At Relais La Costa the whole house belongs to one wedding party at a time. Eight suites, a courtyard, a lawn, a pool and a spa built into the old cellars are reserved together, in the hills of Monteriggioni, near Siena. It is a house for weddings that are small by design: the dining room seats 60, and the suites sleep 30.
The house is built of stone and brick, with exposed beams, terracotta floors and thick old walls that the restoration has kept. Monteriggioni itself has a long history of defence: Siena built the walled hill town that gives the municipality its name in the early thirteenth century, as a fortress facing Florence. The relais sits in the same countryside, with olive trees and woodland around it, and with the skyline of Siena in view from the terrace and the pool.
A house taken whole
Exclusive use is the idea the weddings are built on. Nobody else stays in the house. The eight suites come in three kinds: four Suites of about 45 square metres, two Luxury Suites of about 65 and two Prestige Suites of 75. Belvedere, one of the Luxury Suites, has a fireplace in its living room; Fienile, the other, climbs to a mezzanine on a steel staircase. The Prestige Suites have two bedrooms and two bathrooms, and look towards Siena. Together the suites sleep up to 30, which suits a wedding of close family and friends. Guests beyond that number can be placed in nearby properties, and the relais helps to find them.
Ceremonies in the garden, on the terrace or in town
A symbolic ceremony can be held at the relais itself, on the Panoramic Terrace, which faces Siena, or in the garden. The legal ceremony takes place elsewhere. Civil weddings are held in the civil halls of Monteriggioni, Colle Val d’Elsa or Siena, and a religious ceremony can be arranged at the Chiesa di San Lorenzo a Colle Ciupi, a short distance away, where the frescoes date from the thirteenth century. Couples marrying legally in Italy therefore plan two settings: the town hall or the church for the legal ceremony, and the relais for the ceremony of promises.
Dinner for sixty
The Salone delle Feste is the room for the wedding dinner. It looks out over woods, seats up to 60 guests, and serves as the rain plan for anything arranged outdoors, at no extra charge. Welcome aperitifs gather around the pool or on the terrace, and the courtyard and the lawn are set for long outdoor tables in fine weather.
The kitchen cooks Tuscan dishes to a seasonal menu that couples can adjust, with local wines to match, vegetables from the house garden, known as the BiOrto, and oil from the estate’s own olive grove. For a looser evening there are formats beyond the seated dinner: a barbecue, a pizza party or an open bar.
The spa in the cellars
Below the house, the old cellars have become L’Eremo del Benessere, a spa with a heated hydromassage pool, a sauna and a Termarium, a warm steam bath. Couples can book treatments before or after the celebrations, including massages for two, and the spa can be reserved for the wedding party, which gives the morning after somewhere to go.
The days around the wedding
A wedding here is built to run as a weekend. Farm visits and tastings, truffle hunts, horse riding, trekking, bike and Vespa tours and hot-air balloon flights can all be arranged, with private transfers for guests. Siena is about 15 km away, and Florence about an hour by road.
Planning your wedding
Exclusive use of all eight suites starts at €2,800 a night in the low season, midweek (March, April, October and November). The same house costs from €3,200 a night in May and June and from €3,900 in July, August and September, rising to €4,600 on a high season weekend. A wedding fee of €2,500 is added. It covers the courtyard, the panoramic garden, the pool, the spa and the Salone delle Feste, the party until 1am, Wi-Fi, parking, cleaning and VAT. The wedding dinner is priced separately, from €160 per person, and the city tax of €2.50 per person per night (from age 12) is extra. A stay of two nights midweek or three at weekends is the minimum.
A wedding planner is required, and the relais works with planners it trusts. Florists, lighting, hair and make-up, photographers and DJs are arranged through the planner. The party can run later than 1am for a supplement. Parking at the house is free.
A wedding built as a weekend
Relais La Costa suits a wedding that is meant to be a weekend: thirty guests sleeping under one roof, a dinner for sixty at most, and a house that belongs to the group from the first night to the last. Its limit is also clear. A seated dinner stops at 60, and the legal ceremony takes place in town, so couples who want a large reception, or a civil ceremony on site, should look elsewhere.
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