Becca and Andrew: An Elopement From Anacapri to the Sea

Becca and Andrew wrote to me from Ohio wanting an elopement on Capri that moved through as much of the island’s character as a single day could hold: an art-filled hotel, a historic villa, and open water at the end of it. Most elopements I shoot pick one register and stay there. Theirs deliberately crossed several, and it’s one of the more visually varied galleries I’ve put together on the island.

A First Look Inside a Living Museum

We started at Capri Palace in Anacapri, a hotel that functions as much like a contemporary art museum as a place to sleep. The property’s collection, scattered through its rooms and corridors rather than confined to a single gallery space, includes work by artists like Mimmo Paladino and Massimo Kaufmann, an entrance installation by the sculptor Arnaldo Pomodoro, and suites named for Miró, Kandinsky, and Warhol that each pay some visual tribute to the artist in question. For their first look, we used a quiet interior hallway lined with greenery, glass overhead letting soft, filtered light down onto the space, closer to a conservatory than a typical hotel corridor.

When Andrew turned to see Becca for the first time, there was a real beat of stillness before either of them said anything, that specific pause where a person is genuinely taking in what they’re looking at rather than performing a reaction for the camera. What followed was warmer and looser: laughing, a long hug, Becca dabbing carefully at her eyes so as not to disturb her makeup before we’d even started the rest of the shoot.

Andrew had told me beforehand that he wasn’t sure how he’d react, half-joking that he wasn’t much of a crier. He was wrong about that, and I think he knew it the moment Becca actually rounded the corner. I’ve heard some version of that same prediction from enough grooms over the years to take it as a near-guarantee that the opposite will happen once the moment actually arrives.

Antiques and Contemporary Art in the Same Frame

One of my favorite portrait setups from the whole day used a hallway inside the hotel where an ornate, gilded antique frame surrounds a bold, modern red abstract piece, hung directly above a plain white sofa. The contrast between the frame’s old-world formality and the artwork’s contemporary boldness gave me a genuinely unusual backdrop, and photographing Becca and Andrew there, dressed for a wedding but seated casually against that pairing of old and new, captured something true about Capri Palace’s whole identity as a property: a place that refuses to pick between historic elegance and contemporary art, and simply holds both.

We wandered through a few more of the hotel’s public rooms after that, using the white-and-green architectural palette that runs through much of the property, white walls acting as a natural reflector, greenery from the courtyard gardens adding color without ever turning the images oversaturated. It’s a look that photographs consistently well regardless of the exact time of day, which gave us some flexibility in the schedule before we needed to move toward the ceremony site.

Capri Palace’s collection is deep enough that I could have spent the entire morning finding new backdrops inside it alone. Pieces by Mimmo Paladino and Massimo Kaufmann appear throughout the public spaces, and one of the suites has its own private pool floor painted by the artist Giorgio Tonelli, though we didn’t have access to that specific room during Becca and Andrew’s stay. Even limited to the ground-floor corridors and lounges, the hotel gave us more visual variety in under an hour than most venues offer across a full day.

Vows at Axel Munthe’s Villa

From Capri Palace, we walked the lanes of Anacapri toward Villa San Michele, the clifftop home built by the Swedish physician Axel Munthe, who wrote that he wanted his house open to the sun, the wind, and the voice of the sea, like a Greek temple, filled with light. Becca and Andrew’s symbolic ceremony took place on the villa’s terrace, the entire Gulf of Naples spread out behind them, a single tall cypress standing just off to one side like a fixed point against all that open water.

Their officiant kept the ceremony personal and unhurried, and I noticed both of them laughing more than crying through most of it, an easier, lighter energy than some of the more emotionally intense elopements I’ve shot at dramatic clifftop venues. After the rings were exchanged and they’d kissed, we walked them through the villa’s colonnades and arched walkways for a quieter set of portraits, the kind of architectural framing Villa San Michele offers better than almost anywhere else on the island.

Munthe himself worshipped a particular quality of light at this villa, and I understood why standing there with Becca and Andrew during the exchange of rings. The sky and the water seemed to fold into a single unbroken blue behind them, no clear horizon line separating the two, which is a specific optical effect this stretch of coast produces on the clearest afternoons and one I always hope for when a ceremony is scheduled here.

An Open-Top Taxi to the Marina

Getting from Anacapri’s heights down to Marina Grande for the boat portion of the day meant a ride in one of Capri’s open-top taxis, which are as much a part of the island’s character as any single landmark. Wind pulling at Becca’s veil, the cliffs of Anacapri dropping away behind us in the mirror, it’s a transition that photographs almost as well as the destinations on either end of it. We timed the ride to land us at the marina just as the afternoon light started its shift toward evening.

Through the Faraglione di Mezzo

The boat portion of the day was built entirely around catching what I think of as the rosy hour, not the fiery orange of a hard sunset but the softer pink light that arrives in the last stretch before the sun actually goes down. We sailed out toward the Faraglioni, the three sea stacks that anchor Capri’s entire skyline, and passed directly through the arch in the Faraglione di Mezzo, the middle rock, roughly 82 meters tall with a natural opening wide enough for a small boat to clear.

