We’re so excited to be featuring the magnificent Jewish wedding of our beloved STG Brides Club member Davina, a hotel developer, and Adam, head of digital product for a legal publisher! These two had a positively dreamy destination wedding at Achuza Beit Hanan.
We adored following Davina’s planning journey in Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club, and we’re so touched to hear her kind words about the group:
Talking to the other girls getting married in Israel was a massive help. I could ask anything on the group and get advice, like my virtual bridesmaids… I also met some amazing girls who are now really close friends.”
Davina also found a bunch of her incredible vendors through Brides Club, including Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Emily & Jo, who helped the couple craft a pretty, classic design featuring their monogram that they were able to send both by post AND digitally, for their further-flung friends and family.
And then there’s Davina’s gown, which is pure, classic bridal glamour. Although she visited a number of bridal boutiques, Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Mirror Mirror was the uncontested winner – and the place she found the Pronovias dress of her dreams. Davina can’t stop raving about the impeccable service she received from the whole team at Mirror Mirror, from the moment she stepped in the door through the final fitting.
Davina found the perfect match for her gown in an elegant pair of heels from Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor Emmy London – not only did the lace on the shoes match her gown, but Davina raves that the heels were comfortable, too!
Keep scrolling for some serious wedding magic – we’re positively head over heels for the simply magical photography from Haim Afriat and videography by Nir Tenenbaum.
How we Met (both sides!)
Adam, the groom: About 2 years ago I was at a Shabbat dinner with some friends at the Marriott in Regents Park, London. On arriving I met and chatted with a friend named Lisa, while also noting a large attendance. During the evening, my attention was drawn to one of Lisa’s friends, who didn’t stop smiling and laughing. I couldn’t take my eyes off her. I thought she was stunning!
At the end of the night I was determined to find her, as I feared I may never see her again. Searching through the crowd I found her and we had a quick conversation that ended with me suggesting that we meet again. Two years later, I’m very excited to be marrying that girl, the beautiful Davina.
Davina, the bride: My flatmate, Yael suggested we go to the 2016 CJL Shabbat dinner with some of her friends. We arrived at the Marriott, Regents Park to find the room packed with more than 300 young people. We looked for Lisa, Yael’s best friend and saw her talking to a guy, so we just said hi and moved on. I noticed he was wearing a very nice original grey and burgundy jacket and had amazing blue eyes.
At the end of the evening, I was talking to some friends when Yael told me that she was going home. I was about to pick up my coat to leave, when the guy with the grey and burgundy jacket stopped me and told me that Yael was looking for me. I reassured him, said that she found me and continued my route.I was on my way out when Yael, said to me “I think Adam wants to talk to you”. I looked at whom she was referring to and thought “Why not?” I asked her to wait 2 minutes so I could find out what he wanted. I didn’t know that this would be the first conversation with my future husband!
Three days later (yes, 3 days… what the hell was he doing?!) he added me on Facebook and invited me for a date. As I was travelling that week we had to wait until Sunday to meet. We couldn’t wait to see each other, so we started writing in the first week and didn’t stop. Two years later on the 29 September 2018 Adam surprised me by going down on one knee and asking me to marry him in a very romantic setting with candles and rose petals everywhere.
Israel Meets Tuscany
Davina, the bride: We got married at Achuza Beit Hanan in Israel, 20min south of Tel aviv. We fell in love with the venue as soon as we visited it. The venue is a mix of Israel and Tuscany with an amazing garden feel, there are trees and greenery everywhere.
Adam is Australian, I’m Swiss, and we live in London, with friends and family all over the world. When we got engaged, we decided straight away that Israel was where our wedding would take place as we wanted a “neutral” place and we wanted to have an outdoor and sunny wedding which would have been difficult in London.
Achuza is very unique in its style and not very well known by the international guests yet. The team is very accommodating and the owner himself very involved. Our wedding planner was the link between our venue and us as their team doesn’t speak much English but they made sure we had someone who could speak English for the tasting and every time we went there. They were fantastic on the day as well, extremely professional, the service was perfect. Even if they mostly do Israeli weddings, they have high standards of service and know how to cater for international events.
A Fab Planner
Natalie Abraham – Dreamcatcher was our wedding planner. Natalie organise the wedding of our friends Lisa and Igor few month before we got engaged. We briefly met Natalie at our friends’ wedding. We loved their wedding – everything was perfect and they highly recommended Natalie. From our first call with her, she completely got our vision, idea, budget and we had absolute confidence that she just got it… she straight away sent us a list of venues which matched our vision for a perfect wedding.
