.
We actually met under very unusual circumstances! It was at a mutual friend’s place at her father’s “shiva” (which is the Jewish week-long mourning period) she is Shani’s childhood friend and knew Sean for a few years in Tel Aviv. We met on the first day of the “shiva” and have not parted ways ever since.
We found out early on we had the same dream wedding in mind – we wanted a beach wedding, in Greece, with breath-taking views and great food.ןt was important to us to have our close friends and family with us. We have envisioned it as a very intimate event, surrounded only by the people closest to us.
Great question! For both of us, it was the place all along.
When we started discussing wedding plans we both immediately said – Greece! It was a dream for us both, one that could not be explained in words.
The location, the food and the alcohol. We saw it as a special weekend with our best friends and close family, and way beyond a classic wedding event, we wanted a unique experience – a luxurious holiday weekend in every possible way.
The location. At the beginning of the search, we had our heart set on the first location that Anat and Yonathan showed us. We started fantasising and could not imagine any other place. When the location turned out to be impossible for us due to the increasing number of guests, we didn’t want to compromise on something that was less than perfect. At the time we thought the first location was the one, but as it turns out, the location we chose was one of the most amazing places we saw and it was perfect for us!
When we started the process we knew there were a few things that were important to us in terms of the design – elegance and simplicity teamed up with a few little details that will make everyone smile. As we started planning, we felt that Anat and Yonathan were literally reading our minds, designing the event in a way that fits and describes us perfectly.
Food was a very important part of the event for us, specifically the quality of the products. Early on when we found out about Anat’s background as a chef, we knew we had made the right decision. Anat closely advised and reviewed all through the process of choosing the menu, and went along with us where we wanted to go crazy, putting together special dishes. In parts of the event we felt we wanted classic Greek food, she managed to create classic Greek dishes with a twist, yet still keeping its simplicity. The food has exceeded all our expectations and those of the guests, who keep talking about it to this day!
We love to dream big, we wanted everything from everything at our wedding, and if there is one thing that was clear to us from the start – it was that Anat and Yonathan came to make our dreams come true – even the dreams we didn’t know we have! They went along with every crazy idea we came up with. Every weekly call with them left us smiling and with a sense of calm, and this was one of the more fun parts of the whole planning process. Creating the menu was also a fun part of the planning for us, and had us fantasising for weeks until the event itself came to life.
Obviously, there are a lot of stressful moments. Covid was undoubtedly the source of some stress when the skies were closed just a few weeks before the wedding date and we didn’t believe it was actually going to happen. And of course the planning process – the location, the food, the events – it’s very hard to imagine how everything will turn out when you are far away and unsure whether everything will happen exactly as you wanted – especially as we did not get to see the venue prior to the event, or taste the dishes on the menu we chose. But as soon as we landed in Greece, and arrived at the hotel – all the pressure was gone.
Wow. Wow. Wow. It is an event of a lifetime that we will never forget! and not just because it was our wedding. The fact that we were able to bring the people closest to us together for an entire weekend – eating, drinking and having fun is something that is hard to describe in words. It is one of the most special things we have done in our lives and we, together with our friends and families, can’t wait to recreate it again! We keep thinking about it, remembering moments from this crazy experience over and over again and just fantasising about recreating it in the future!
Wow, it’s hard to pick one moment! there were definitely a few memorable ones.
There was the moment we walked down the stairs on the first evening, to the first party. Suddenly everything came together. We saw the DJ, the design, the food stands and everyone around us, beautifully dressed, with huge smiles on their faces. Right then it was the moment we felt the celebrations were on.
There was the moment on Friday morning, the day after the first event, that we got up to see it was heavily raining, and instead of a pool party as planned we all just spent time together indoors – playing drinking games, enjoying ourselves and eating amazing food.
And of course the official event on Friday night, which was both exciting and powerful, while we broke some 700 plates according to the Greek tradition and blew the place away!
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