Real Wedding: Mikilena & Matthew
Band: Joe Capps Band
Invitations: Fine Stationery
Reception Site: Hildene
As a little girl growing up in Marco Island, Florida, Mikilena Greusel dreamed of a fall wedding. Unfortunately, the vibrant foliage she desperately wanted was nowhere to be found, replaced only with green palm leaves. It wasn’t until she met Matthew Hall and traveled to Vermont that she found her East Coast paradise.
Mikilena and Matthew met on their very first day at Davidson College in North Carolina. “I had been playing a Simon and Garfunkel CD, and I heard the same exact part of the same song playing down the hall,” says Mikilena. Thinking it was a weird coincidence, she went to investigate, and found Matthew. Their shared taste in music seemed like fate, and they began dating soon after.
During the course of their relationship, Mikilena and Matthew traveled to Vermont many times to visit his friends and family, often staying at the Four Chimneys Inn in Bennington. “We spent many winter nights walking in the snow and falling more deeply in love,” says Mikilena. The couple was together all through college, and lived with each other for two years in New York after graduation, before both enrolling at the University of Florida. As they traveled south to their new home in Gainesville, Mikilena and Matthew decided to stop at Davidson College for a visit. “At Davidson there is a tradition, or a superstition, that if you kiss your boyfriend or girlfriend while standing near the old well, you will be bound to get married someday,” says Mikilena. She told Matthew they might as well kiss there for good luck, never expecting him to drop to one knee in front of the well and propose. “It was a very magical moment, preceded by years of engagement traditions at the school. It could not have been more perfect!” she says.
Both Mikilena and Matthew knew that Vermont was the perfect place for them to be married, despite the fact that most of their guests had to travel to attend the celebration. Luckily, the Vermont countryside was so beautiful that autumn, no one seemed to mind. They spent several days in Vermont preceding the ceremony, and on each day Matthew sent his bride-to-be a bouquet of flowers. “The first bouquet was just like the one he gave me the first week we were dating, and all of the others were beautiful, and the gesture and sentiment behind each were very touching,” she says. The couple planned to have their ceremony at Matthew’s church in Bennington, with a reception to follow at Hildene in Manchester. At the ceremony, breathtaking floral garlands were wrapped around the staircases, and candles glowed softly from the windowsills. The couple honored their respective late loved ones by setting aside a pew in the church and placing a bouquet of flowers on the seat. Instead of reading their own vows at the altar, the couple read them to each other the night before, preferring to share the intimate moment together, and read traditional vows at the actual ceremony.
Their reception took place on the back terrace of the Hildene estate, overlooking the vibrant fall foliage of the valley below. They had settled on a color palette of rich olive greens, cream, and browns. “We didn’t want to compete with the beautiful autumn colors,” says Mikilena. “The olive green matched perfectly with the array of fall colors so charitably provided by the natural shades of the season.” Though the newlyweds reside in Florida, both have fond memories of their special wedding weekend in Vermont and make sure to schedule frequent visits to share with Matthew’s family. “It’s nice to still visit and have ties to the place where we made our vows,” says Mikilena.
Mikilena & Matthew's Advice
#1 When preparing to get married in Vermont, decide early on the big points (location of wedding, reception site, florist, photographer, caterer, etc.) so you can start planning early & reserve your first choices.
#2 Leave room for last-minute details. We hadn’t decided on transportation from the airport, and when the rental agency heard we were getting married, they gave us a luxury car rate for free!