There are some nights that stay with you long after the celebrations have ended, and for our family, the 2026 New Zealand Wedding Vendor Awards will be one of them. Markovina Vineyard Estate was named 2026 Wedding Vendor of the Year, the supreme award at the New Zealand Wedding Vendor Awards, alongside three national category wins for Best Venue - Ceremony, Best Venue - Reception and Best Catering - Food.
This recognition is particularly meaningful for us as 2026 also marks 60 years since the Markovina family arrived in Kumeū. Three generations later, we are still here, still family owned and operated, and still welcoming couples through the gates to celebrate some of the most important days of their lives. To have that journey recognised by the people who have experienced Markovina for themselves is something we are incredibly proud of.
In this article, we share more about what the awards mean to our family, the different spaces that make Markovina such a special Auckland wedding venue, and the story that brought us here.
Let’s Talk About:
● What the Supreme Award Means
● The Four Awards We Brought Home
● Nine Places to Say Your Vows
● The Evening After the Ceremony
● Everything Cooked Here at the Estate
● Sixty Years, Three Generations
● If You Are Still Choosing Your Venue
● What the Awards Mean to Us
● Come and See Markovina Estate for Yourself
What the Supreme Award Means The New Zealand Wedding Vendor Awards celebrate every part of our industry, from florists and celebrants to photographers, cake designers, entertainers and venues. The supreme award sits above all of those categories, and it is given to just one winner nationally each year.
What we love about these awards is how the winners are chosen. They are decided by public vote, with extra weight given to the couples who married during the year. Among wedding venues in Auckland, this is not something we could enter our way into. It arrives because people took a moment, long after their own wedding day was over, to say that it mattered.
That is why we have found this one so moving. Every vote came from someone who stood on these lawns.
The Four Awards We Brought Home
At the 2026 New Zealand Wedding Vendor Awards, Markovina Vineyard Estate was recognised in four categories:
● 2026 Wedding Vendor of the Year, the supreme award
● National Winner, Best Venue - Ceremony
● National Winner, Best Venue - Reception
● National Winner, Best Catering - Food
Between them, those three category awards cover the vows, the celebration that follows and the food on every table on your wedding day, one of the most special days of your lives.
Nine Places to Say Your Vows
Best Venue - Ceremony is an award for the ground you stand on when you make your promises to each other.
One of the things that makes a wedding at Markovina special is having the freedom to choose where your ceremony takes place. We have nine outdoor ceremony locations throughout the estate, each with its own character, whether that means standing beneath our beautiful kauri trees, beside the pond, amongst the gardens or surrounded by the original vineyard.
Every one of them feels different, and they change again with the season and the hour. A January ceremony in the late afternoon light asks for a different corner of the property than a smaller autumn gathering. Helping couples find the right one is one of our favourite parts of the planning, and we walk it through with everyone who books with us.
You can explore our ceremony locations and photo inspiration gallery to get a feel for the different settings or learn more about weddings at Markovina and what is included when you celebrate with us.
The Evening After the Ceremony
Best Venue - Reception is the award for everything that happens once the vows are done.
The ceremony might be the moment everyone has been waiting for, though the reception is where the celebration really begins. Once the vows are exchanged, the day moves into drinks, photographs, dinner, speeches, dancing and all the conversations that happen when friends and family have time to relax together. Our wedding reception spaces are designed to make the most of the estate, with an easy flow between the gardens and indoor areas. We host one wedding at a time, so couples and their guests have exclusive use of the estate for their celebration, rather than sharing the grounds with another wedding taking place at the same time.
We also know that no two weddings look the same. Families bring their own traditions, cultures and ways of celebrating, which is why we work with couples planning Indian weddings, Asian weddings, Māori and Pasifika weddings, Middle Eastern weddings and intimate weddings. We take the time to understand what is important to each couple and work with them to create a celebration that reflects their family, their traditions and the way they want to spend the day.
Everything Cooked Here at the Estate
Best Catering - Food is the award our kitchen team will hold onto the longest.
Winning Best Catering - Food was particularly special for our kitchen team because food has always been such an important part of what we do.
