Real Wedding: Joseph Christiana & Zachary Ranta

Draw inspiration from their stylish celebration.

By Julie Suratt· 6/12/2018, 2:18 p.m.

The wedding party included many of the couple’s former swimming and diving teammates from Harvard. / Photograph by Person + Killian Photography

THE STORY

For the first seven years of their relationship, Joseph “Joc” Christiana and Zac Ranta didn’t live in the same state. When they met at a party at Harvard University in 2008, Zac was an undergrad studying molecular and cellular biology, while Joc, a Crimson alum, was working 100 miles away in Connecticut. Zac smiled across the room at Joc and thought, “We should become better friends.” They quickly did, and spent their weekends commuting to each other’s home base. Visiting became more challenging when Zac moved to Wisconsin for medical school, but the couple recalls those times fondly: “It was actually a lovely period in our relationship,” Joc says. “We were just focused on us when we were together, and we were able to fall in love all over again.” Eventually, when Zac landed a medical residency in Boston, the pair moved in together in the Back Bay.

After Joc proposed, they looked for a wedding location that celebrated their shared space. They chose the Boston Public Library, just four blocks from their condo, so “our friends and family could see the beauty of our neighborhood and how our everyday [lives] looked,” Joc says. In another nod to their adopted home state, the couple’s ceremony at Old South Church included a reading from the 2003 Massachusetts Supreme Court ruling legalizing gay marriage. “We thought that was really fitting, given where we live and who we are,” Joc says. Not to mention, how far they’ve come.

THE DETAILS