Grace & Sean
01 JULY 2025
“Sean and I are from Washington, DC. We met out at a club on Halloween night in DC, and dated for 6 years before we got engaged at Lotte New York Palace in New York City at Christmas time. I am a Real Estate Agent, and Sean is an engineer. We both love to travel, and we attended 20 weddings together over the years before it was finally our turn! :)
We didn't know anyone who had gotten married in Portugal before, in fact, we had never even been there before! We didn't even see our wedding venue until the day before our wedding day. We chose Portugal because we felt like we had seen enough destination weddings taking place in France or Italy, so we wanted to do something that would be a more unique experience. I also feel like a lot of people from the US had already visited France or Italy at some point, but not everyone had been to Portugal. We wanted our wedding to not only be a celebration, but also something incredible that would set the tone for our future!”
“We were deciding between Porto and Algarve, but since we were having a Summer wedding we ultimately decided to move forward with Porto given that it wouldn't be quite as hot there compared to Algarve. I wanted to find a planner local to the city I chose, and upon my research I found Mary Me in Porto. We ended up choosing the Yeatman as our wedding venue because I knew it would be perfect for an intimate wedding, and it was! Some of the other venues we were interested in looked great, but they had way more space than what we needed.
Obviously when you do a destination wedding, you usually end up with a pretty small wedding. If we would have had our wedding in DC at a hotel that was the equivalent of the Yeatman, it would have easily been double the cost. The service at the Yeatman was truly unmatched. Obviously each one of our vendors was amazing, but the Yeatman and the service they provided truly exceeded our expectations - and the food did too! Porto exceeded our expectations as well... It's amazing because while it is a city, it still feels so quaint and beautiful.
Especially when you stay in Vila Nova de Gaia on the other side of the river, which is where the Yeatman is. We received amazing feedback from our guests on both Porto and the Yeatman. Our wedding planner also suggested having a live artist at our wedding, which was something the guests really liked! She took photos of the guests, and then sketched a picture of them. I haven't seen that at a wedding before, so I thought it was a unique touch. A lot of our guests also took a day trip to Douro Valley, and said it was one of the most beautiful places they had ever been to.”
“Since we were going into all of this without ever seeing anything in person (I didn't even do a hair & make up trial) I was still feeling pretty nervous the night of the Welcome Party... but after the Welcome Party, all of my nerves went away because it was so incredible. We did a sunset cruise on a Rabelo boat with a Portuguese guitar and hors d'oeuvres. I also handed out Porto welcome bags with water & pastel de natas (yum). One thing I did that is obviously something a bride is advised not to do - was go out the night before my wedding! Yep, after the boat we all went to Paris Street and partied until 2am. My eyes were a little puffy on my wedding day, but I have no regrets! We had the best time.”
“The planning process from afar was kind of nice, because I feel like with a destination wedding you are a little less involved, which takes away a lot of stress. My wedding planner did everything, including my invitations and website. Obviously it's hard for older guests to travel, or people with young children... so we were sad that some people had to miss it. However, it was still worth it for us because our budget in DC would have gotten us a very basic wedding... Not fireworks overlooking the water at a 5-star hotel with a Michelin chef! For the most part, all of our friends love traveling, so the majority of them were thrilled to make the trip. Another perk to a destination wedding - you can get married on a random Tuesday and it not be weird (we did July 1st, 2025). That means you don't have to worry about booking way in advance to get all of the best vendors. Whereas when you get married locally, it has to be on the weekend, therefore booked way in advance.”
“The only thing I would have done differently would have been booking out the required number of rooms at the Yeatman so that we wouldn't have had to end the wedding at 11:30pm. Since we had to end at 11:30... We started the ceremony at 4pm (which meant it was still pretty hot outside). I would have preferred to start it later at 6 pm, and then not have a set end time for the wedding. If you book out a certain number of rooms at the Yeatman, you can do that... but we didn't worry about it because we didn't think it would be a problem. Even though the ceremony and cocktail hour were a little warm, it was still amazing! We didn't get to honeymoon in Portugal because we actually had to leave a couple of days later for a wedding in Santorini. We definitely plan to come back though, maybe we'll do an anniversary trip in Algarve! :)”
“I would 100% recommend a destination wedding in Portugal to other couples. It's beautiful, the food is incredible (which was very important to us), and the people are great. Our guests loved it, and my husband & I truly had the most incredible and memorable experience there that we will cherish forever. Porto is such an amazing and romantic city. My advice would be to start with researching (or visiting) the different areas in Portugal, because they all have something different to offer. Once you pick your planner, just put your trust in them! Everything will turn out great.”
Planner: @maryme.portugalweddings
Venue: @theyeatman
Photo & Video: @savemomentswedding
Hair & Make-Up: @jennymakeupland
Dress: @evalendel
DJ: @nproducoesportugal
Artist: @mariadasletras.pt