She suggested Achuza Beit Nanan and told us that we will fall in love with the place. She was almost 100% sure we would pick the venue even before we’d even seen it. We couldn’t thank Natalie more, she was truly amazing and I recommend her. She knows the Israeli wedding market, all the vendors she recommended were truly amazing and reliable and she held a great bond with them. Natalie is as cool as a cucumber when planning weddings, however her organisation and bond with the vendors was not only the key to the wedding running smoothly and on time, but also allowing us to enjoy it.
We didn’t really have a colour theme, we originally wanted coral and peach flowers but our designer explained that we couldn’t get that in Israel in September so we had to change to white and light pink. Other than the colour theme, we had three words to describe our wedding: Elegant, Rustic and Romantic.
We gave some direction to Zemel Design for the design, showed some Pinterest board with our vision, material we liked, but we actually didn’t know exactly what it would look like before we got to the venue on the day. As an example, we knew that he would add glass bubbles with flowers hanging from the chuppah and we would have flowers on the poles of the chuppah but we didn’t know exactly what it would look like, we really trusted him for the execution and couldn’t be happier with the result.
Natalie has worked a lot with Zemel, we trusted both of them 200%. Zemel did an amazing job, the venue is already stunning without anything but he really enhance the venue and the chuppah. It was better than what we could have ever dreamt for.
What ‘Smashing The Glass Brides Club’ Did For Us
Brides club has been a huge support, especially this amazing community. Talking to the other girls getting married in Israel was a massive help as I didn’t know much about planning a wedding and even less in Israel. I could ask any question, there was always someone to answer or if no one could answer in the group Karen made sure she put us in contact with someone who could help.
I really felt like I could ask anything on the group and get advice, like my virtual bridesmaids. Now that I’m married I love being able to help girls who are getting married in Israel. I also met some amazing girls who are now really close friends. I love the community and I’m glad it’s now continuing with Smashing Life.
DRESS
My mum and my sister came to London one weekend to look for a dress and with the limited time that we had together, it was important to visit recommended shops ie. those that met what I was looking for in terms of budget and quality. I didn’t know who to ask and thanks to Brides Club vendors list we went to 4 -5 shops – all great shops, high quality and with different budget ranges and I found my dream dress at the amazing mirror mirror boutique.
Vendors I found through Brides club were: Ketubata, Mirror Mirror, Emily & Jo, Emmy London
Extraordinary Invitations
We made our invitation with the Brides Club vendor Emily & Jo, we wanted something simple, pretty classic with our monogram. We were very happy with the outcome, Jo was so responsive and helpful – everything went very smoothly. We needed an invitation we could sent by post and digitally as we had a lot of guests from Australia, Brasil, US… and didn’t want to take the risk to get the invite lost in the post – we used the same invitation which we uploaded on paperless post.
We did our save the date with Paperless post and our website with the knot.
Hair + Makeup
For makeup, I went with the very talented Jaquelyn Lawrence, recommended by our wedding planner Natalie. I had a trial with her and really liked her personality and style. She did makeup for 5 of us on the day. She really understand faces and personalities and adapted her make up. The most difficult is to be able to do people of different ages and I have to say my mum was absolutely stunning, it was very natural, very her. I keep recommending Jaqui to every single bride, she’s a beautiful person and a very talented artist.
I was very lucky to have my personal hairdresser for my wedding, my aunt has been my hairdresser for the last 20 years and she’s the one who did my hair. It was a very special moment to share with her.
A Pronovias Dress
I got my dress from Mirror Mirror, it’s the Elcira dress from Pronovias. Mirror Mirror was the last shop we went to. My mum and my sister came for a weekend in London and we had to find the dress that weekend. We went to 5 shops in 2 days and in the 4th shop we saw one which was nice and suited me well but the experience in the boutique was really not great.
When we got to Mirror Mirror, 5th shop of the weekend, we felt hopeless but this was without knowing the Mirror Mirror team. I was hesitating between two dresses, I knew the one I preferred, I really had this princess feeling when I saw myself for the first time in it, but mum and sis were pushing a bit for the other one which was a Mirror Mirror original design.
