A City Hall Elopement With a Live Cellist and Seven Guests

Getting Ready Before the City Hall Elopement

Hair and makeup came together early while Kaylee's bouquet sat waiting nearby, garden blooms gathered loose, warm-toned. Sam got dressed with his small group close by, a boutonniere pinned to his lapel.

Before they left for City Hall, the two of them did a first look, a quiet few minutes with just each other, Kaylee's dress and her flowers, before the day opened up to everyone else. No big crowd to build toward, just the two of them and the seven people they'd asked along.

A City Hall Elopement Under the Rotunda, With a Live Cellist

The ceremony was inside San Francisco City Hall, at the foot of the grand marble staircase that sweeps up beneath the building's gilded dome, the 1915 Beaux-Arts rotunda that rises taller than the dome on the United States Capitol. The cellist from Bay Area All Strings & Brass had been playing since before anyone arrived, folk and indie songs carrying up through the open colonnade while the seven guests found their places.

Seven guests stood close around Kaylee and Sam, near enough to reach out and touch. Janette said the words, the two of them exchanged their vows and rings, and the smallness of the room made every line of it land. They had walked in together to Johnny Cash's 'Rose of My Heart.' When it was done they walked back out to 'Kiss' by Prince, played on strings, the seven of them following behind down the marble.