I’m sure many of us who’ve been married – at least those of us who aren’t married anymore – remember a feeling of discreet disapproval surrounding the wedding, and maybe even a tight-lipped “are you sure about this?” from a friend. But that does rather pale in comparison to the reception that Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez are enjoying as they arrive in Venice to kick off their mega luxe wedding this week.
In fairness to the couple, the bulk of protests aren’t about Jeff and Lauren tying the knot, the people of Venice aren’t terribly worried about their union. Many of the protests are about Venice, a city with very limited space, being used as a playground for billionaires, and about how the extreme levels of tourism render the city an uncomfortable place to live for actual Venetians.
Regardless, a protest doesn’t exactly feel like the perfect starting point for nuptial bliss. A superstitious person might even suggest that it’s a bad omen.
A banner against Amazon founder Jeff Bezos in St Mark’s Square (Photo: Yara Nardi/Reuters)I can’t help thinking that Lauren and Jeff’s wedding might signify the official ending to the “Mega Wedding”. That all the backlash will lead to a sort of trickle down social economics thing where us normies are put off the formerly aspirational celebrity wedding because it all just sounds a bit… much.
Details about the wedding are a little hazy, as guests have been asked to sign NDAs, which already feels rather sterile rather than celebratory. But we do know it’s a destination wedding, which everyone sort of secretly hates, and that one of the pre-wedding events was a foam party on a yacht.
I’m only in my early thirties and the idea of having to go to a foam party feels painfully juvenile, so I’m not really sure how people in their fifties are going to find the experience of getting foam sprayed into their eyes while navigating sea sickness.
As a wedding veteran (I went to nine last summer alone) I’ve come to the conclusion that there is a bell curve for the appropriate budget. Too little money can be a problem. I have been to weddings done on a shoestring where the bride and groom have started to take the piss, asking everyone to bring a dish, do the decor and pay for their own drinks, to the extent that everyone feels a bit taken advantage of. But even those weddings have a sort of cheerful, make do and mend atmosphere where you band together, unified by the increasing unreasonableness of the bride and groom.
The weddings with the endlessly enormous budgets often seem to be the least fun, though, picking overly fancy locations where it’s impossible to cut loose, or serving a sliver of wood pigeon for the meal when everyone really just wants a plate of carbs.
square REBECCA REID I’m getting married again – and there are rules we divorcées must follow
Read More
The classiest, and the most enjoyable weddings I’ve attended have had a sensible, mid-range budget. The kind of budget which allows for an open bar, decent mass-catered food and a band who aren’t someone’s cousin’s brother’s mate doing them a favour.
Perhaps it’s my snobby Britishness, but I can’t help thinking that the Bezos wedding is suffering from having too few limitations. When you’re that rich, there’s nothing you can’t do, which must make it enormously easy to lose sight of good sense and, sadly, good taste.
A small, simple ceremony and a nice dinner with their actual friends, in a place where they have some connection, would have some sense of community, especially given that both of them have been married before. It also would have been surprising, impressive and belied a kind of understated confidence in their own status.
It would also, helpfully, have avoided becoming a shorthand for a tourism crisis in a sinking city, the kind of wedding unlikely to attract literal protests. But perhaps I’m speaking of the kind of retrained good sense that seems to evaporate once you become one of the richest men in the world.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( The thing Jeff Bezos needs? More limitations )
Also on site :
- Fresh sirens in north Israel warning of Iran missiles: army
- Target's 'Top-Selling' $5 Backpack Is Heading Back to Stores This Year
- Risk of Iran attack on US bases in Gulf likely not “huge”