Vannak and Mathieu: Two Cultures, Two Ceremonies, One Impressive Soirée
The chemistry between Vannak and Mathieu is notably undeniable throughout their entire wedding; a wedding which was a combination of two cultures and two ceremonies, resulting in one exceptionally impressive soirée on the French coastline.
Photographer Maya Maréchal | Venue Château de Cassis
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How and when did you meet?
Mathieu: The first time we met was on December 6th, 2014 in a club called Hearth of Darkness, in Phnom Penh. I had just recently moved to Cambodia to work for an NGO and Vannak, a local, was working as an urban planner. That night, we had a mutual friend who knew we both spoke French and he had told Vannak to come and talk to me. We talked for a while, there was a bit of flirting and then we exchanged numbers.
Tell us a little about the first time you met?
Mathieu: After meeting that night, we kept in touch and talked a lot in the following weeks. At this point, we had tried meeting up for a date but there was always something that came up. The next time we properly met was on Christmas Eve, where he invited me to his Christmas party. We spent most of that night together and were practically inseparable. It’s funny because I met most of his family and friends that night. Luckily for me, after the party, there wasn't any awkward first introduction.
What was the first thing you noticed about each other?
Mathieu: My first impression of Vannak was “WOW” how does he manage to have two jobs (Architecture and Urban planner for the city) all at the age of 33? I immediately knew that he was a hard worker and loved doing what he did. Also, what struck me was the fact that he had the biggest smile on his face the whole night. He had so much energy and radiated happiness. I guess you could say I had butterflies.
Any standout moments in your relationship?
Vannak: There are many, but I think when I proposed to Mat, it was definitely an exceptional moment for us both and truly influenced the following years of our relationship.
What does marriage mean to you?
Vannak: Marriage for us was just to legitimize our commitment to one another. We're partners, lovers and best-friends and would love to start a family one day, and it seemed like the right decision for us.
Additionally, we wanted to have our closest family and friends together in one place to celebrate. Being from different parts of the world, many of our guests hadn’t met before the wedding .
Who proposed and how?
Mathieu: He had organized a surprise proposal at Angkor Wat in Siem reap. Angkor is this incredible Buddhist temple built in the 12th century and has a lot of meaning for Vannak. We've been to Angkor Wat many times together, and every time we're both amazed and spend hours going through temples. He had organized this with the help of my little brother and his sister. All of my family were in Cambodia visiting at that time. We were in a beautiful spot, and then I realized there was a drone flying on top of us, and I said “OMG isn’t that illegal in Angkor Wat” and next thing you know Vannak took my hand and looked at me with watery eyes and said can I ask you something? He then even went on one knee and asked me to marry him, and of course, I said YES. Definitely a day to remember!
When did you get married?
Mathieu: We got married on September 5th, 2019. I always wanted to get married during the summertime. Being a Canadian, I knew my family and friends would have more holidays during the summer months. My husband, on the other hand, is Cambodian, a country where it’s always hot. Naturally, he preferred cooler months for his family and friends.
We decided that May would be perfect since it's just before summer, but the venue we chose had no availability. We then opted for September, just when the summer heat starts to go down and tourists leave. It was perfect!
Vannak & Mathieu’s story continues below ↓
What was the main influence behind your wedding day?
Vannak: Incorporating both our cultures was super important to us. Contrary to some weddings, our families were very hands-off and it gave us a lot of flexibility in planning our day the way we wanted.
Khmer weddings are usually between 2 to 3 days but we chose one part that was most symbolic to us (that ceremony lasted about one hour).
We then had a one-hour secular ceremony. We read vows to each other.
The two ceremonies were emotional—lots of happy tears.
What was the most important thing to you surrounding your wedding?
