A Midcentury Modern Micro Wedding at Case Study House #26

A Midcentury Modern Ceremony on the Balcony

The ceremony happened out on the deck. Two short rows of rust-orange midcentury chairs on chrome frames faced a small altar table dressed with pink and white flowers, a white awning angled overhead against the sun. A Zen priest in a black robe stood to officiate, book in hand, the hillside and treetops filling the space behind him past the cable railing.

Their close family gathered in around Ceazon and Scott while they read the vows they had each written and exchanged rings, and a champagne toast closed it out right there on the balcony. The deck hangs off the hillside above China Camp State Park, so it sits over the Marin landscape rather than on it — the hills and the bay spread out below while the steel-frame bays of the house held everything from behind. Beverley Thorne designed it in 1962, the only Case Study house ever built in the Bay Area.

“Vows on a deck cantilevered over the Marin hills, a Zen priest officiating, and a bouquet loud with hot-pink and red.”

Portraits Inside the Case Study House #26 Landmark

Hors d'oeuvres went out to the guests while Ceazon and Scott slipped away for portraits, then they came back for family photos. This house gives a photographer no bad angle: double-height ceilings, all-glass walls, the west light pouring in through the afternoon, the Marin hills framed in every pane. Near the doorway, an older woman wiped at tears while the family moved around her.

Ceazon stood for portraits in her white slip dress, her locs loose, the red lipstick and the vivid bouquet bright against the pale planes of the house. This is twenty minutes north of the Golden Gate Bridge, the bay visible from the deck on a clear day — a setting you cannot rent anywhere else in California.

Dinner and Dancing at the Architectural Landmark

Dinner was one table set out on the deck, the whole party seated together while the hills sat behind them. Chef Jessica Brunelli handled the food from the house's full kitchen, modernized while the rest of the architecture stayed intact, and the table's centerpiece was a wild, unstructured arrangement of hot-pink zinnias, orange poppies, and white hydrangea. Everyone leaned in and laughed through the meal, sunglasses on against the low sun.

For dessert there was a red velvet cake from Criminal Baking. Then everyone pushed into an after-party. The family danced inside the glass walls while the hills past them went dark and the room lit up, the whole house glowing on the Marin hillside like a lantern with everyone still inside it. The dancing ran until the evening wound down.