Every wedding menu at Markovina is prepared here on the estate, in our own kitchen, by our team under Head Chef Nazareth Lobo. Our menus are developed with each couple during the planning process, allowing us to consider the style of the celebration, the people coming and the food they want to share with their guests.
Having the kitchen and events teams working together on the estate also makes a real difference to how a wedding day comes together. Our chefs and service team understand the timing of the day, the room, the couple’s plans and what needs to happen next, allowing the food to become part of the celebration. You can explore our wedding cuisine and catering to see more of what we offer.
The award belongs to the people behind the scenes as much as anyone. From the chefs preparing food in the kitchen to the team setting tables, serving guests and making sure everything is where it needs to be, there are many people working quietly behind every wedding we host.
Sixty Years, Three Generations
There is an even bigger reason this year feels special for our family. 2026 marks 60 years since the Markovina family arrived in Kumeū and began building the vineyard that would eventually become Markovina Vineyard Estate.
Our story began with Ivan Markovina Sr, who came to New Zealand from Lumbarda on the island of Korčula in Croatia with his wife and their first child. After settling in Whangārei and running the Marsden Café, the family moved to Auckland in 1966. It was here in Kumeū that Ivan Sr found the land where he would establish the family vineyard.
He planted a range of grape varieties, including some brought from Croatia, such as Grk. His son, Ivan Markovina Jr, later took on the winemaking and entered the estate’s wines in the Easter Show, achieving considerable success over the years.
The family eventually began hosting events on the property, with Rina looking after the catering and Ivan taking care of the bar and spit roast. What began as hosting celebrations for friends gradually grew into the wedding and events business that exists today. The Markovina story is also part of the wider history of wine in Auckland. According to New Zealand Wine, Auckland is one of New Zealand’s oldest wine regions, with its early wine industry established by Croatian, Lebanese and English winemakers. West Auckland and Kumeū remain an important part of that history, with many long-established wine families still calling the region home.
Much has changed on the estate over the past 60 years, though the family connection has remained. Three generations of the Markovina family continue to work in the business today, and some of the original vines are still growing amongst the gardens and wedding spaces.
You can read more about the Markovina family story and how the estate developed from a family vineyard into one of Auckland’s established wedding and event venues.
If You Are Still Choosing Your Venue
If you are partway through a shortlist right now, you are probably asking the same three questions everyone does. Will the setting suit us, will the evening work, and will the food be any good?
We think the 2026 results answer all three at once, because the ceremony, reception and catering awards went to the same estate in the same year, chosen by couples who had already lived the whole day from start to finish. Alongside them sit more than seven hundred five star Google reviews and the words couples have left us over the years, which tell it far better than we ever could.
What the Awards Mean to Us
Winning four awards in one night is something we are immensely proud of, though the part we keep coming back to is the people behind them.
For 60 years, couples and their families have walked through our gates to celebrate weddings, birthdays, anniversaries, corporate events and other important occasions. We have watched generations of families return to Markovina, sometimes years after they were here for someone else’s wedding, and we have seen the estate become part of so many different family stories.
That is what makes being named 2026 Wedding Vendor of the Year particularly meaningful. The award recognises the work of our entire team, and it also reflects the trust couples place in us when they choose where to celebrate their wedding day.
We are grateful for every couple who has chosen Markovina, every guest who has celebrated alongside them, and every member of our team who has helped make those days possible.
The awards are another milestone in a story that began here 60 years ago, and we are excited about what comes next.
Come and See Markovina for Yourself
Choosing a wedding venue is a very personal decision, and photographs can only tell you so much. We always encourage couples to come and walk through the estate, see the ceremony locations, explore the gardens and reception spaces, and get a sense of how the day could feel when they are actually here. Our 10 reasons to visit Markovina Estate is a useful place to start if you are researching wedding venues in Auckland, and our wedding open days provide an opportunity to experience the estate, sample our food and meet some of the people who help bring weddings together. When you are ready, you can book a viewing at Markovina Vineyard Estate. We would love to show you around, talk through what you are planning and help you imagine what your wedding day could look like here.
To every couple, family, guest, supplier and member of our wider wedding community who voted for us in the 2026 New Zealand Wedding Vendor Awards, thank you. After 60 years, we could not have asked for a more meaningful way to celebrate the people and the place that have made Markovina what it is today.
