How I met my partner: A chance meeting sparks ten years of happiness

PEOPLE made bets on how long Natasha Tynan and Joris Lambrecht’s marriage would last, but 11 years later, they’re still going strong.

Natasha had just returned to her home town of Cork after years abroad and was working as the features editor of Irish Hairdressing Magazine, and one half of Lippi & Lox hair and make-up, when she and her family went on a skiing trip to Mayrhofen in Austria in 2012.

“In December, me, my mum, dad and sisters decided to do a ski trip for dad’s 60th, it was a family trip,” she said, adding “I had no intention of meeting someone.

“But when me and my sisters were out at the après ski bar having drinks, a group of guys came in. One guy was wearing a really ridiculous hat and he caught my eye.

“We ended up dancing together in the middle of the floor — and from the moment we met, that was it.”

They spent just three days together before she went home, with Joris asking her to leave him something from her, so she left a necklace.

“My mum said I was ridiculous, that I was never going to see it again, but it’s in my drawer today.”

Joris, who worked in finance and lived just outside Brussels, came over to Cork for a weekend trip in January, and in March. Natasha and her family went to Belgium for his 30th birthday, but she had no idea he had rang her dad in advance and asked his permission to ask Natasha to marry him.

“When he called my dad, my dad said ‘can you call back in 20 mins, I have to ask the boss first,’ which is my mom, but he forgot to call him back until three hours later, and Joris was sweating.

“He had a huge party for his 30th and he proposed on stage, in front of hundreds of people I didn’t know — I said yes.”

She said “everyone thought I was crazy,” but they planned a wedding for December, and she spent the summer in Belgium before moving over there for good in September.

“We both just knew it was divine timing, both of us had come to a certain point in our lives, we were very sure what we wanted for ourselves.

“I definitely had no intention of leaving Cork before I met him, because I had already lived away and invested a lot in setting myself up in Cork. I was really rooted, but I moved and I’m still here,” she said.

They married in December 2013 in Belgium, a year after meeting, and then had a wedding party in the Clarion in Cork, before going back to the same ski resort where they met for their honeymoon.

A year later, they had their first son, and now have two boys, Jack and George. She added: “It was super fast, but now it’s all slowed down.”

She admitted that moving over was difficult, and she struggled with the language, as they live in a Dutch-speaking area where very few people spoke English.

She met a make-up artist and they started working together, and she continued writing for the magazine for the first two years, but “that took a 360 over the years, and I’m now a yoga teacher and a mindfulness practitioner for kids,” she said. Joris still works in finance but also DJs for weddings and events.

“The overall story is very romantic, but there was definitely an adjustment period.

“We are both here with very little family support so we really got through by ourselves, and I can be proud of us for that.”

They returned to the resort where it all began in 2022 for their ten-year anniversary.