Mao Yang and Anan are both wedding photographers, which means they have seen enough weddings to know exactly what they wanted to skip. Together with their closest friend and planner Sugar Ting, they built something that was less a wedding and more a three-part journey across Italy: a proposal on the Spanish Steps in Rome, a red dress session on the streets of Palermo, and a ceremony on a Sicilian cove where strangers waded in from the sea to cheer!
Location: Sicily, Italy
Style: Spontaneous, Intimate, Cinematic
Time of planning: 6 months
Number of guests: 15
Setting: Public Beach
Season: Summer
The Proposal & Roman Street Session
The couple met in April 2019 when Mao traveled to her city to photograph a friend’s wedding. Dinner afterward, numbers exchanged, and then almost nothing for a year. It was not until the summer of 2020, when Anan passed through his city as a tourist, that something actually shifted. That is the kind of origin story that writers would call implausible and real life calls Tuesday.
The street session before their wedding in Rome is everything the word “editorial” is supposed to mean and usually does not. Anan wore a custom RETROJLOVE white maxi — sleeveless, high-neck, asymmetrical hem, lightweight cotton-linen that moved with the city rather than against it. The drape traces back to the ancient Greek chiton, silver metallic flat sandals with thin straps finished it off. The accessories did the most talking: a white knit beanie and narrow black-frame sunglasses.
Mao came in all black on top, a smooth short-sleeve shirt with a design language that gestures toward Yohji without announcing it, and white loose straight-leg linen trousers with the cuffs rolled, which is the Italian concept of sprezzatura applied from the ankle up. Black leather loafers with a thick sole: relaxed, workwear-inflected, and making zero effort to be a wedding shoe.
Rome stayed in every frame: traffic, graffiti walls, umbrella pines, the ordinary hum of a summer afternoon. The decision to shoot in the real city rather than around it is the one creative call that makes the whole chapter. There is a shot of them both against a graffiti wall that has zero interest in being a wedding photo, and that is precisely why it works.
Before any of this, there was a ring to find. Mao had spent an entire day in Shanghai hunting for one with a group of friends, searching from morning until evening, growing tired and a little discouraged. Just when the plan seemed to be falling apart, a cat sitting outside a shop made someone stop.
"Just when we thought we might not find the perfect ring, my friend stopped in front of a shop where a little cat was waiting. She said: let me go in and take a look first — maybe this little cat will bring us luck. Two minutes later, she ran out and called me inside."
Inside: a sapphire ring, one of a kind, size unknown. To get Anan’s ring size without her suspecting anything, his friend pretended to shop for herself and kept trying rings on Anan’s hand instead. The ring fit.
The proposal happened on the observation platform at the top of the Spanish Steps, during the late afternoon when Rome goes golden. Sugar Ting had scouted locations across the city in advance; the Spanish Steps at sunset won. On the evening before the wedding, while shooting on the streets of Rome, Mao steered them casually toward the Steps. A friend created a distraction, something about adjusting the bride’s outfit, and in that window he retrieved the sapphire, got down on one knee, and completely forgot how to start. When Anan turned around, she said yes with tears and a firm gaze, and the sunset did the rest.
The Red Dress Session at Quattro Canti, Palermo
Quattro Canti sits at the intersection of Palermo’s two main streets, the baroque heart of a city that has been absorbing aesthetic drama for centuries. The red dress session happened here, and the location was anything but passive. Those walls have seen processions for the Madonna, opera divas, and centuries of sacred and secular colliding in the same afternoon. Anan’s dress understood the assignment.
The dress was RETROJLOVE again: deep V-neck, sleeveless, floor-length in matte red satin, with a panel of translucent orange-red sheer fabric extending into a train on one side. Burgundy pointy-toe heels with an ankle strap and metal block heel finished the look, which is the right shoe for a cobblestone street functioning as a runway.
