Finca Monasterio

Yes. Finca Monasterio is taken on an exclusive-use basis for a minimum of three nights, so the house, the gardens, the pool and all 32 rooms are yours throughout. There is no other party running alongside yours.

In the ceremony garden, under a pergola covered in jasmine, with your guests seated on the lawn either side of the aisle. In the winter months the wisteria flowers in its place, so the setting works whatever time of year you marry.

Yes, the venue is licensed for legal ceremonies, so you can marry here for real rather than holding a symbolic blessing and doing the legal part at home. There is paperwork involved when you marry in Spain as a foreign couple, and the requirements differ depending on your nationality and residency. We handle that side of it with you, well ahead of the date, so nothing is left to chance.

The Pavilion is a glass-fronted, orangery-style building overlooking the pool and gardens, and it takes both dinner and dancing under cover. It means you never have to make a nervous decision about the weather on the morning of your wedding.

There are 32 in total, sleeping 70 guests. That is 28 double or twin rooms and four suites of roughly 45 square metres, all en suite, and the ground-floor rooms have their own private garden terraces. Exclusive use is taken for a minimum of three nights.

Yes, and we would encourage it. The Orange Tree Courtyard suits an intimate rehearsal dinner, and the olive grove is a lovely spot for a relaxed paella in the afternoon light. Since your guests are already staying on site, the days either side of the wedding become part of the celebration.

There are five acres of gardens to wander, a large pool, and a spa with a sauna, steam room and gym. Sotogrande, with its marina, restaurants and beaches, is a short drive away, and the surrounding national parkland is good walking country.

It sits at Montenegral Alto in Cádiz province, inland from Sotogrande in the Andalucían countryside, surrounded by olive groves. It is rural without being remote.

The estate works across a longer season than most, because the ceremony garden changes with it. The jasmine on the pergola flowers through the summer, and the wisteria takes over in the winter months, so the setting holds up either way. Late spring and early autumn are the sweet spot for most of our couples, warm enough for the gardens and the pool but without the fierce heat of high summer. Winter weddings work here too, in a way they do not at every venue, because the Pavilion is glass-fronted and covered, so dinner and dancing never depend on the weather.

In high summer we would steer you towards a late-afternoon ceremony. The sun is at its strongest from around one o'clock until four, and the ceremony garden is open lawn, so a midday start is hard work for you and for your guests. Marry later and the heat softens, the light turns gold across the olive groves, and the celebration flows naturally into the courtyard for drinks and on into the evening. Outside the peak months there is far more flexibility, and an earlier ceremony leaves a longer evening.

Gibraltar is the closest by some margin, at roughly forty minutes by road. Málaga is the one most guests will fly into, since it has far more routes, and it is around an hour and a half away. Seville is about two hours. Jerez is also an option at roughly an hour and a quarter. We arrange transfers for the whole party, so nobody arrives wondering how to get there.

Yes, both are handled in house. The kitchen cooks everything on site, from the wedding breakfast to the rehearsal dinner and the paella lunches, and there are sample menus to work from before you commit to anything. Bar service runs on a drinks package per guest. As a guide, catering starts at around €75 per person and drinks packages run from about €35 per person, depending on what you choose.

For a summer Saturday we would say twelve to eighteen months, and the most popular dates go further out than that. Finca Monasterio takes one wedding at a time on a minimum three-night stay, so there are far fewer available dates in a year than at a venue running two events a weekend. If you have a date in mind it is worth asking early, even if nothing else is decided yet.

Sotogrande is the obvious draw, with its marina, restaurants and beaches, and there is polo and horse riding in the area through the summer season. Several well known golf courses are within easy reach. For a day out, Gibraltar is close enough for the Rock and the monkeys, and the white villages inland, Jimena de la Frontera among them, make a lovely afternoon. The surrounding national parkland is good walking country if your guests want to stretch their legs.

Yes. We plan and coordinate weddings across Spain, and we take care of everything from the suppliers and the timeline to running the day itself. Get in touch and we will talk you through how it works.