Shannon Connolly & Anil Podduturi
The New Museum
September 12, 2009
It all started with a rose. A really big rose: Shannon and Anil were walking along Bowery when they stumbled onto an installation of “incredible” larger-than-life roses by the artist Will Ryman. A couple of e-mails later, Ryman offered to loan the couple his work for their wedding. “He was really intrigued by the idea of it,” Shannon explains, adding, “a rose symbolizes so much in our culture in terms of love, tradition, passion, and friendship.” Shannon and Anil were the New Museum’s first wedding, so it was only fitting that art and culture set the theme. Indie violist Anni Rossi played during the ceremony; books with jackets that matched their pink-and-black color scheme—thirty feet worth, painstakingly sourced from stores like the Strand—lined the tables; and favorite literary passages were projected on the walls (“We’re both avid readers,” Anil explains). Afterward, the pair surprised the guests by switching mid-song from a slow first dance (to Cat Power’s cover of “Sea of Love”) to a Bollywood duet. “It was a great icebreaker!” Shannon says. “All sides of the family jumped in.”
As told to Thessaly La Force.
The Details
Bride’s Gown:
Lela Rose
Flowers: Baura New York
Caterer: Creative Edge Parties
Cake: Cheryl Kleinman Cakes
Makeup: Mark Edio
Hair:
Clara Purvis of Blackstones
Shannon Connolly & Anil PodduturiPhotographs by Robin Roemer
“I collect these vintage enamel pins, so we set them up as a garden of flowers so the guests could wear them like corsages. Everyone did!”
“We had a library theme. There was a Joyce table, a Nabokov table, and one for Proust.”
A: “The sash on the cake is inspired by the one from Shannon’s dress.”
S: “We wanted it to be neon pink on the top”and the texture’s meant to mirror the outside of the museum.”
The couple on the museum’s rooftop deck.
