by: We are so excited to share today the wedding of stunning bride Katie Provost and her groom, Shaun O'Neale, winner of USA MasterChef Season 7! Their wedding was just featured on MasterChef on FOX as part of the popular cooking competition. We're honored to give you an exclusive look into every fabulous detail you may have gotten a glimpse of on the show. Katie and Shaun are the only couple in the whole world to have been married by chef Gordon Ramsay!
The stunning couple exchanged their vows this past spring under a beautiful white rose arch at Malibu Wine Safaris, with 100 of their closest friends, family, and Stanley the Giraffe in attendance. Then, everyone was served a mouthwatering meal prepared by the competing red and blue teams! {Check out the July 11th episode of MasterChef to see how it all went down.} 
Katie was an absolute blast to work with as she shared some of the fun and unique details of her and Shaun’s story and MasterChef wedding day. It’s not often your wedding is shot for a national television audience! Scroll through all the gorgeous photos to get the inside scoop of their big day from our interview with Katie. 
Oooh and the gorgeous couple also ordered their custom wedding programs from MagnetStreet Weddings … which definitely adds to the fun. So sit back, grab a glass of vino, and take in the dream that is Katie and Shaun O'Neale's MasterChef wedding day! 
Venue: Malibu Wine Safaris \ Photography: Wedding Nature Photography \ Music: Seaside Strings \ Hair & makeup: Hair And Makeup By Mary & Giovanissa Couture Bridal Makeup Artist
MasterChef Wedding: Interview with Katie O'Neale
How did your love story begin? Shaun and I actually met on the dating app Bumble. Las Vegas is a hard city to date in and dating apps make it easier to weed out the people that aren't looking for the same things.
How did Shaun pop question? We got engaged in San Francisco. I am Shaun's booking manager and book all of his celebrity appearances (along with my full time job as an accounting director). Shaun was performing a cooking demo at Macy's Union Square that weekend, so I flew out with him to watch. The following day, we were walking around San Francisco and ended up in Palace of Fine Arts ... where coincidentally, a marriage was taking place. After some time walking around there, Shaun stopped me and popped the question. It was perfect ... completely our style...nothing like what you see in movies or on The Bachelor ... it was just real =) We are both in our mid-30s, and this is the first marriage for both of us. You don't see that too often nowadays that people hold off that long to meet and marry their soulmate.
You had just TWO months to plan your wedding?! We found out in December 2017 (2 months after we got engaged) that MasterChef wanted to film our wedding March 1st, 2018. That gave us only 2 months to plan and for me to find the perfect wedding dress. Since we had so little time to plan, wedding planning actually went pretty smooth. We didn't have time to look around and interview potential vendors, so once we found ones that we liked, we hired them. Shaun and I were responsible for tux/dress, travel, wedding programs, musicians, hair/makeup, photography, photo booth and wedding reception food/venue. MasterChef was in charge of wedding food, décor, flowers, and venue. I would say the hardest part was hiring vendors without meeting them until the day of the wedding. I got lucky and was able to have a hair/makeup trial run in California the week before because we just happened to be in L.A. for one of Shaun's events. Shaun was the best at helping to plan! He even tried to find me a hair/makeup artist. I'm extremely lucky to have a man that may have even planned more than me because he knew I was stressed. Other future husbands - take note! It's not all about the bride...she needs your help, too =) It's BOTH of your day!
Did you pick out your own wedding colors or theme? That part was tricky ... since the team colors for MasterChef were red and blue, we couldn't have any shades of red or blue for our wedding. And since we didn't have 100% confirmation of our wedding venue until 3 days before we got married, we couldn't exactly plan for a theme either. MasterChef handled all the décor, but Shaun and I opted for a deep purple accent color as opposed to a pastel … as we were not aiming for a rustic wedding and both have more modern and cutting edge styles.
What was the highlight of the day? Obviously number one was being the only couple in the whole world to have been married by Gordon Ramsay! It was actually a surprise to us because we didn't approach Gordon about officiating our wedding … HE approached US because of his love and respect for Shaun. There was also Stanley the giraffe who was behind our ceremony the whole time in his bow tie =) And one of the highlights for both of us was the support we received from our friends and family who all traveled to Malibu in the middle of the week with 2 months notice just to celebrate our wedding with us.
We love cake ... tell us about yours! MasterChef actually made our wedding cake, and it was a beautiful marble decoration on the outside and filled with red/blue cake on the inside (to represent the team colors). We had the most amazing wedding toppers that MasterChef made for us that were bobble heads of Shaun and I in our tux and dress … and Shaun's bobble head even had his signature hat!
