Boy meets girl at a bar in St. Helena; boy proposes to girl at annual firehouse lobster dinner in St. Helena…or so goes the courtship of Leigh Anne and Tony.
It didn’t take this couple of three years long to know that they would be together forever. Tony knew that Leigh Anne was the one after they spent her birthday weekend at Calistoga Ranch. For Leigh Anne, it was the distance—the two-hour drive separating their homes—that filled her thoughts with dreams of forever.
Two years after the couple’s first kiss at the St. Helena Fire Department’s lobster feed, Tony proposed under a gazebo in Lyman Park, next to the firehouse. Friends and family were there to take photos and share with Leigh Anne in the surprise of her engagement.
The bride and groom each had their own fond memories of the wedding planning process. For Leigh Anne, it was “flying down to Beverly Hills for her dress design and fitting.” And for Tony, it was booking the band, venue, officiant and culinary staff.
Since all of their “firsts” had happened there, it was fitting that the couple chose to wed in St. Helena. The late June wedding took place at Trinchero Family Estates in Napa Valley—owned by the groom’s family and a perfect spot for an intimate wedding.
Held in the winery’s barrel room, the site was transformed with drapes, carpeting and lighting. Suspended from the ceiling and hanging over each table were floral arrangements in glass balls, which accented the ceiling’s dramatic height. Perhaps even more dramatic was the chandelier wedding cake suspended from the ceiling. “This was the second marriage for both of us,” Leigh Anne says.
“We both wanted it to be more than just a wedding—we wanted it to be an event that people would be talking about for years.”
After the couple’s first dance, barn doors opened up from the barrel room into the fermentation area of the winery. Guests were then welcomed into the whiskey bar and nightclub-like set-up created by the couple’s wedding planner and designer Robb Smith with Laurels Events.
On the day of the wedding, the bride and groom felt happy, nervous and most of all, relief. In the words of the groom, “I was going to spend my life with a person that makes me happy.”
—Jacqueline Renfrow
