Facade of the church, the newlyweds coming out among the guests

Wedding venues in the Lake Maggiore area

Wedding at Abbazia di Santo Spirito, Comignago

Comignago, between Romanesque history and Lake Maggiore

Reception interior with the brick porticoes.

Two weddings, the same stone backdrop

The brick porticoes and exposed stone of the Abbey speak of centuries of history, yet they welcome a contemporary reception with total ease.

It's a venue I have photographed many times: every time, the light filtering through the arched windows changes the story, but the atmosphere always stays the same.

A wedding within the walls of an ancient abbey

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The Abbazia di Santo Spirito stands in the centre of Comignago; tradition traces its origins to the Roman Cominia family, from whom the village is said to take its name. After the fall of the Empire the site passed to monks, then to the Umiliati order, who in 1282 built the tower still visible today, its four levels decorated with hanging arches and mullioned windows.

The church itself, thirteenth-century Romanesque in layout, keeps an almost austere sobriety, while the eighteenth-century entrance portal speaks to later changes, after the sixteenth-century reforms of Saint Carlo Borromeo led to the suppression of the Umiliati order. Next to the abbey, the neighbouring Villa Giannone now hosts the wedding reception.

In a place with such a long history, I photograph trying to add nothing that isn't already there: the stone, the light filtering through the windows, and the gestures of the couple marrying right there, in that moment.