Daniela + Elias by Alessandra Linoci - Together Journal

We went into the olive grove, and there he had laid out with little stones, “Marry me?”

Tell us a little about yourselves, what you do, what you love…

Our names are Dani and Elias. We are both 35 years old. Dani is a dentist, and Elias is an engineer in Wuerzburg, Germany. We love to travel a lot, have a good glass of wine, and enjoy great food together. We also started learning Italian before our wedding in Italy.

How/where/when did you meet – and what were your first impressions?

We met in 2015 at a birthday party of 2 of our oldest friends, Anissa and Vince. Anissa is Dani’s kindergarten friend and her brother Vince studied and lived together with Elias at University. Dani saw Elias upon entering the party and asked Anissa who he was. She said‚ “It’s Elias. I think he doesn’t have a girlfriend. He looks like Ryan Gosling. I’m going to introduce you to him.” Dani came out of a long relationship and didn’t want to get into another one right away. So we had “a little affair” for about 6 months, but actually, it wasn’t an affair because we didn’t see anybody else. And this became quite sure already that we just wanted to have us exclusively. We used to have a long-distance relationship and only saw each other on the weekends. After 2 years, Elias moved to Dani’s hometown Wuerzburg.

When did you first realise that this was someone you’d like to spend the rest of your life with?

We think when we moved in together, we all just felt so “known” and normal. We really thought‚ oh this is really it‘

Was there a proposal? Tell us a little about it…

Proposal was on 6.6.21 in Puglia Italy. We spend a few nights at Masseria Dagilupi in Ostuni. Elias brought his drone (which he normally really hates) and got up very early each morning to walk in the olive grove while Dani was on her phone doing Instagram. She saw Elias picking something up but didn’t make a lot out of it. Elias also spent hours getting his drone in the air, which was a bit unusual. Dani told him just to let it go, but he insisted. On one night on the 5th of June, we had booked a dinner under an olive tree at Masseria Dagilupi. Elias had the idea to propose that night. He already had the ring in his pocket. But the drinks came, served with a pink plastic straw, and that was the moment he thought ‚nope not going to happen. Also, Dani used to say how she didn’t like the darkness and the bugs that were attracted by the little light on the table. The next morning he woke up super early and thirsty (he said he later dreamt that Dani said no to his proposal). Both of us decided to at least (when already awake at 5 am) watch the sunset from the roof of Dagilupi. Elias told Dani to already get up. He drank 2 espresso and got his drone. So Elias wanted to get the drone into the air to film something. He was searching for something on the floor but couldn’t find it. Dani was also looking at the screen and said to him ‚what are you searching for? The sunrise is over there! Why do you film the floor?“ So he wanted to get the drone back. But while trying to catch it midair (cause the landing noise was so loud), he cut off part of his finger and was bleeding. So we went down again into our room to get some bandages. And Elias then just said‚ “Come follow me, I need to show you something“. We went into the olive grove, and there he had laid out with little stones, “Marry me?” And told Dani, I know you do not like it when I ask you too many questions. That’s why today I want to only ask you one question. Do you want to become my wife? And that’s the story of our proposal. We did get the drone in the air to film the “Marry Me? -Stones btw” 🙂

What was one element you were happy to splurge on?

We were able to celebrate our wedding at beautiful Masseria Moroseta. We first visited Moroseta in 2020 for dinner and told each other that it would be a dream come true to get married here.

Did anything happen on your wedding day that you laugh about in hindsight (even if it was stressful at the time)?

It was nothing really stressful because Alessandra and her team had everything under control, and we just had 100% trust. What was quite a moment was that Elias got a surprise cake and dropped the first slice into his wine glass. Dani had to laugh so hard that she quite fell off the chair.

Tell us about your main outfits, what was unique, is there a story? The history of the ceremony dress…

Dani: Once I got the proposal, I started searching for a unique, modern, plain, cool and sexy wedding dress. I found Annika Maria’s Wedding Dress via Instagram and liked so many of her designs. She was the first wedding designer I visited with my mom and maid of honour. And already then, I knew that she was the one I wanted to work with. She is just such a unique person with a huge heart and knew right away what I wanted or what would suit me. In 2022 I decided for a different kind of dress. But visited her again beginning of January to see her new collection. And then I fell in love with the dress I picked. I had a hard time choosing between the “original one of 2022” and the “new collection one.” But with the help of a view very good friends, I definitely made the right choice for me.

Elias: I wanted to have a suit that felt special, cool and unique. I knew a lot of guests would be wearing beige. So that was out of the talk. I also chose against a classic shirt and wanted to go tone-in-tone. Black also wasn’t going to be a colour I wanted to wear at 40 degrees Italian heat. So I went with a dark brown polo shirt out of silk-cotton and a matching suit.