Vanessa from Mirror Mirror was fabulous, she made me feel completely at ease, not putting pressure on me to make a decision (complete opposite from the shop number 4), she told me to go home, look at the pictures, sleep on it and come back when I was ready. I went back the following Monday and said Yes to the dress.
Jane herself took care of my fitting, we had a lot to tuck in, cut etc…. Jane and her seamstress team are just amazing, they did such an amazing job. It was like the dress was made for me at the end, you wouldn’t believe we had to make so many adjustments. We added some straps with two positions, one for the chuppah and pictures on the shoulders and the second for the dancing part, so I could move more easily.
My mum could only come to one fitting and my sister came to the last one to pick up the dress. It’s not easy to go to your first fitting alone but Jane and the team were very supportive, helpful and took pictures so I could send to my mum, my sister and my grandma.
The dress was a gift from my grand-mother who worked in fashion most of her life. Unfortunately she couldn’t be with me to find the dress and the fitting but we had a lot of Facetime calls so she could follow the process which was very important to me.
Accessories
I only wore earings which I got from a great Etsy shop Milan Mon Amour, I decided not to wear anything else as the dress had a lot of lace.
Shoes
Shoes!!! I loooove shoes and obviously I wanted something special, something I can wear again and again even if I have 100 pair of shoes this 101 pair was the most important.
I’m quite short 5′ and love high heels, I wanted something elegant, sophisticated with a special touch. I found my dream pair at Emmy London. I saw the model online, I called them and was in the shop 30min later, an hour later I ordered the ones!
I went for the Isidora model, 10.5cm heel height, as I have a size 2.5 (uk size) I needed a bespoke pair anyway. I decided to change the original blush colour to more camel with the white lace. The shoes matched perfectly the lace of my dress and were absolutely amazing and comfortable.
I had a second pair of shoes for the after party, I wanted platform trainers to have the same height than with the first pair and something a bit bridal. I found the perfect pair on Etsy by DesignAfraca.
The handsome groom
Adam wore a 3 piece navy suit – it was custom made from a tailor in Golders Green. He wore black shoes from Dune and a grey/silver tie from Charles Tyrwhitt. All men from the family wore the same tie (dads, brother and brother in law). He had some special happy feet socks and all his friends who got ready with him had some funky happy feet socks too. Unfortunately there’s no pictures of all the boys with their funky socks.
I got engraved cufflinks with his initial at the front and our wedding date at the back from Etsy and my dad gave it to Adam on the day with a letter from me.
Ceremony
Our rabbi from London, Rabbi Dov Cowan, married us. It was very important for us to have someone who knows us well. Adam met Dov 6-7 years ago just a year after he moved to London, Dov became a close friend and we really wanted him to marry us. Rabbi Dov is an amazing speaker, he knows how to balance emotions as well as jokes and is very inclusive.
We had a lot of non Jewish friends and it was important for us that everybody understand the ceremony. We prepared a chuppah book – explaining all the tradition and customs of a Jewish ceremony.
For the sheva brachot, we asked 3 men from my side and 4 from adam’s side – we wanted to honour some of our friends and family who came from far away like Brasil for one of my cousin and Australia for Adam’s best friends. The last sheva bracha was done by my childhood hazan who now lives in Israel. Alain Shraga Blum has the most amazing voice, it was really important for me to have him under the chuppah as I learnt with him for my Bat Mitsva.
Ketubah
We went for a custom made ketuba from Ketubata. We wanted our ketubah to reflect our two cultures, we had have a flower from Australia (waratah) and one from Switzerland (Edelweiss), as well as lemon and wine leaves to represent our venue Achuza beit Hanan. Ketebuata really got our vision, which choose one of their design and asked them if we could adapt it with our idea which they did beautifully.
Chuppah
Achuza Beit Hanan already have this amazing chuppah built in the garden covered by wine leaves, we could have left it as is but we decided we wanted to add some flowers. We discussed with Zemel Design and he really came out with the idea of the flowers lifting/growing from the bottom of the chuppah poles and glass bubbles hanging under the chuppah. It was just breath-taking. The first time I saw the chuppah was when I was walking down the aisle, the sky was pink, purple and with Adam waiting for me at the end. It was a magical, fairytale moment surrounded by our friends and family
Our music choice
We had the amazing Retroband. We originally hired them for the cocktail and chuppah as our venue wouldn’t allow live music/band for the dinner but as it’s a small jazzy band, we negotiated them playing an extra hour during dinner. They did a jazzy/rock set and our first dance which was Perfect from Ed Sheeran. We had a 3 person band for the cocktail and 5 for the dinner.
