“Dancing With the Stars” judge Derek Hough and Hayley Erbert, longtime partners in life and on the ballroom dance floor, are married.
Hough, 38, and “DWTS” pro dancer Erbert, 28, married Saturday in front of family and friends in a redwood forest in Northern California’s Monterey County, People magazine reported. Hough’s publicist Susan Madore confirmed the wedding to USA TODAY.
“It’s one of the most breathtaking places,” Hough told People. “It’s like a fairytale.”
“We’re in a redwood forest, but we got married right in front of this mother tree that’s surrounded by all these smaller trees,” Erbert said. “They drop all the seeds, and it plants kind of like an army of children to protect the mother. The symbolism of it was beautiful. We’re here, planting our seeds to grow our family.”
After the nuptials, guests headed to the reception, which was held in a 100-year-old barn.
The couple began dating in 2015 after meeting on “DWTS”: Erbert was a dancer on the show for seven seasons and four tours. Before joining the judge’s table, Hough, the younger brother of Julianne Hough, was a “DWTS” pro dancer, winning the coveted Mirrorball Trophy a record-breaking six times in the televised dance competition.
The couple announced their engagement on June 2, 2022, with joint Instagram posts featuring a perfectly lit dancers’ embrace amid white flower petals, 250 oversized candles and white feathers. The whole surprise engagement was set up by Hough, transforming the couple’s Los Angeles home.
“It’s only the beginning … the beginning of forever,” the Instagram caption read.
Hough telegraphed the weekend wedding with an Instagram post Wednesday of a romantic song he had written called “Hold Back Time” featuring an animated video of a bride and groom jumping into a lake from a dock.
In the song, Hough intones, “Don’t be nervous about the future / We’ve go love and we won’t let it go.”
The couple are due to dance together in their “Symphony of Dance” national tour kicking off Sept. 28 and Hough will take up judging duties for ABC’s “DWTS” this fall.
As for their first dance at the wedding, Erbert told Brides magazine the moment would be a personal one amid a professional career.
“We perform for a living, so we just want this dance to be for us,” she said. “We don’t want to perform for anyone else.”
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“We want to feel good and comfortable, but we don’t need to be perfect,” Hough added to Brides. “That’s a lot less important to me than just looking into her eyes as we’re rocking back and forth. I want to feel truly present in that moment.”
People reported the couple’s first dance was to “Fall Into Me” by Forest Blakk, which took place on an antique mirrored floor with a fog machine.
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Derek Hough, Hayley Erbert wedding: ‘DWTS’ judge marries dance partner
