Welcome to Who What Wear Weddings, the vacation spot for style-minded weddings. Expect insightful guidelines directly from the newlyweds, shoppable components, and quite a lot of must-save imagery as we proportion the nuptials of our favourite type folks getting married. For upcoming options, proportion your submissions right here.
“We just met as friends,” style Arlenis Sosa stocks as she thinks again to the summer time day in 2021 on Long Island, New York, when she met author John McCarty at his brother’s engagement get together. Flash-forward six months afterward a commute with mutual buddies to Saint Bart’s and their courting took a flip. “From the start of the trip, the spark was undeniable. We were inseparable, waking up early to see each other (which would be a shock to anyone who knows us), taking walks on the beach, making sure to sit next to each other at every meal,” Sosa shares with Who What Wear. “One evening, we went out on a drive to find the perfect mountain peak to watch the sunset. We settled on a rocky ledge and watched the sun slip into the sea. That’s when I really realized I was falling for John.” Though their time together in Saint Bart’s was early in the couple’s relationship, those around them could sense their special bond. “One morning at breakfast, one of my friends prophetically remarked, ‘Arlenis is going to marry John.’ He might’ve meant it as a joke, but I was already 95% sure he was right.”
Three years later in August 2024, Sosa flew from her home in Los Angeles to Rhode Island for a photo shoot. “Little did I know, later that same day, John took a red-eye to NYC, where he planned to pick up the beautiful emerald engagement ring he had made for me,” Sosa says. But things didn’t go as planned. “When he arrived in New York, he learned that there had been an issue with setting the stone, and the ring wouldn’t be finished until the following day. This was a major issue seeing as he had to propose to me that night before I departed Rhode Island on a 6 a.m. flight the following morning. Already running late, he bolted to the closest department store, found a ring that vaguely resembled my dream ring, swiped his card for $24.99, and hit the road.” After a five-hour crawl through rush hour traffic, McCarty arrived in Newport, Rhode Island.
Just as Sosa was headed to bed, she received a text from a friend asking her to meet them in her hotel lobby, but when she arrived, she instead found McCarty waiting for her. “As I walked through the lobby and reached the entrance of the hotel, it felt like an ordinary night. But as soon as I saw him standing at the bottom of those stairs, it became extraordinary,” Sosa shares. “Everything after that is a flash.” At that moment, Sosa saw McCarty drop to his knee, and they began hugging and kissing. Then, his voice broke through, asking, “‘So is that a yes?’ ‘Of course!’ I replied.” Engaged just for a few moments, the couple heard their friend erupt in cheers nearby, rushing over with champagne glasses for the couple. “I looked down at my ring, excited but surprised. He noticed and whispered in my ear, ‘Don’t worry; that’s not the real one.’” The couple then spent the night celebrating with friends over pizza and champagne.
The night the couple was engaged, they began discussing their wedding details, and later decided on Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic to celebrate their wedding in February 2025, which fell on Dominican Independence Day. The bride infused details from her Dominican heritage into the celebrations, including everything from local empanadas to Dominican dancers who led the traditional “Hora Loca.”
“We welcomed visitors to the primary respectable tournament, welcome beverages, at La Yola. La Yola is a shocking marina-side eating place and bar with refreshing tropical cocktails and savory seafood bites.”
“Guests sported shiny sundown colours for this tournament to check the sky because the day became to nighttime. Guests had been additionally absolutely immersed in Dominican tradition with dancers, track, and bottles of MamaJuana.”
“While I used to be in Paris for my get dressed fittings and on a stroll within the sixth arrondissement, we stopped on the Dries Van Noten boutique and located John probably the most implausible pale-yellow go well with. Right away I knew John would glance so good-looking and the colour felt so suitable for the welcome dinner surroundings at sundown. [My dear friend and stylist Yanuel Garcia Laureano] blended the go well with with chocolate-brown espadrilles and an ivory knit T-shirt, which simply made John seem like this kind of leading-edge gentleman.”
“For the welcome dinner, we select to paintings with NYC-based emblem Attersee. I’ve had a courting with the logo since it all started again in 2021, and I’ve at all times beloved their female, easy, and adapted aesthetic. My stylist works fairly carefully with the logo, and we had the speculation of extending a vest they’d created for his or her assortment in 2024 and making that piece into the get dressed I wore that first night.”
“When it got here time to select what I might put on, I partnered with [Yanuel]. The overarching theory for the whole thing we select I’d say was once ‘feminine simplicity.’ We each sought after to select and/or make items that invoked a easy but romantic feeling for each the welcome dinner and the marriage day that have been fitted and a mixture of customized and ready-to-wear items.”
“For the marriage day itself, John additionally labored with my expensive pal Yanuel. Together, they picked a Ralph Lauren Purple Label males’s tuxedo. They sought after to reach an old-world classic-modern search for John that felt large good-looking and suitable for the instance.”
