When the photographer Catarina Zimbarra of Catarina Zimbarra Photography captures beauty that lies in details, Catarina focuses on taking photographs of the most special moments that can be found at every wedding, but when she manages to capture true and luminous beauty that literally makes us stare at her work for hours, then we know taking photographs that way is a gift from above. Let us share this beauty with you and show you why we find this wedding so extraordinary!
The beautiful bride with piercing blue eyes radiates so much happiness wearing her bespoke dress embellished with delicate lace and gorgeous earrings and her groom is by her side admiring his better half's beauty. Sounds like a fairy tale, isn't it?
We enjoyed seeing traditional accents of Portuguese weddings: little girls wearing head wreaths decorated with silk ribbons follow the bride and especially the church ceremony when the bride got emotional, and who would not? Sacred matrimony is a special moment for each couple, the ceremony of uniting two hearts for eternity. Cheers to love!
About their wedding: We are a young and very passionate couple. We are bonded by a long friendship that started 10 years ago, when we were only 15, and met at a pilgrimage to the Santuary of Fátima, in Portugal. Since then we became very good friends. Thats really the beginning of our love story, a relationship build over a big friendship. As catholic, since we started dating almost 4 years ago, we soon decided not to make this journey alone, because we believe that this path can only be made successfully with the help from somebody from above... So, from the moment we got engaged, we set to get prepared for this big happening that changed definitively the course of our lives. The mother of the bride owns an ancient family estate in Beja (in the Portuguese countryside, Alentejo) that has a special value because it's linked to the family history for many generations And so, we soon decided tho have the ceremony there, but we wanted something special, not so much of a social event (as so many times wedding parties end up to be) but a celebration with our families and closest friends. We wanted something that really spoke of our personality. So, with the precious help of our family and friends, we decided to be ourselves doing most of the party arrangements. We started planing and preparing many details since the beginning of our engagement, 10 months before the wedding date. And we soon decided to be ourselves making all the decoration of the place where we served a cocktail followed by dinner. The flower arrangements where made with flowers bough at the market, and arranged at the place only two days before. The same happened with all the lightening and other decoration details, that made this a unique day. During the week before, we moved there and work really hard to get all things done! It took us some really hard and heavy work, but it was most fun at the same time! It was a good time for families and friends get to know each other better, and get more involved in the celebration of our wedding. At the wedding day, the most special moment for us was the religious celebration at a church from the 18th century located in the historical centre of Beja (Igreja de Nossa Senhora do Carmo). The ceremony was presided by the brother of the bride (who is a priest), along with five more priests, all very special friends for us. The chorus was composed by many of our friends that filled up the altar, allong with the bridesmaids and the groomsmen. The musics sung had a really special role in our celebration, and, along with our pure joy of the special moment that we were living, there was created an atmosphere that touched everybody assisting. Then, we went from the church to the farmhouse on top of a decorated trailer pulled by a tractor, along with the bridesmaids and the groomsmen, and some young nephews. At the reception everything went better than we ever imagined. The result of our effort exceeded our expectations, and we think that we went beyond our dreams. Everybody was comfortable, really having fun, and we could feel the hey were really happy for us. We danced the all night trough, and party continued after we had left...
Photographer: Catarina Zimbarra // Venue: Monte do Areeiro in Beja, Portugal // Wedding Dress: Custom, made by seamstress // Decor: homemade // Florals: homemade
