L+L from ProvenceEditorial Wedding photos at Villa Balbiano, Lake Como
Villa Balbiano
Italy- September 2025
Above: Film of L&L by Il était un Pixel in Villa Balbiano, Italy, 2025
Below: Photos by Il était un Pixel
There is a delicious subtlety behind this series, and it deserves to open the story: these images were made for a magazine, with a full editorial team, but L & L, the couple at the center of the frame, were not models playing at being married. This French couple had actually married at Lake Como a few weeks earlier. Returning to the scene of your own wedding for an editorial series, dress and suit brought back out, is a unique case in my portfolio(*): an editorial with the emotion of a real wedding, and a real couple with the creative freedom of an editorial.
(* the opposite happened a few years back, when I shot Y&X for a magazine, and then shot their real wedding, but in reverse order with respect to L&L’s story!)
The villa that needs no adjectives
Villa del Balbiano is, to my eye, one of the most beautiful places in the world to photograph a wedding. A sixteenth-century palazzo on the lake's western shore, one of Como's largest private gardens descending to its own dock, and interiors that hold their own against the exteriors, which is rare at this level: a huge Steinway piano, and art everywhere, in every room, on every floor. Working there means photographing inside a set where every angle was composed by four centuries of taste.
A production at the scale of the place
The team assembled for this series matched the setting: a production team from the United States, wedding planner Svetlana of Boutique Weddings Prague, and local Lake Como vendors for catering, florals, entertainment and music, down to the vintage car, itself from the lake. It is one of the lessons Italy keeps teaching me: the great houses of Como rest on a local ecosystem of exceptional standard, and a well-run international production consists mostly of trusting it.
The day: ceremony, gardens, Daytime fireworks
The series unfolded a complete wedding day. An outdoor ceremony between the villa and the lake, generously flowered, with fireworks bursting over the water in the middle of the day, a Balbiano signature few venues in the world can offer, and one that, against every expectation, photographs magnificently: white plumes against the blue of the lake, with no night to make them ordinary. Then the cocktail hour in the gardens, with lawn games led by a giant chess set and a live jazz band playing at the water's edge; and finally dinner outdoors, the villa illuminated behind the tables.
A craft note: shooting fireworks at 3 p.m.
Daytime fireworks deserve their technical footnote, because nothing in a photographer's habits prepares them for it. Night fireworks are exposure puzzles; daytime fireworks are composition puzzles: white smoke-plumes against sky and water, read best from angles where the lake provides a dark ground for the bursts. We scouted the shoreline for exactly those sightlines during setup, and the frames of the couple beneath the white plumes, lake behind, villa beside, are among the most singular in my Italian archive. When a villa offers you a spectacle few places on Earth attempt, you prepare for it like an eclipse.
Creative Team
Photo/Video: Il était un Pixel, Jeremie
Venue: Villa Balbiano from The Heritage Collection
Planner: Boutique Weddings Prague
Floral design: Chiaras pertifloral events
Executive Production Team: Wed vibes
Entertainment & Fireworks Blunotte venti
Rentals: Preludio divisione noleggio
Content creator: Vowhaus collective
Dresses: Raraavis group
Shoes & Jewelry: Chanel
Bridesmaids Dresses: Aware Barcelona
BTS: Alex Gaidashev
MUAH Main Couple: Yulia Colta
MUAH Guest Couples: Valentina Denis beauty
Stylist: vladavladasem
Games: Italian wedding games
Guest Suit: Stilberg de
Models: Rosovia, Couple of sparkles, Model couple wedding
Retro Car: Vague luxuryrent
Cake: Lisa bakery
Stationery: Livlaermann
A postscript
A photo from this series was published in British Vogue February 2026, in print. I mention it with the sobriety it deserves: the villa, the team and the lake's light made the image; I had the privilege of pressing the shutter.
And for your wedding on the lake?
If Villa Balbiano or Lake Como is on your shortlist, I have the luck of knowing the house from the inside: the villa's dedicated page and the lake's full guide are the right next reads.