“My jewellery was once all customized made via my expensive pal Amir who, together with his father, has a studio within the middle of the jewellery district in NYC. He was once sort sufficient to make me 3 customized earrings for the festivities. The most unusual are a couple of emerald-cut deep-green emerald stud earrings I wore for the rite which matched my gorgeous emerald engagement ring.”
“For attractiveness and jewellery, we additionally sought after to increase the female, leading-edge, and easy aesthetic. Hair and make-up was once achieved via my expensive buddies, Makky Pratayot and Hos Hounkpatin. I absolutely depended on their imaginative and prescient; they didn’t disappoint.”
The bride with friends and family on her wedding ceremony day.
“For the marriage get dressed, we labored with my expensive pal Esteban Cortázar, who was once sort sufficient to paintings with us in making a one-of-a-kind get dressed. We met in New York in 2009, when Esteban had simply began as inventive director of Ungaro Paris. He selected me to shoot his spring summer time hotel lookbook. After that gigantic day, our courting persisted, no longer simplest on a certified degree but additionally as a lovely friendship that we’ve got the enjoyment of celebrating nowadays. I known as Esteban in November, simply 3 months sooner than the marriage, to have him design my get dressed. Despite having a super-busy agenda, Esteban, with a lot love and happiness, accredited.”
“We started the method with a lunch assembly between the 3 people in NYC on the finish of 2024, and shortly thereafter Esteban despatched over some sketches from Paris. Since he’s founded in Paris, we needed to do so much over the telephone and did a couple of far flung fittings right through the primary weeks of 2025. I after all was once fortunate sufficient so as to take a weeklong commute to Paris, the place Esteban and his group actually made the get dressed on me over 3 fittings.”
“I will be able to by no means omit status in his studio in Paris dressed in the get dressed as he pinned the corset pleating element via hand. Standing in entrance of the reflect, I started to rip up as my expensive pal made my dream get dressed come true sooner than my very eyes! It was once this kind of dream procedure, and I used to be so fortunate to paintings no longer simplest with this kind of gifted clothier corresponding to Esteban but additionally any individual who I believe an expensive, expensive pal.”
“The evening we were given engaged, we began discussing the timeline and made up our minds we needed to stay our engagement brief. We had been hoping to be married inside of six months. Initially, lots of the folks we talked to with this function date in thoughts known as it subsequent to unimaginable, however when we settled on a planner who was once open to each concept that got here to thoughts, it made us really feel find it irresistible was once inside of achieve.”
“After taking a look at many cities all over the Dominican Republic, we made up our minds on Punta Cana on account of its fantastic seashores, luxurious accommodations, and simplicity of shuttle for visitors. From there, discovering the church, Nuestra Señora de Punta Cana, and the reception venue, Playa Blanca, was once a breeze as each are the most productive in all of Punta Cana. Aligning the provision of those two was once a little bit difficult, however ultimately we discovered the easiest date, Dominican Independence Day.”
The groom seeing the bride moments sooner than they had been married.
The couple stand in combination on the altar.
Moments because the couple stated “I do.”
“After the rite was once finished, we had been surrounded via buddies and households in entrance of the church as they burned sparklers in our honor.”
“We loaded into our traditional automobile and had been whisked away to our dreamy seashore reception to take our {couples} portraits sooner than the solar absolutely set.”
The couple deliberate footage at the seashore simply sooner than sundown.
The glad bride and groom.
“After we wrapped up footage, we headed again up the seashore to take hold of a drink and make our formal front into the reception space.”
“We opted for a minimalist vibe that enhanced the herbal wonderful thing about the site, leaning into the luxurious vegetables of the Dominican jungle, a heat beige that resembles the sand of our seashores, and white to characterize the purity of affection we had been there to have a good time.”
“With each the meals and track picks, I actually sought after to present our visitors a style of my Dominican heritage, and they didn’t disappoint.”
“For the welcome dinner in addition to the after-party for the marriage day, I additionally went with easy items that Amir was once sort sufficient to make for me, which incorporated emerald-cut diamond studs talented to me via my husband and diamond tennis bracelets for the after-party.”
A second to cheers the newlyweds.
The couple with their households.
“In addition to Esteban’s get dressed for the church rite and dinner, for the after-party which came about at the seashore, [I] selected to switch again into an extended sheer sequin get dressed that felt very leading-edge, at ease, and mirrored all of the lighting fixtures across the dance ground.”
DJ Andrew Sullivan and a lovely tiered cake on the reception.
“From the highly spiced goat empanadas that my husband couldn’t put all the way down to the Dominican dancers who got here out for ‘Hora Loca’ to steer us thru other conventional dances to the cigar bar with customized rolled ‘Arlenis & John’ cigars, it was once all absolute best.”
Wedding Planner: Ashley Alemany
Dress: Esteban Cortázar
Second Dress: Attersee
Stylist: Yanuel Garcia Laureano
Makeup Artist: Makky Pratayot
Hairstylist: Hos Hounkpatin
Band: Cayo Arena
DJ: Andrew Sullivan
Photographer: Aldry Joel
Videographer: Capture
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