Guess what? WE got Hitched!

Our Story

How do you elope during a worldwide pandemic?

Very carefully.

After a proposal at Pasadena’s palatial Huntington Gardens, we decided the safest thing to do during the height of the pandemic was a series of micro-weddings: three bright moments that would become the constellation of our love.

View our engagement photos in Echo Park, Los Angeles.

We got our marriage license from a part-time wizard at a 24 hour chapel in a Long Beach office complex — and our vaccines in San Fernando Valley (yes, in the same day!). A week later, we were in the desert near Joshua Tree, California, saying our vows with an audience of four in a dome that may or may not have been designed by aliens.

It was everything we always wanted.

Check out the art, music, poetry, and otherworldly architecture of our Integratron elopement.

Even though we couldn’t all gather in person, we felt everyone’s presence through your kind words, art, and good vibes blasted out into the multiverse. And we valiantly spared you from yet another Zoom call in our socially distant lives (yes, you’re on mute).

Support the independent artists and creatives who made our dream a reality.

We loved the idea of the ephemerality of it all, that somewhere in the world love was happening, and if everyone listened carefully enough, you could hear it in your hearts. There, under the cathedral-like dome of the Integratron — just steps away from a desert orchid farm we were told “has sentient flowers” — we felt connected to you.

Donate to meaningful non-profits or our family travel fund at our registry.

Tying the Knot

At a ceremony helmed by Sophia’s close friends Merril Lavezzo and Matt Read (and their 1-year-old daughter Margaret), we held ceramics made by Sophia’s mother Mary Kercher, listened to music composed by Drew’s brother Doug Tewksbury, carried mementos passed down the Tewksbury line, and experienced Tanya Aguiniga and Todd Beattie’s participatory art piece and poem including knots and words from 36 members of our family and friends. Surrounded by your words and wishes, we tied the knot.

Check out photographer Alissa Garcia's Integratron elopement photos here.

Planting a Seed

In our second service, we planted a seed for the future. At Noah Purifoy’s Outdoor Sculpture garden, Tanya and Todd completed our union with a blessing and an offering to the desert, where we planted two baby Joshua trees to give back to the land that has given us so much.

After we made our vows to each other in the California desert — then a month later, we made vows to our parents in another arid expanse.

Experience a moment of our Noah Purifoy ceremony.

Wedding Bells

Our parents traveled to the deserts of Arizona — Drew’s home state — for a pop-up ceremony at Arcosanti, a creative community housed in an architecturally imaginative village created by Italian futurist Paolo Soleri. Nearby the experimental city’s concrete cubes and jangling wind chimes, we made promises to our parents under the structure’s vaulted arches, overlooking aged Italian cypress trees and a craggy canyon.

Check out photographer Jessica Jameson’s photos from our Arcosanti adventure.

Afterward, we all sat on a log, drank champagne, and watched the moonrise, while the compound’s cat, Yuki, followed us like a shadow.

The next day, we worked with Arcosanti’s artisans to craft ceramic bells using clay from the region; it was a wedding bell to call our own.

Visit our registry to donate to meaningful non-profits or our travel fund.

But these three bright moments are only the beginning.

Over the next weeks and months, we will be bringing the celebration to you; we hope to make more pop-up visits to the East Coast, Northern California, and Canada to raise a glass to love with our geographically distant families.

(And to make that happen, we need your help. Instead of getting us a blender — we have two already — please feel free to chip in to our registry and travel fund here.)

Until then, check out the photos, art, video and words from our ceremonies below.