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HARDY is officially married!
The award-winning singer-songwriter tis the knot with Caleigh Ryan, his longtime girlfriend who became his fiancée more than a year ago.
Ryan told PEOPLE, which shared photos of the newlyweds on Sunday (October 30), that the couple chose a venue in Nashville, Tennessee, Diamond Creek Farms, because it was “brand new and absolutely stunning… It's a beautiful stone venue. It has an outside ceremony space that looks out to all the trees and Tennessee landscape.” Ryan married her husband in a gorgeous custom-designed gown, which “came out so beautifully, and I'm so excited about it.”
HARDY — whose full name is Michael Wilson Hardy — and Ryan shared an emotional moment during their first look before the ceremony, and shared an intimate exchanging of vows, they told PEOPLE. HARDY also noted that fellow songwriter Smith Ahnquist — “one of our favorite people” — officiated the ceremony. Dierks Bentley, Brantley Gilbert, Lauren Alaina, RaeLynn, ERNEST, Morgan Wallen and fellow newlywed Mitchell Tenpenny were among the celebrities on the guest list of about 350 people. The cocktail hour included burros carrying beer in baskets to the guests — Ryan was “obsessed with it” — and the reception was complete with a 90s country-playing band and a tattoo artist, offering wedding-themed ink. The post-reception party moved to Luke Bryan’s Luke’s 32 Bridge on Nashville’s Lower Broadway, which Ryan gushed to PEOPLE was “like a wedding present,” since her now-husband typically opts not to venture to the popular Nashville honky tonks.
HARDY and Ryan got engaged in August 2021. The “Wait In The Truck” singer posted a sweet photo on Instagram of the proposal, celebrating that he’s “not her boyfriend anymore, with a red heart emoji. The photo was tagged at The Lyric, a historic venue in Oxford, Mississippi, where the couple met a few years prior. HARDY previously shared his proposal story, recalling that he brought Ryan to the venue under the guise that he had a private show planned, and “it just worked out. As far as I know, she was pretty fooled.”
Ryan told PEOPLE that “once we met each other, there really was no one else. We never entertained anyone else. It was just so easy.” HARDY added that he knew he loved his now-wife after only three times meeting in person.
Congrats to the newlyweds!