How did you find your gorgeous Vera Wang dress? It's actually a funny story. My personal style is very edgy and modern, and I like my clothes to be unique and really draw attention. That being said, I found the perfect dress with a low-cut top, lace bodice and covered in Swarovski crystals for $4,000. I had my heart set on it and was ready to go back to the store to buy it. I went with one of my bridesmaids to pick up her dress at David's Bridal (so I wasn't even looking for a dress for myself anymore) and I walked by this super simple, classy Vera Wang dress that was on a mannequin on the way to the fitting room (and only $795!). I kept staring at it ... totally not my style, but yet I was drawn to it. I tried it on and fell in love. I was so torn between the two completely different dresses, that I didn't know what to do. Then it came to me! My whole life, I've always gone for one specific kind of guy ... and obviously that never worked out. When I first met Shaun, he was the opposite of the type I usually go for but I decided to give it a chance. And it ended up being the best thing that ever happened to me. So sometimes you have to go with what feels right and not what you think you want. And that's what I did when choosing my dress.
Did you get to pick the dinner that the MasterChef contestants prepared? We chose scallops (for the appetizer) and duck breast (for the main course). It was prepared by the contestants of the current MasterChef season, and they did a great job under the circumstances! We did get to decide on what was being served. I chose scallops because that is what Shaun cooked for me on our second date =) Shaun chose duck breast because he wanted to challenge the contestants ... duck breast is a hard thing to cook for 100 people, and Shaun knew it would bring out the best in the contestants.
Did you have something borrowed, blue, old, and new? Of course! I borrowed Shaun's logo to put on my garter belt. Something blue was tough because as I mentioned before, there could be no blue or red anywhere in the wedding since those were the team colors ...obviously I went with blue panties. LOL. For something old, my cousin gave me a handkerchief that belonged to my grandmother who passed away a few years ago. She would have loved to have been at the wedding and she would have definitely been wearing pink =) For something new, obviously everything I was wearing was new, but Shaun's mother also gave me a beautiful ring to wear that day.
What was it like having your wedding recorded for TV? OMG crazy! Shaun is not shy in front of the cameras so he wasn't nervous at all. I, on the other hand, was terrified! My voice was shaking, and I was so nervous about what I would say during the introduction. But once we got to the actual ceremony, I forgot all of the cameras were there and it was the most amazing experience of my life. When we were first approached to have our wedding filmed for MasterChef, I was hesitant. But then I thought to myself, how many other people in the world get this opportunity? I'm always one to live in the moment ... One thing I do have to say was weird though was one of the production crew taping a microphone to the inside of my thigh one minute before I had to walk down the aisle!
Any advice for couples planning their wedding now? Yes!
#1: Husbands - this wedding is yours too. We all know this is ‘her day,’ but that is even more reason why you should take some of the stress off the bride and do your fair share of planning.
#2: Don't go into dress shopping with preconceived notions. You might not cry when you try on the perfect dress but who cares! Did you cry the first day you met your husband? I would hope not but you still fell in love! LOL
#3: Hire a wedding planner. So much stuff was missed at our wedding just because we didn't have a wedding planner—such as the handing out of the programs, the passing of the guest book, making sure people knew where the photo booth was, etc. You won't have one second to think about these things on your wedding day ... so pay someone else to.
How have your lives changed after being more in the spotlight? I don't think our lives have changed so much as this exposure has led to so many great opportunities. Shaun and I have traveled the world because of his work as a chef to such places as Puerto Rico, Costa Rica, Italy and then Ireland in a few months. We have also had the opportunity to work with major brands such as Macy's and Disney on several occasions (which I am obsessed with and have been visiting several times a year since I have been born). It's more about the exposure that this opportunity has provided to Shaun and not so much about the fame. We have big plans of opening a restaurant in Las Vegas in 2019, so being able to travel so much and build a brand was key.
And last but not least, we are curious about your wedding programs! I found MagnetStreet Weddings most likely by Googling affordable wedding programs. This was a last-minute cost that we weren't planning on spending, so we were looking for something cheaper yet still looked professional. The programs turned out absolutely beautiful! We couldn't have been happier with them. To be honest, I often use competitors for stuff like this, but I went with MagnetStreet because you had a better template selection and were having an amazing sale =)
Thanks SO much to Katie and Shaun O'Neale for sharing their story and MasterChef wedding details with us! We can't wait to see all the exciting adventures ahead of you two. xoxo
