---
title: Italian Wedding Planner Roberta Sabbatini Turns Wedding Favours Into a Village Market at the Reception
description: Roberta Sabbatini of ItalianTouch Events swaps the favour box for an Italian market where wedding guests fill their own olive-oil bottles and tote bags.
author: Dr Marina Nani (Editor-in-Chief)
updated: 2026-09-15T11:42:28.875Z
canonical: https://richtravelmagazine.com/article/roberta-sabbatini-italian-market-wedding-favours
image: https://cdn.nanimediahouse.com/roberta-sabbatini-hero.webp
categories: Luxury Travel, Food & Culture
content_type: Spotlight
region: Italy
publication: Rich Travel Magazine
about:
  - type: Organization
    name: ItalianTouch Events
    description: London-based wedding planning company specialising in destination weddings in Italy for international couples. Founded by Roberta Sabbatini, who has planned weddings in Italy since 2003, it combines venue sourcing, planning, design, florals and on-the-ground coordination and says it has delivered more than 350 celebrations across Tuscany, the Amalfi Coast, Lake Como, Puglia and other regions. Its Italian Market turns the wedding favour into a regional produce stall where guests fill their own olive-oil bottles and tote bags. Ten per cent of annual profit goes to Girls Not Brides.
    url: https://italiantouchevents.com
    industry: Wedding planning
    sameAs:
      - https://www.instagram.com/italiantouchevents
      - https://www.tiktok.com/@italiantouchevents
      - https://youtube.com/@weddingstoitaly
---

At a recent wedding planned by ItalianTouch Events, the guests filled their own bottles from a barrel of olive oil. A second barrel held wine. Roberta Sabbatini, the Italian-born wedding planner who runs the company from London, calls the format the Italian Market: wooden tables, crates and baskets of seasonal produce, bunches of herbs and handwritten signs, laid out the way a stall would be on market day in a small Italian town, with a personalised tote bag for each guest in place of a favour box.

She has been planning weddings in Italy for couples from abroad for more than twenty years, and she says the idea came from a sense that the traditional favour had become disconnected from the wedding itself.

> "A wedding favour should leave guests with a memory of Italy itself: a taste, a story, and a ritual they actually take part in, not just an object left behind in a drawer."
> — Roberta Sabbatini

"Couples were spending a lot of money on beautiful objects that guests often left behind, forgot in a drawer, or simply didn't know what to do with," she says. Food is a huge part of Italian culture, and she wanted the gift to be something guests could taste. "I wanted the favour to become part of the wedding, not just something waiting on a table at the end of the night."

## Wedding Favours Guests Fill Themselves

"We recreate the feeling of a small Italian market inside the wedding itself," says Roberta Sabbatini. The tables are set to look abundant and informal, with extra virgin olive oil, artisan pasta, wine, biscuits, sweets, preserves and sauces displayed much as they would be on a village stall. Guests fill a small bottle from the olive-oil barrel, pick a regional speciality, or put together their own collection of products to take home.

"Guests don't just take the favour and move on. They stop, ask questions, take photos and gather around the market, choosing what they want to take home. It becomes a small event within the wedding itself," she says. "The idea is that for ten or fifteen minutes, guests almost forget they are at a wedding favour station."

The market can be set up at the wedding venue on the day itself, or at a welcome party earlier in a multi-day celebration. The concept is still relatively new, Sabbatini says, and the guest reaction at the weddings where it has run is what confirmed it for her. "They might use that olive oil months later at home and remember exactly where they were when they filled the bottle. That is what I want a wedding favour to do. I want it to bring back a memory."

## Regional Produce From Tuscany, Puglia and Sicily

"We adapt the market to the region where the wedding is taking place, so a Tuscan market should feel different from one in Puglia or Sicily," she says. "I want the products to tell guests something about that particular place."

The Tuscan table carries extra virgin olive oil, saffron, chestnuts, handmade pasta and traditional sweets, and she adds savoury saffron biscuits, cantucci and jars of hare or wild boar sauce. In Puglia the crates hold taralli, local olive oil, regional pasta and tomato-based specialities. A Sicilian market is pistachios, almonds, citrus preserves and traditional biscuits. Products change with the season and with the couple, and she says the company is now developing distinct regional versions so the experience can reflect Tuscany, Puglia, Sicily and other parts of Italy.