A silver chain choker and large hoop earrings kept the jewelry minimal and cool. Hair slicked back in a wet look, dewy skin: the whole beauty direction was built around the image of a goddess stepping out of the sea.
Mao came in a full black suit, loose jacket with a soft drape, straight-leg trousers with a slight flare, matte leather loafers. He is the shadow that makes the red possible.
Street musicians appeared at some point during the Palermo session, and both of them joined the crowd in a piazza to sing and dance. That moment, completely unplanned and happening in the middle of a wedding day, is what Sugar Ting meant when she described this whole trip as a gentle adventure.
The Ceremony at Mediterranean Coast
The ceremony location was found on Instagram, a quiet, lesser-known bay on the Sicilian coast, facing the Mediterranean, booked without a site visit. They saw a video, liked the look of it, and committed. That is entirely consistent with how this wedding was planned from the beginning. The floral aisle was made entirely of orange lilies: one flower type, one color, running from the beach to the shore.
"For the wedding flowers, we searched every flower shop in Palermo. The moment we saw the vibrant, full-bloomed orange lilies, we fell in love at first sight and chose them immediately."
For the ceremony, Anan wore a third RETROJLOVE look — a long-sleeved, collared shirt-dress in cotton-linen with the button placket open to the chest and a high slit on one side. Large silver teardrop earrings, referencing ancient coins or seashells depending on how you look at them, and then the detail that the whole ceremony balanced on: double thick braids worn long, with a translucent gauze head-wrap. The gauze is a modern take on the Catholic wedding veil — lighter, more open, face completely visible.
Mao wore an off-white, oatmeal-toned single-breasted jacket over a black high-neck top, with straight trousers that broke slightly over dark brown matte leather loafers. The cut is relaxed and comfortable in the way of Brunello Cucinelli — quality as an aesthetic position rather than formality. A small fresh flower boutonnière finished it, which on a Sicilian cove in summer is exactly the right level of ornament, and exactly right amount.
Sugar Ting who also handmade the bridal bouquet from seashells and pearls. The couple plans to keep it permanently. Each guest received a personalized card printed on white artisanal paper with the same motif, pearls and shells throughout, because when the ocean is your venue, you let it set the tone.
The first look was folded into the ceremony itself. Guests stood alongside the groom on the shore, and vacationers already on the beach joined in without being invited and without hesitating about it. When Anan appeared in the distance, walking down the winding path toward the cove, the beach erupted.
Strangers cheered, swimmers stopped to look, and a moment that belonged to fifteen friends who had flown from China also belonged to whoever happened to be there. After the vows and rings, the couple ran into the sea together, still fully dressed. Guests gathered the orange lilies from the aisle and gave them to the strangers who had stayed to watch.
A friend had secretly commissioned an elderly craftsman in Rome to engrave a keepsake inscribed with Amor Omnia Vincit, Love Conquers All, which was presented during the ceremony. There was no rigid program: the fifteen guests were all close friends, and the couple opened it up for everyone to speak. Mao describes the result as a summer dream. The overhead shot of white-clad guests on pale rock, orange lilies cutting through to blue water, people swimming in the background, confirms it without argument.
Advice from the couple:
• Set a clear budget.
• Choose an ideal destination that resonates with you.
• Find a wedding planner who aligns with your vision—this is crucial.
• Select photographers, videographers, makeup artists, and hosts that you truly connect with.
• Start working out at least six months in advance to ensure you’re in good shape and feeling your best.
• Be fully prepared: itinerary, accommodations, transportation, etc., and do your best to take care of every friend attending the wedding.
• Have a Plan B for your wedding to handle any unexpected situations.
PLANNING & FLORALS Sugar Ting | PHOTOGRAPHERS Liang Xiao Tie, Enjoy Jinlii | VIDEO @59.7005469 | DRESSES RETROJLOVE | MUAH @zjj262580 | HOST & CONTENT @panlinior | GROOM Mao Yang
