![]() Planning his own wedding, after orchestrating so many for others, was surreal but fantastic. ![]() It made enough of an impression on Rafanelli that when he married his partner of 30 years, Mark Walsh, in September, they had a morning service and lunch at Oyster Harbors on Cape Cod. That was the celebration he and his brothers and sisters watched over and over. Then they had lunch at his mother's home. Their wedding in the late 1940s was a morning service at St. ![]() "My mother started decorating at Halloween," he said. ![]() They celebrated everything in a big family way in homes in Coventry and later Warwick. His Irish-American mother, Carol Ann Ryan, married his father, Anthony Rafanelli, an Italian-American from North Providence. His credits include planning Chelsea Clinton's wedding and working with the Obamas to create seven state dinners and decorating the White House for Christmas.īut it's families like his that add to Rhode Island's sweet quirkiness. "I feel really lucky to have grown up in this quirky state," he said in a recent phone interview from New York City, a home base along with Boston for his Rafanelli Events company that does the poshest of social events across the U.S. It was there that the six Rafanelli kids were sent on rainy days to watch the home movies of their parents' wedding in North Providence. Bryan Rafanelli's career as a designer and party planner extraordinaire has its roots firmly planted in the basement rec room of his family's Coventry home. ![]()
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