A Garden Party, a Hacienda Chapel, and a Tequila Train: Viviana & Alex's Wedding at Herencia de Allende
- Author: Natali Grace Levine
- Wedding date: 12/06/2025
- City: San Miguel de Allende
Love Story
A friend of Alex’s invited Viviana as his plus one to a concert on Valentine’s Day. She walked into the pregame and locked eyes with Alex across the room. “Valentine’s Day became our anniversary because we always say we started dating that day.” Six years later, that date still belongs to them.
The proposal needs some context. They had just left Chicago and were spending a couple of months in Montana when Alex woke Viviana at 6:30 AM with an urgent desire to hike a mountain before sunrise. About ten minutes in, they crossed paths with a black bear. Viviana immediately turned around and sprinted back to the ranger station. Alex, undeterred, kept calling for her to come back and finish the hike. She refused. He eventually met her at the ranger station, flustered, and drove them up the mountain instead. There, they had coffee watching the sunrise, and he got down on one knee overlooking the Crazy Mountains. “Not perfect, but pretty damn close,” Viviana says.
About Your Wedding
Two hundred sixty guests, a year and a half of planning, and a clear vision from the start: intimate, unproduced, and fun. Viviana is an interior designer in Palm Beach; Alex works in private equity. They describe themselves as pretty casual people, and the wedding was built to reflect that. The style was a garden party. The colors were calming greens, muted blues, and yellows. The goal was for people to leave thinking “Damn, that was fun.”
Much of the inspiration came from friends’ weddings - details, atmospheres, small moments they loved and made their own. The design direction was the hardest part of planning, given the endless possibilities, but it came together in the end. “Nothing felt rushed or overly structured; it all flowed naturally from one moment to the next.”
Morning Details
“It felt easy, natural, and exactly how I wanted to spend those hours before the ceremony.”
Viviana wasn’t interested in a big getting-ready production. Her friends and bridesmaids stayed in the house, moving at their own pace, popping in and out of her room throughout the morning. The one detail she wore that carried weight beyond the day was her grandmother’s necklace - the same one her mother wore at her wedding. Something borrowed, something inherited, something that connects three generations of women in a single piece of jewelry.
Bride Getting Ready
The dress was Danielle Frankel - the third and final one she tried on, an immediate yes. “The dress hadn’t officially been released yet, and somehow I was the first to try on the sample, which also made me the first to wear it down the aisle.” She found it at the Danielle Frankel Studio and felt lucky about the timing beyond coincidence.
The veil was, by her own account, the most beautiful part of the look - hand painted flowers that perfectly matched the dress. White daisies and orchids made up the bouquet, arranged with the wedding planner’s eye for what would work in the garden setting. Viviana told the bridesmaids to wear whatever they wanted, trusting their taste entirely. Despite everyone choosing independently, it all came together naturally - exactly the kind of outcome that only works when everyone involved has good taste.
Groom Getting Ready
Alex got ready at the hacienda in a Ralph Lauren tuxedo, surrounded by his entire wedding party - his dad, his groomsmen, the full contingent. The getting-ready photos were taken on-site, so the hacienda stone and December light were already working before the ceremony started. His older brother Jack later served as ring bearer - a detail that reflects the tone the couple set for the day.
First Look
At the hacienda gates, just the two of them, before the day began in earnest. The entrance of Herencia de Allende framed the moment in a way that no purpose-built backdrop could - old stone, December sun, and the chapel waiting somewhere beyond. There is something specific about a first look at a venue like this one: the architecture has absorbed enough history that it lends weight to even the quietest moments, and this one was quiet in the best possible way. Whatever either of them said to each other in that moment stayed between them. The 260 guests, the mariachis, the tequila train - all of it was still ahead. For now, it was just the two of them and an old stone gate in San Miguel.
Photoshoot Before The Ceremony
San Miguel in December, a hacienda, and a garden that needed no extra decoration. The light in San Miguel de Allende in winter has a particular quality - warm and direct without being harsh, the kind that photographers build entire careers around - and the grounds of Herencia de Allende offered enough distinct settings that the pre-ceremony portraits never had to repeat themselves. Stone archways, garden paths, the chapel facade, the open sky above the courtyard. Every corner of the hacienda had something to offer, and the hour before a ceremony has its own particular stillness that doesn't last and doesn't need to. The guests would arrive soon enough.
Ceremony
The ceremony took place in the small chapel at the hacienda - an intimate space that concentrated the weight of 260 people’s attention into something that felt, despite the guest count, genuinely personal. Viviana and Alex’s guest list was split between English and Spanish speakers - she grew up in Mexico City, he in Minnesota - and their priest, originally from Minnesota but long settled in Mexico, navigated the bilingual ceremony with the ease of someone who has spent years living between the two languages. “One of my favorite parts of the ceremony was how seamlessly he moved between both languages. It felt very thoughtful and made the ceremony feel natural for everyone there.”
The mariachis played. The mojigangas - the large papier-mâché puppets that are a staple of San Miguel celebrations - made their appearance. Alex’s brother Jack carried the rings. And somewhere between the chapel and the cocktail hour, the garden party properly began.
Wedding Venue & Decor
A hacienda in San Miguel de Allende with a chapel, a garden, and 260 people who felt right at home. Herencia de Allende held the ceremony, cocktail hour, and reception without feeling like three separate events - the flow between spaces was seamless, the scale intimate despite the guest count, the setting doing most of the decorative work.
The colors were greens, muted blues, and yellows - chosen to feel calming rather than dramatic. White daisies and orchids ran through the florals. The overall aesthetic was garden party: relaxed, personal, and exactly as unproduced as Viviana wanted from the start.
Reception
Their first dance was to The Best by Tina Turner - chosen deliberately because they wanted something unserious and fun. The tequila train that followed became one of the most memorable moments of the evening: Viviana and Alex stood on chairs in the middle of the dance floor with tequila bottles and poured shots directly into guests’ mouths as they came by. Traditional Mexican elements ran through the celebration - mariachis, mojigangas, the energy of a San Miguel wedding done properly.
"In the end, it all came together better than I could have imagined thanks to my incredible wedding planners!" The music set the tone, the flow never broke, and everyone left with exactly the feeling the couple had been working toward all along. "Damn, that was fun."
Wedding Team
- Photographer Gaby Bolívar
- Planning & Design Lupita Tirado
- Venue Hacienda Herencia de Allende
- Photographer @agweddingcinema
- Flowers @xochipilliestudio
- Music @ricardo_saher_eventos & @manilamusicmx
- Rentals @warehouseguanajuato @_cordeliamx @carpas.sanmarino @huproductionco @11.11eventrentals @rentandcompany @carmesi.pintadoamano @inspirarte_velas @sophiapedrazzi_cakeboutique @summitmx @mojiganga_estudio @janine_planeacion_eventos
- Catering @ekbanquetes
- Invitation @Zola & @evdisenosocial
- Dress @daniellefrankelbride
- Hair & Makeup @makeupby.mena
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