Harel (the leader of the group) and the rest of the group are just the best! They are the nicest people on earth and have the best dandy/hipster style. I would listen to them all day. They reinterpret any song in a jazz/soul version.
For the chuppah Adam and his parents as well as our siblings walked down the aisle on Mechake from Idan Raichel and I walked down with both of my parents on Boi Beshalom (Halleluja version). I did the 7 circles on an instrumental version of Eshet Chayil and before breaking the glass we had Im Eshkachech. All songs played by Retroband.
We also had DJ Bago from Alpha Music – he started with the Hora and then played all kinds of music. He really adapted to our crowed, made sure everybody had fun. We had a very diverse crowed from 2 years old to 90 and coming from all over the world. DJ Bago was really phenomenal and made sure our guests wouldn’t leave the dance floor.
My favorite time was the last song, he put our first dance song again and all our friends and family got together in a circle around us while we dance our last dance – it was truly magical moment, very emotional moment. We don’t have any picture or video at it was 2:30am but it will remain one of the strong moment of the night.
Flowers
We had Zemel Design for the flower – the main flowers were roses in light pink, we also incorporated a lot of candles and light bulbs on the tables and hanging from the trees. We really trusted Zemel, we showed him what we like and he just worked his magic and creativity – everything was fabulous and it’s really thanks to him. He’s an introvert and as a result when you meet him he doesn’t talk much, but he delivers great results and blows you away with his designs.
The table plan was amazing, he sent us some ideas but we would never have imagined the effect – it was just stunning and made a real impact as soon as you arrived in the venue.
Photographer
For the photographer we had Haim Afriat. Natalie told us he is the king and he really is. We loved his style, he knows how to capture emotion and atmosphere. We loved our pictures, you can feel the love.
We decided to have a couples photoshoot after the wedding as we didn’t want to see each other before the chuppah and we didn’t want to have a long cocktail hour. We did family pictures during the cocktails and a few picture of us on the night but the real couple pictures we did few days after. This was the best decision we made: I could wear my dress twice, I redid my hair and makeup, and we had all the time we wanted to take great picture with no stress at all. We did our photoshoot in Jaffa. We loved the place, the history, and it really represents an important part of Israel.
Videographer
For the video we had Nir Tenenbaum, again we could not be happier with the result. Nir did the wedding of our friends two years ago and when we saw the video we knew we wanted him. Nir has this ability to catch the moment and like Haim he captured the emotion, the life, the fun… we love his way of editing, he uses the groom’s or parent’s speech, a unique emotional moment and builds from there.
He starts by sending you a 5min teaser/trailer and he then sends the full movie of 1h30. Both are just amazing, very representative of the day, and it just us back to this magical day when we received it. I have to admit I watch the trailer almost every day. I just love it so much. Adam and I were very emotional on the day but we didn’t see each other’s reactions when we walked down the aisle – seeing the video is really magical.
Food and cake
The catering was done by Achuza, we had so much food and everything was truly amazing. We had loads of salad for starters, for mains our guest could choose between salmon and beef ribs. All our guests couldn’t stop telling us our good the food was. For dessert we had a buffet, again each dessert was better than the last.
We also had a candy bar organised by Zemel during the after party and we also had some naughty photos of our nieces taking candy from there.
Entertainment
For entertainment we had Retroband for the cocktails and 1h during the dinner, props on the dance floor as well as a photobooth and we had live on DJ.
We had 3 dance set and we wanted to make sure we get people of the dancefloor by bringing something new each time. We also wanted to make sure the music would bring everyone on the dancefloor, we didn’t want the older generation to feel it was young people music and they wouldn’t belong. The first dance set was an upbeat Hora with DJ Bago, 2nd dance set was the jazzy/rock set – with retroband – perfect for all ages.
Adam then delivered a speech and at the end of his speech he invited me on the dance floor for our first dance, half way through our dance our parents joined us on the dancefloor and we switch partner so I could have a dance with my dad and adam with his mum without a change of song– friends and family joined us then.
For the 3rd dance set which continued until the end we asked Adam’s mum to invite all the Australians to the dance floor to teach others the Nutbush dance at the end of her speech. The Nutbush is a fun/easy line dance, which is popular in Australia and sung by Tina Turner. I sent the choreography to my family as well so they could learn the steps before. Almost everybody joined and tried to learn the steps, it was really fun and the perfect way to get a high energy dancefloor.