Mathieu: Though it should be about the two grooms, when we started planning, both of us just wanted to make sure every single person who came would have a fantastic time and a memorable event. Our guests were travelling from all over the world to come and celebrate our day. That meant the world to us. Another thing that was strongly recommended by our wedding planner was to go through every little detail in the months before our wedding so that when the day came, we would have no stress, people would have all the information they needed, and we wouldn’t need our phones. We could just enjoy every single minute.
Where did you find the bulk of your inspiration?
Mathieu: Vannak and I already had a general idea of what we wanted for our wedding, but evidently, we looked online for some inspiration.
Instagram was amazing. I got inspiration from wedding pages, tags or locations. I'd say I probably started looking online two years before the wedding for some ideas.
How did you choose your suppliers?
Mathieu: Our wedding planner recommended all of our suppliers except the Photographer and Videographer. We decided to do our research for both and found them through Instagram.
Did you find it difficult to translate more common traditions into a 'same-sex' wedding?
Mathieu: We had two small ceremonies and adjusted them to our style and also to make them shorter. It was difficult at first to organize them since we didn't have many references. Vannak attended one gay wedding and for myself none. The lack of references was especially real for our Khmer ceremony since it's not legal in Cambodia for same-sex marriage, so there's no right or wrong way of doing it.
Additionally, we decided to mix it up for our wedding party. We both had two guys and two girls on each side.
Any surprises on your wedding day? Or anything that didn’t go to plan?
Mathieu: I sometimes even forget this happened, but we had a pretty big issue right before our reception. Our wedding venue was in this beautiful medieval castle that's now a boutique hotel. It's located on the south coast of France, and they can get extreme winds (mistrals). There was wind during the whole day, but it didn't disrupt the wedding, but just around dinner time, it became violent, and we couldn't set up the tables as planned since the stationery, lights and even glassware were flying off the tables. We had a quick talk with the wedding planner and made some minor adjustments to the table setting, which was excellent. We still had our wonderful outdoor dinner sitting under the stars.
What was the most difficult thing about planning your wedding?
Vannak: Choosing a venue that suited both Mat and I was a bit harder than we expected. As an architect who studied in Paris, I wanted to get married in a historical, old french venue, and Mat wanted to be on the coastline. Surprisingly there are not many options for historic venues on the coast.
Right at the beginning, we both fell in love with Chateau de Cassis, and it checked every single box for us both but didn't allow many weddings per year. We contacted them, and they said they were fully booked for the year 2019, devastated, we spent another six months looking with no luck. I had almost lost hope for a venue in France and started to think maybe we could find something in Italy or Greece but just like that, I asked our wedding planner to contact Chateau de Cassis one last time just in case they had an opening. To our surprise and excitement, the chateau had a cancellation so we could have the spot.
Where did you spend your honeymoon?
Vannak: My first (option) for our destination wedding was France and for Mat it was Greece. After looking into it and talking, we felt that France would be pretty amazing and meaningful since we communicate in French to each other. I lived in Paris for 12 years and Mat is a french speaking Canadian. Naturally, Greece was going to be our honeymoon destination. We didn't have much time for our honeymoon because we had work waiting for us back in Cambodia. We were still able to do two nights in Santorini and three nights in Mykonos.
Any advice for other couples planning their day and finding it difficult to navigate the journey?
Mathieu: Invest in a wedding planner! Planning a wedding, especially a destination wedding, is already challenging and time-consuming as it is so we can't imagine having done all of this by ourselves.
Additionally, we had a little over 100 people at our wedding flying from all over the world, and it was terrific! We got the chance to catch up with everyone properly so my advice is to keep the guest list to a maximum.
Suppliers
Photographer Maya Maréchal
Videographer Ian Badenhorst
Venue Château de Cassis
Suits Camps de Luca Paris
Planner Camille de Luca
Flowers Jadis Fleur
Celebrant My Ceremonie (Anne-Sophie)
Catering & Cake Marrou Traiteur
Furniture Be lounge
Tableware Maison Options
Cocktails Douce-Ivresse
Hair & Makeup Rosine Muraire
Sound & Music MK evenement
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