Becca and Andrew toasted with prosecco as we approached the arch, and I timed the shutter for the exact moment the boat passed from open water into the rock’s shadow, then back out into full light on the other side. It’s become one of my signature images for elopements built around a boat day, and it worked especially well here given how much of the rest of Becca and Andrew’s gallery had been indoors or in shaded gardens up to that point. The Faraglioni gave the day its most open, expansive close.

Shooting from a moving boat through a natural rock arch leaves very little room for a second attempt. The captain has one real pass to line up the approach correctly, and I have a handful of seconds to catch the couple, the light, and the rock formation all working together before the moment’s gone. I’ve missed this shot before on other boat days when the timing didn’t align, which is exactly why I now brief every captain beforehand on what I’m hoping to capture rather than leaving it to chance during the pass itself.

Ending Near the Lighthouse

We stayed out on the water as the light kept softening, drifting toward Punta Carena and its lighthouse on the island’s southwestern point, one of Italy’s most significant maritime beacons. Becca and Andrew spent this stretch mostly ignoring the camera entirely, which is exactly what I want by the last hour of an elopement day: two people who’ve stopped performing for the lens and are simply present with each other as the boat rocks gently and the sky moves through violet and rose.

By this point in the day, my job had shifted almost entirely to staying quiet and out of the way. Both of them were tired in the good way that comes after hours of walking, ceremony nerves, and sun, and the images from this final stretch read as noticeably calmer and more unguarded than anything from earlier. I find that the last thirty minutes of a long elopement day often produce a different kind of photograph than the rest of the gallery, less composed, more simply observed, and I’ve learned to keep shooting through what might look like a lull rather than packing up early.

Why This Route Works as a Single Day

Moving from an art-filled hotel interior to a historic clifftop villa to open water in one afternoon only works on an island this compact, and even then it requires real sequencing. Anacapri’s two landmark stops sit close enough together to walk between them, which bought us time later in the day for the boat portion without rushing the ceremony itself. If you’re picturing something similarly varied for your own elopement, building the schedule around Anacapri first and the marina last, rather than the reverse, keeps the day’s natural rhythm intact: quieter and more contained in the morning, opening up toward the sea as the light changes in the afternoon.

The reverse order, starting at the marina and ending in Anacapri, would have meant fighting the light the whole way rather than working with it. Boat sessions depend entirely on catching a specific window before sunset, so anchoring the day’s structure around that fixed point, and building everything else backward from it, is the planning principle I’d give any couple trying to combine this many distinct locations into a single elopement.

Questions About an Elopement Like Becca and Andrew’s

Can you book a photo session inside Capri Palace without staying there?

Access for a first look or portraits generally requires either a room booking or advance coordination with the hotel directly, since it’s a working property rather than a public attraction. I handle this coordination as part of planning a shoot there.

Is Villa San Michele available for a legally binding ceremony?

No, it’s a museum rather than an authorized civil ceremony venue, which is why it works specifically for symbolic elopements like Becca and Andrew’s. Couples wanting a legal marriage need the Capri or Anacapri Town Hall instead, with the legal side typically handled separately from the symbolic ceremony itself.

How long does the boat ride to the Faraglioni take from Marina Grande?

Roughly twenty to thirty minutes each way depending on the boat and sea conditions, which is why I build at least two hours into any elopement day that includes this portion, enough time for the crossing, the pass through the arch, and a slower return once the light has fully gone.

What should we wear for the open-top taxi ride?

Anything you don’t mind the wind moving. Becca’s veil became part of the visual story of that ride rather than a problem to manage, and I generally encourage couples to let elements like wind and motion read as part of the day instead of fighting to keep everything perfectly composed.

Can this itinerary work for a couple who wants fewer locations?

Easily. Any single piece of Becca and Andrew’s day, the hotel portraits, the villa ceremony, or the boat, stands on its own as a shorter elopement package if you’d rather not move across the entire island in one afternoon.

Do we need to be Capri Palace guests to have our ceremony at Villa San Michele?

No, the two are separate bookings entirely. Becca and Andrew stayed at Capri Palace but held their ceremony at Villa San Michele under a completely separate arrangement with that site, which is how most couples combining these two Anacapri landmarks structure their day.

What’s the walking distance between Capri Palace and Villa San Michele?

It’s a manageable walk through Anacapri’s town center, roughly ten to fifteen minutes depending on pace and how many photo stops happen along the way. Both sit within the same compact part of the island, which is exactly what makes combining them in one elopement practical rather than a logistical strain.

If a multi-location elopement like this one appeals to you, reach out with your dates and I’ll help you sequence a day that fits the light and the logistics, whether you want the full Anacapri-to-sea route Becca and Andrew chose or a shorter version built around just one or two of these stops. For current packages and pricing, my Capri wedding photographer page has the details.