As part of the 3rd dance set we also had Live on DJ – Violin and Saxophone playing over the top of the music played by the DJ, which brought some extra energy with them interacting with everyone on the dancefloor, keeping people dancing.
The photobooth by selfiebox was right next to the dancefloor so people could take picture without leaving it. We got some amazing picture from it. We received all the pictures the day after the wedding, it was amazing to already have pictures to look at – great memories for friends as well to take with
Favours
As favours we did our kippot with Kippotpro – I highly recommend them, they’re very fast to answer, very efficient, great quality and the kippot were beautiful. We also did a personalised fan with our initials and wedding date. We wanted something small for men and women and not too costly for us.
Details
Adam did a speech as well as my dad and Adam’s mum – we wanted to make sure there weren’t too many speeches. My sister organised a special video with all our friends and family it was a great way to have everyone involved without having too many speeches… the video was a surprise for us but I knew my sister would organise something in response to me organising a flashmob for her wedding.
We decided not to have groomsmen and bridesmaids, I personally don’t like to pick between my friends, or risk someone feeling excluded, and we didn’t want to impose. We had only our family walk down the aisle but we both had our close friends get ready with us.
We had a special guestbook. Our guest book was a puzzle and all our friends could write on a piece of the puzzle and we will frame it and have it in our home. Our first date was in a board game café so we thought it was a nice way to integrate this into our wedding.
Honeymoon
I’m actually writing this on our way to our honeymoon, we’re going to Cuba and Mexico. After the wedding we had a family mini moon, we went to Beresheet in Mitzpe Ramon with Adam’s family from Australia. We don’t have a lot of opportunity to be all together so we decided to extend the wedding a bit by staying all together. We then went to Switzerland with Adam’s parents to celebrate Rosh Hashana with my family in Switzerland and it was a nice way to start the new year as a new family
Advice to couples currently planning their wedding
I was a very non stressed bride, I think on the day everybody was shocked by how relaxed I was and the same goes for Adam. We spent the week before the wedding enjoying the Israeli beach and time with family as everything was under control (or almost).
My first piece of advice is make sure you can delegate on the day to a wedding planner, day of coordinator, or friends, you don’t want to know about anything going wrong on the day so you can concentrate on enjoying yourself. The thing that matters the most that day is you and your husband anyway.
Make sure you pick your battles with your parents, my mum was quite picky on the invitations for example, Adam and I didn’t really care so we did something she was happy with and the design on the day was more us. And if parents are too intrusive, you may benefit by not sharing all the details.
Relax on the day, make some lists so you know what you need to take and what you need to do so you have everything under control and don’t forget anything important like your shoes, jewelry, cufflinks…
DAVINA & ADAM’S LITTLE WHITE BOOK
Photography – Haim Afriat
Videography – Nir Tenenbaum
Bride’s dress – Pronovias found and fitted at Mirror Mirror {offers £200 discount for veil and accessory purchases over £400 to all members of Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club}
Invitation – Emily & Jo {offers 10% discount to all members of Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club}
Bride’s shoes – Emmy London
Wedding planner – Natalie Abraham – Dreamcatcher
Venue – Achuza Beit Hanan
Afterparty Shoes – DesignAfraca – Etsy
Bride’s accessories – Milan Mon Amour – Etsy
Groom’s attire – Charles Tyrwhitt, Dune
Groom’s cufflinks – ZaNa Design – Etsy
Makeup – Jaquelyn Lawrence
Flowers – Zemel Design
Band – Retroband
DJ – DJ Bago – Alpha music
Ketubah – Ketubata
On-the-day stationery – Zemel Design
Kippot – Kippotpro
Photobooth – selfiebox
Rabbi – Rabbi Dov Cowan
Smash The Glass Pouch – Smashing The Glass Etsy Shop {or join Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club and get one for free!}
If you’re a Jewish or Jew-ish bride-to-be, you’ll want to join Smashing The Glass’ Brides Club. Guided by the world’s number 1 Jewish wedding expert, Karen Cinnamon, Brides Club is the private community for Jewish and Jew-ish brides that removes wedstress and indecision and gives you what you need to plan with confidence during these uncertain times. Join our Brides Club here.
This is very wonderful and attractive blog. love to see you both . have a great life god bless you. and thank for sharing this blog.