Getting married in Torri del Benaco
Torri del Benaco is a small town on the eastern shore of Lake Garda, in the province of Verona, with a small harbour, a castle at its edge and olive groves and lemon gardens behind. The name comes from its towers, and it is a town where everything is within a few minutes’ walk of the water. Couples who choose it tend to want a wedding that feels private rather than grand.
The castle is the reason. A fortress very probably stood here in Roman times, and the Scaliger castle you see today is a fourteenth-century one: in 1383 Antonio della Scala commissioned its renovation from the builder Bonaventura Prendilacqua. It has three towers and a keep, and walkways along the walls that look over the lake. When the outer walls were demolished in 1760, the ground inside became a garden for citrus trees with a lemon house, a limonaia, to shelter them in winter, a reminder that lemons once grew on Garda’s shore. The castle was left empty until 1980, when residents restored it, and since 1983 it has held a museum of the lake’s fishing, olive growing, boatbuilding and rock engravings.
The rest of Torri is quiet and walkable: the harbour with its small boats, the old town lanes and the lakeside promenade. The ferry to Toscolano-Maderno on the western shore starts here, so guests who stay on the Brescia side can cross the water to the wedding.
Wedding makeup artist in Torri del Benaco: at a glance
- Artist
- Elena Potapenko, bridal hair and makeup, 18+ years of experience
- Based in
- Veneto, Italy; travels to Torri del Benaco for weddings
- Specialty
- Bridal hair and makeup by one artist, with a trial before the day, plus hair and makeup for the mother of the bride and the bridal party
- Languages
- English, Italian, Ukrainian and Russian
- Booking
- Check whether your date is free
Where weddings happen in Torri del Benaco
Civil ceremonies here are small and set in and around the castle, which hosts only one civil wedding a day, so your date has the place to itself.
The castle lemon garden
The most photographed setting is the lemon garden at the foot of the castle, with citrus trees around the ceremony and the water in sight. It is outdoors, so the planners’ advice is to use it from April to October. The space suits a small circle of guests, often with only the couple seated.
The tower terrace
A ceremony can take place on top of the castle tower, with the lake on every side. It is the smallest of the settings, for the couple, the witnesses and a few guests, which makes it a favourite for elopements and very small weddings.
The Barchessa, the rain plan
The fishing-museum room of the castle, known as the Barchessa, is the indoor backup when the weather does not hold. If the sky is uncertain, the ceremony moves under cover and hair and makeup do not change; only the photographs do.
San Giovanni and the harbour
A small old church, San Giovanni, stands in the town a few steps from the lake and is used for ceremonies; the town hall can confirm which kind of ceremony it currently hosts. Afterwards the harbour, with its moored boats, and a bar on the front for an aperitif at sunset are the places the day gathers.
These are places where couples marry in Torri del Benaco, not a list of Elena’s past jobs. If your ceremony is elsewhere, the plan works the same way: tell her the venue and the time, and the morning is counted back from there.