Wedding | Tais & Bruno

19 hours ago

5 min read

Tell us a little about yourselves!

Hi there! We’re long-time friends that met in the advertising industry in 2015 in our home country, Brazil.

Cisco (Bruno) is a Brand Creative, that has his hobbies focused on a creative and curious stand: photography, music and reading. He’s a great listener and a lovely person to talk to, always bringing up quirky questions or themes to debate (e.g.: what is your biggest irrational fear in life?).

I’m also in the Marketing industry, but in a Project Management role. I’m more into loud hobbies, like concerts, anything sports-related and a wine bar.

We started dating in 2019 in Porto Alegre, south of Brazil. With the pandemic hitting in 2020, we found ourselves sharing an apartment six months into our relationship. A lot of couples made it or break it at that time, but I’m glad to say our outcome was the most positive one. In 2021 we moved to Amsterdam due to a job offer and have been each other’s family since, discovering this great city and building exciting new chapters of our lives together.

Why did you decide to get married where you did?

We knew we didn’t want anything religious, or big – our goal was always an intimate wedding, without much pageantry around it. The most important thing for us, in our wedding, was to have a celebration of our love with our close ones.

So we went to the city hall to book a date, and the nice employee that talked to us said that the Stadsloket Oost had the most nicely decorated ceremony room of all. And that’s what sold the ceremony location to us.

For dinner, we wanted somewhere where we could have all our guests in one single table, having nice food and conversation at a private space. We had been to The Hoxton a few times and knew that was something they did, so while exploring other options like dining on a boat along the canals, and discussing what fit best to our wants, the private dining at the Living Room space they have on the hotel premises was the best choice.

How many guests did you have?

With us, during the dinner, the total was 18 people.

Our families were not here, so it was really our closest Amsterdam friends, their loved-ones and a room with great energy and lots of love to share.

What was your budget?

Honestly, it was the least we could spend. Our finances were very constrained at the time, and while we wanted to have a nice and memorable moment with our closest friends, we also couldn’t afford great luxuries.

With that, one of our decisions was to ask our friends to pay a part of their dinner, as a wedding gift to us. We didn’t want big presents, but we wanted to have everyone together for that one night in celebration.

I think that, in total, we spent under 5k.

Tell us about your outfits.

The groom went for a dark-blue two-piece suit, with a white shirt and subtle tie. Pairing it with brown accessories and shoes. It was a pretty easy fit and choice for him.

As for the bride, it was a bit trickier. While I didn’t want to wear a dress, I was struggling to find nice suits or different options that wouldn’t be crazy expensive like tailor-made outfits. One day, speaking to a friend about it, I got the recommendation for the brand Reiss, which had a good occasion-wear section.

As soon as I saw the jumpsuit with the silk detail around it, I knew that was my wedding outfit. It was crazy to experience my “say yes to the dress” moment, that I thought until then it was just a hoax other people tell about weddings. I ordered it online, it arrived a couple of days later, needed to do some small adjustments and that was it. I was insanely happy about – it was fully me and what I felt comfortable wearing.

My shoes were simple, comfortable, and complemented the outfit nicely.

No big jewellery for me, but I made a point of wearing a scarf that was from my grandma, and she gave it to me as a gift as I was moving to Europe as it’s “too cold there”. She was ill at the time of our wedding, so wearing it on the day and having her somehow there with me was very important.

What was the most important aspect for you, in terms of planning your wedding?

That it felt like us. As mentioned before, we didn’t want a lot of pageantry around it, but we also wanted to provide a great time for our friends and remember this day with love and care in years to come.

It was hard to find references of what that meant, as everything wedding-wise always seems big and expensive. We had quite some conversations about it, and decided that the core points for us were: a great day, as relax-free as we could, and good photos that we could look back into later.

Were there any elements that were important for you to incorporate?

We had a story with a napkin that I (the bride) kept from our first non-official date, and found in a jacket pocket years later, while moving officially to his place. Funny enough, the napkin was from H&M, and Cisco had bought it in Amsterdam while on a family trip in early 2019. So we wanted to bring that story, from our pre-Amsterdam era, to our wedding dinner and share it with our friends that we made here.

The napkin said “food, friends, good times”, and we always felt like that represented us and what we wanted in our homes all too well.

Any tips for couples getting married?

Talk, with open minds, and go beyond the usual Pinterest board to find the references that feel like you.

This day is about the love and partnership the couple has developed, and what feels good to you both. You’re not obliged to do anything. It needs to be good to you, and a good memory to you two.

Are there any vendors that you would like to tell us a little more about?

With a small wedding, we didn’t have many vendors, but all the ones we had were absolutely amazing.

Starting with the celebrant, at the municipality. Our ceremony was scheduled to be in English, but she spoke Portuguese (our native language), so she did our whole wedding ceremony in Portuguese – which was insanely cute, thoughtful and created some sweet memories for us.

We made our own wedding rings at Yizon Studio, in a remarkable and the most precious experience we’ve shared along this journey. It was a great day, Yizon was a super nice person and helped us as much as we needed. Our wedding rings look amazing and have not only one symbolism attached to it, but also a reminder of a great moment we had together while making rings for each other. Since then I’ve been advising everyone to have this experience, honestly.

The folks at The Hoxton were extremely kind and professional with us. The entire evening was amazing, it happened exactly as we discussed beforehand, and they were great at preparing the event and hosting our party.

Our photographer, Nadia Wisse, was another great kind presence during the day. She captured amazing shots along the afternoon ceremony and dinner, that guide us through the wholesome day we had. She made our vision come to life, and was extremely gentle with us and our friends. We’re super happy every time we look back to the pictures from our wedding day.