VOWS:CAROL O'RIORDAN and Roberto Pavesi were married on June 22nd in the Church of San Antonio in the Tuscan town of Montecatini, where the groom grew up. The wedding was conducted by the bride's uncle, with readings in both English and Italian.
She is from Waterfall in Cork and graduated in 2002 from University College Cork with a BA in commerce and Italian. She then went to work for Bord Bia in Milan, where she met her husband through a friend who had spent an Erasmus year with him in Germany. The night they first met, they got stuck in a lift for an hour and a half, and it was thanks to him that they eventually escaped. “I had my eye on him ever since,”she admits. They were friends for eight months before becoming romantically involved.
After two years in Milan they moved to Brussels where Roberto, an engineer, worked for Toyota and Carol worked for Saatchi Saatchi. They spent four years there, two and a half years living together, during which time Carol took a career break and trained as a Bikram yoga teacher in Hawaii. Last October, Roberto was offered an overseas contract with Toyota in Bangkok, where they now live.
They chose to get married in Italy, partially for the weather, though on the actual day it poured. “But they say in Italy that a wet bride is a lucky bride,” says Carol. “Amazingly we also managed to avoid all the showers as we travelled around in a 1970s red Fiat covertible.” The buffet-style feast later ensured that everyone met one another in between courses, and the typical Italian wedding cake was a big hit with the Irish guests. “Most of the organisation was done from Bangkok with the help of both our mothers,” says Carol.
Photography: Therese Aherne