Intimate Wedding on Pag Island, Croatia

This beautiful intimate Pag Island wedding could be summed up as Adriatic meets the sky! The location, Pag Island, is nothing short of breathtaking. Blue skies, the biggest Croatian mountain and sapphire Adriatic Sea gave us a fantastic background to wedding photos of Ana & Marin. Pag is a deserted enough to give us amazing views but at the same time is rich with culture and gastronomy! Pag is an island for hedonists who will gladly escape to this paradise in the Adriatic to exchange vows and enjoy everything this destination has to offer!
Ana & Marin choose Boškinac, a family hotel on Pag Island, situated almost in the middle of nowhere, giving them and their guests a complete privacy to enjoy their happy day in peace.

Wedding weekend on Pag Island starts here…

Our story begins after we met for the second time, during the celebration of birthday of mutuals close friend’s daughter. In the neighborhood where I lived, in Split we often walked past a cafe that has a graffiti of Audrey Hepburn on a Vespa Its from a movie Holiday in Rome, which is one of my favourite films. It also had a signpost “Split”. I had a feeling, that for me really “all roads lead to Split”. After two years, we got engaged, and decided to get married sometime during 2020. My wish was to get married in the spring.

The wedding was supposed to be in April, and for 150 guests! But we had to postpone due to the pandemic. Given the uncertainty of the whole situation, any postponement of such a larger celebration seemed risky to us. So we decided to get married in a small circle of about 20 people as soon as the measures allow. We started with new plans in early May. Our priorities were natural ambience and local food. Marin came with the idea of Boškinac Hotel, winery and restaurant, on Pag Island. Boškinac is a small hotel and restaurant in Stara Novalja with a beautiful stone terrace and a view of the olive grove, vineyard and Novalja field. I told Marin that I wanted to get married in the church of St. Ante. So we did. He found a small church St. Ante near Boškinec, from 14th century. Completely made out of stone.
I designed my own dress with the help of seamstress Mirjana. And we finished it last minute, due to previous quarantine! I wanted the wedding dress made from natural material. A simple, antique cut and with long sleeves. Since the shops were not open during the quarantine, I could’t make buttons for the sleeves and the back that needed to be “dressed” in the silk from which the wedding dress was sewn. I ordered the same through Etsy and luckily they fit perfectly. Marin bought a beautiful blue suit at Varteks, ten days before the wedding.

We traveled to Pag a week before to prepare everything. I decided to make bouquets myself to decorate the church, courtyard and the restaurant. Marin’s grandmother borrowed me her the antique lace, teapots, vases and candlesticks. While  I wrapped the vase jars with jute and lace one night until the late hours, Marin stacked the platters and prepared cold side dishes for Friday, which in my opinion were a real work of art, visually and tastefully.

The wedding as well as the preparations were full of funny and unexpected moments. For example, maid of honor Anja and I were late for the wedding planned at noon, because the morning preparations were a bit complicated. In parallel, Ena and David, my friends who photographed our wedding, ironed the wedding dress at the last minute, because they took it to photograph it before dressing and realized that it was crumpled. From the jewelry, I wore earrings and my mother’s old gold bracelet from the 60’s. Marin wore a lapel in the shape of a Pag lace butterfly with a floral lapel, which is a legacy from the family.

The ceremony itself was wonderful. The church filled with our dearest people and the wonderful words of the sermon was really like from a fairy tale. The vocals of Iva from TransAcoustica from Split, who normally sings jazz and sevdah, brought us to tears. Imagine Ave Maria and the song Depths in a small old church with perfect acoustics. The photo session was more fun considering that we were photographed by Ena and David Mihoci and Ante from MihociStudios with whom we are friends.

During dinner, surprise speech from the maid of honour and best man made us laugh and cry. We continued the party after dinner until early morning of the next day. We finished our weekend on Sunday, with a lunch at local tavern. Our wedding day was truly perfect, much better than we imagined it and expected. The words from the wedding that resonate with me are the blessings of priest Ranko, who wished us that this would not be the happiest day of our lives. And I believe it will not!

Wedding venue: Hotel, winery and restaurant Boškinac