## Foreign Couples Marrying in Italy

About 16,700 foreign couples married in Italy last year, up 9.8% on 2024, and spent more than €1.1 billion between them, according to the Osservatorio Destination Weddings in Italy. The average event cost €67,000, and those weddings accounted for more than three million overnight stays. American couples made up 31.7% of enquiries, followed by Brits and then Germans, and 46.8% of foreign couples hired a planner. Tuscany was the busiest region for foreign couples, ahead of Lombardy, Campania, Piedmont and Sicily.

"The couples who come to us haven't chosen Italy accidentally. They want Italy. So our job is to find ways for their guests to experience it," says Sabbatini. "If you bring your family and friends all the way to Italy, there should be moments during those few days that they simply couldn't experience at the same wedding somewhere else."

## From Sugared Almonds to a Market Table

Sugar-coated almonds were first made in Sulmona, in Abruzzo, in the 1490s, and five of them in a tulle pouch remain the standard Italian bomboniera. The odd number cannot be divided, which stands for a marriage that cannot be split, and the five stand for health, wealth, fertility, happiness and long life. A 2025 survey of 9,700 Italian couples by the wedding site Matrimonio.com found that 79% still give bomboniere.

Almonds still appear on Sabbatini's Sicilian table, next to the pistachios and citrus preserves, but guests choose what they take rather than being handed five sugared almonds in a pouch. "The idea came from wanting to move away from wedding favours that guests simply receive and often leave behind," she says.

## Wedding Planner Italy Fees and Services at ItalianTouch Events

ItalianTouch Events plans luxury weddings in Italy for international couples, and the market is one part of a service that runs from venue sourcing and design through florals to coordination on the ground. Its main regions are Tuscany, the Amalfi Coast, Lake Como and Puglia, and it also offers legal contract review and live guided video tours of a wedding venue. Full planning starts from €6,500, typically 10 to 15% of the wedding budget, the company says, and it takes on a limited number of weddings each year. Ten per cent of annual profit goes to Girls Not Brides, the global partnership working to end child marriage.

## Roberta Sabbatini's Background

Roberta Sabbatini began her working life as a journalist, then owned and managed three restaurants before moving into wedding planning, design, floristry and event styling. She studied food styling at Leith's School of Food and Wine in London and speaks Italian, English, French, German and Mandarin. She has been planning weddings since 2003, working between Italy, the United States and London, and the company says it has delivered more than 350 celebrations in that time. She is based in London, where the company is registered.

"When couples choose Italy for their wedding, they are choosing it because of the food, traditions, atmosphere and way of life," she says. "I wanted the gift they give their guests to become part of that experience."

**About ItalianTouch Events**

London-based wedding planning company specialising in destination weddings in Italy for international couples. Founded by Roberta Sabbatini, who has planned weddings in Italy since 2003, it combines venue sourcing, planning, design, florals and on-the-ground coordination and says it has delivered more than 350 celebrations across Tuscany, the Amalfi Coast, Lake Como, Puglia and other regions. Its Italian Market turns the wedding favour into a regional produce stall where guests fill their own olive-oil bottles and tote bags. Ten per cent of annual profit goes to Girls Not Brides.

[Website](https://italiantouchevents.com)

## FAQ

**Q: What are Italian wedding favours called?**
The Italian wedding favour is the bomboniera, and the sugared almonds inside it are confetti. The classic version is five confetti in a tulle pouch, a tradition that goes back to Sulmona in the 1490s. Roberta Sabbatini's Italian Market replaces the pouch with a tote bag that guests fill themselves from tables of regional produce.

**Q: What is a typical wedding planner fee?**
ItalianTouch Events says its full planning service in Italy starts from €6,500 and typically comes to 10 to 15% of the wedding budget. That covers venue sourcing, planning, design, florals and coordination on the day.

**Q: What are some good edible favours for a wedding?**
At ItalianTouch's markets the choice follows the region. In Tuscany that means extra virgin olive oil, saffron biscuits, cantucci, chestnuts and jars of wild boar or hare sauce. In Puglia it is taralli, local olive oil and tomato-based specialities, and in Sicily pistachios, almonds, citrus preserves and traditional biscuits. Guests fill their own bottles of olive oil or wine from a barrel rather than receiving a pre-packed box.