Some of the 500 people who lined up outside Lincoln Center in Manhattan on June 21 wore distinctive get-ups like a light-up bridal veil or a tuxedo appliquéd with tropical birds. Many, though, came in T-shirts and baseball caps.
They were all there for a mass celebration known as “The Wedding: New York’s Biggest Day,” which is part of the venue’s “Summer for the City” programming. The event has been growing in scope and attendance since its inception in 2022. Now it is among the most anticipated offerings of the summer, according to Shanta Thake, Lincoln Center’s chief artistic officer, who was on hand at the recent installment to welcome couples.
“Biggest Day,” conceived as a response to weddings derailed by the coronavirus pandemic, includes welcome festivities like a photo booth run by a professional photographer, a temporary-tattoo artist inking bare forearms with press-on hearts and a tarot-card-reading station.
An hourlong symbolic “ceremony” in Alice Tully Hall with love-themed readings and performances follows, as does a “reception” with passed desserts in the lobby and outdoor dancing on the plaza next door. No one legally marries, despite the presence of a rabbi, a reverend and other religious leaders this year. But for many, that’s the point.
Sri Sapram and Oliver Yao, for example, have been dating for two years but are not yet ready to commit for life. One reason is that, for now, their relationship is long-distance. Ms. Sapram, 22, is studying to be a physician assistant in Philadelphia. Mr. Yao, 24, left his job in finance recently and, at least for the summer, is “funemployed,” he said.
At last year’s event, Mr. Yao attended the free event as a witness for his mother. Older generations like hers were better represented at the recent installment. But for him and other 20-somethings, the experience offered a glimpse of what the on-ramp to matrimony, minus the holy part, might look like should they one day choose it. Mr. Yao’s assessment: Thumbs up.
“This is so much fun,” he said. For Ms. Sapram, the pro-nuptials vibe was strong enough to get her wondering if, without a ring on her finger, she qualified to attend.
“I was like, are we even allowed to be here?” she said. They were. “We love each other,” Mr. Yao said.
Long-married couples who milled around them before finding their seats for the ceremony were quick to profess their love for each other, too. Many used the celebration as a chance to take stock and reflect on why they would do it all over again.
“We think about our marriage a lot,” said Brad Tassell, who came from Bowling Green, Ky., with his wife of 32 years, Janet Tassell; both were waiting in line for a pre-ceremony flower crown. A stand-up comic on cruise ships, Mr. Tassell is often away from home for months at a time.
“I’ve been watching hookups happen on cruises for years,” Mr. Tassell, 60, said. “It makes me so glad I have Janet. She’s so different and smart and interesting. I hit the jackpot.”
The Tassells had come in street clothes. Primo and Tess Dela Cruz, from the Upper West Side of Manhattan, came dressed as bride and groom — she in pearls, shiny Birkenstocks and heart-shaped sunglasses, and he in a double-breasted suit with gold buttons. They were there, they said, to double down on the feelings that led them to the altar 40 years ago, after both arrived in the United States from the Philippines to work in health care.
“We only have each other,” Ms. Dela Cruz, 66, said. “It’s a reminder of the importance of the relationship,” Mr. Dela Cruz, 71, said.
Elvin and Mary Cespedes, of the Bronx, came to celebrate their first wedding anniversary after 15 years of a courtship rocked by health crises. Mr. Cespedes, 49, who works as an auto mechanic and made his way out of the photo booth using a cane, reserved their spots at the wedding to surprise his wife with a night on the town. Ms. Cespedes, 43, had taken care of him through several diabetes-related surgeries, he said.
“She loves me in good times and bad,” he said.
Ms. Cespedes, in a white dress, her hair swept up, called the gesture “romantic.”
“He’s real sweet to me,” she said.
Not every couple with more than a decade of commitment behind them had formalized their relationship. Leah Rossner, 76, and Priscilla Prutzman, 78, live in Hastings, N.Y., and have been together 22 years. But they never married. They dressed in matching rainbow heart tunics for the event.
“We’re two people who love each other and who love New York,” Ms. Rossner said.
Michael Bailey, 51, and Dario Dalla Lasta, 60, of Greenpoint, Brooklyn, had been to the event twice before. This year, they arrived in matching purple suits, ready to celebrate their 14 years of marriage and two decades as a couple.
“We’re proud of being together that long,” Mr. Bailey said. Neither takes the marriage for granted.
“I’m old enough to have seen friends, an entire community, decimated by AIDS,” Mr. Dalla Lasta said. “Now we have the right to marry. I have to represent that.”
Edward and Phoebe Lewit, of the Upper West Side, were not there to represent what more than a half-century of marriage looked like, though they could have. Mr. Lewit, 87, and Ms. Lewit, 85, married 65 years ago. They have not yet missed an installment of “New York’s Biggest Day” and feel it’s their duty to keep coming.
When it comes to love, “it’s important to celebrate, just in general,” Ms. Lewit said.
Mr. Lewit agreed. “If you have the opportunity,” he said, “grab it.”
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