Swank Brooklyn Dance Party

• By Kaija Helmetag
• Published Summer 2011

Bea Cardenas & John McMonagle

Basilica of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral and Smack Mellon
June 5, 2010

W hen Bea Cardenas, 34, and John McMonagle, 31, met at the Maritime Hotel for their first date, Bea, a publicist for Bumble and bumble, wrote John off as too clean-cut. (He works in finance and showed up in a crisp white button-down.) But then “we started talking, and everything clicked,” she says. “We liked all the same music, and we’re both obsessed with Wes Anderson.” Two years later, John surprised Bea with a sidewalk proposal. In homage to their favorite director, the couple arranged a Royal Tenenbaums–themed photo shoot for the wedding party. The ceremony took place at St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral several months later, complete with a children’s choir, and was followed by a reception at Dumbo’s Smack Mellon, where the Tenenbaums photos resurfaced as a decorative motif. “I wanted the wedding to have an eclectic feel,” says Bea. “I don’t like anything too neat or too done.”