Alexis: I got to know Liz (in-person at the L.A. shop) and Oliver (remotely, over email) quite well over the months leading up to their engagement and wedding. I loved working with them so much! I thought their story was really special, and I asked Liz to share their engagement story and rather epic honeymoon "adventure".
Liz: We had planned for my parents to visit his family in snowy Montana for New Year's and while we didn't say it exactly, I suspected we would get engaged with everyone there to celebrate - we were living in Ethiopia at the time, so it was a special occasion for everyone to be together.
New Year's Eve was as magical and snowy as they come. At midnight the sky was clear and we were deep in the woods with both of our families, our nephews going headfirst down the hill on sleds, the dog frolicking, a bottle of champagne passed around. Oliver and I walked away from everyone and stood under a tree and looked at each other. The snow was actually glistening in the starlight and I could feel my heart beating, waiting. Nothing happened. Eventually we all went inside and went to bed. I woke up the next morning and tried to be nice. We were all prepping for a big snow party that Oliver's mom puts on every New Year's Day. People were baking, and Oliver and his brothers were building a big bonfire at the top of the hill. His mom asked us to take some Adirondack chairs up the hill and he and I hauled them through the snow, me trying to contain my horror that we were still just boyfriend and girlfriend. The rest is more typical: we stopped halfway up the hill and Oliver got on a knee and asked me to marry him. He presented a gray diamond Lauren Wolf ring. If you can have a crush on a piece of jewelry, I have one on this ring. He told me he'd been carrying it everywhere for days and that the one moment he didn't have it was the night before, that he knew he'd missed the most perfect moment to propose, but it didn't matter, we were so happy.
We had fun choosing our bands with ESQUELETO, and Alexis helped us a great deal with all of our questions from so far away. In the end we settled on two Lauren Wolf bands and got them just a day before our wedding in my hometown on Cape Cod. A few days later, we began a pretty dreamy honeymoon that ended in the Maldives, a destination Oliver had always wanted to visit, specifically to see a whale shark. We took a boat far out into the ocean and our captain spotted a shark and instructed us to dive in quickly. We swam fast and followed this huge spotted fish for a while before heading back to the boat. As we climbed back on I caught a look on Oliver's face and I knew before he said it that he'd lost his ring. He likes to say a whale shark ate it, which I go along with to make him feel better. Alexis of course helped us with our 4th ring, a replacement band, and I presented it to Oliver (unceremoniously) in Montana the next time we were home.
Photography by Olivia Gatti
