Inside Serena Williams’s Fairy-Tale Wedding in New Orleans
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It’s 3:00 p.m. the day before their wedding, and Serena Williams and Alexis Ohanian are practicing their first dance one last time with a choreographer in the depths of their venue, the Contemporary Arts Center in New Orleans. Outside, paparazzi are ensconced across the street hoping to catch a glimpse of the tennis superstar, and vendors are quickly working to build the French ball–themed, Beauty and the Beast–style decor, complete with a gold arch of flowers at the end of the aisle, long tables covered in lamé fabric, and lots of surprises. Inside, Serena is a calm, cool, and confident bride, dressed in leggings and a black baseball cap, just trying to nail her steps for when she and her husband take their first spin on the dance floor to “Tale as Old as Time” tomorrow.
Some might say that just like the protagonists in Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve’s fairy tale, Serena and Alexis are an unlikely match from two very different worlds. She’s the greatest female athlete ever, arguably the greatest athlete of all time. (No man has ever taken home a title pregnant! Enough said.) Meanwhile, he’s the founder of Reddit (the birthplace of many a meme), a guy who grew up playing Game Boy, and has been referred to as the “mayor of the Internet.” When they met, she’d never heard of Reddit, and he had never watched a single one of her matches. But, as we all know, opposites attract.
