A “Tunnel of Love” Led to an Epic After-Party at This Wedding in the Smoky Mountains

Interior designer Emma Williams grew up in Los Angeles, and real estate developer Atticus Shorr was born in London before his family moved to a farm in Pennsylvania. “When they eventually landed in California, our families—who’ve known each other for 50 years—reconnected and thought it would be nice to get us all together,” Emma explains. “This is how I ended up, at 16, on Hope Ranch beach in Santa Barbara in 2014, instantly smitten with a handsome newcomer who was far more interested in body surfing than being introduced to old family friends. He gave me a quick, polite handshake before sprinting back into the ocean. He swears he remembers that first meeting; I remain unconvinced.”

They stayed friends over the years. “[But] I always felt like we were closer than we actually were,” Emma admits. In the spring of 2023, things shifted though. “After one of those family dinners, we started texting—a lot,” Emma remembers. “He was living in Boulder, I was in New York, and I didn’t think much of it…until he announced he was coming to New York for June, staying with his brother Jake, to ‘try the city on for size.’” As it turns out, this potential move was as much a veiled excuse for the real estate developer to take her out on a few dates as it was to relocate.

On Atticus’s first night in New York, they went to Casino, an Italian restaurant in Chinatown, with Jake and Jake’s girlfriend, Virginia—and from that night on, things moved quickly. Atticus’s month-long stay was extended week after week, and soon, he had more of his things at Emma’s apartment than he did at his brother’s. “Like most do when head over heels, we were convinced we had invented falling in love,” Emma remembers.

In July, after cooking a meal at home together, Atticus pulled Emma into his lap and told her he loved her. “When I returned the sentiment, he asserted, ‘We are going to get married,’ to which I replied, ‘I know’—and we both keeled over with laughter knowing how absurd it sounded and how true it was,” Emma recalls. “As my cousins—who are more like sisters to me—said in their wedding toast to us, Atticus and I were never really dating—we were always going to get married.”