PW Reader Ring: Caroline & John!

Caroline’s ring!

The couple: Caroline Gonzalez and John Ciccone, Philadelphia.

The ring: My engagement ring is an oval, Edwardian-inspired white gold setting with an aquamarine center stone and small blue topazes all around. John had asked me if I had any major ring requirements and as it turned out, I had a lot! As an off-beat bride, I a diamond solitaire just does not fit my personality at all, and so I told him that I’d rather help him design the ring. We designed it on Gemvara.com. It is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen, and everyone agrees that it fits my creative and whimsical personality.

The proposal: Once we had designed the ring, I knew a proposal was coming, but I had no idea when, where, or how! And so, John snuck around behind my back and asked my brother for his blessing, secretly made me a scrapbook about our relationship, wrote a proposal song, got permission from the owners of the diner where we had our first date to hide his guitar in their kitchen, then enlisted some of his artistic friends to show up at the diner at a designated time to film and photograph the occasion.

On our one-year anniversary of dating on November 1, 2013, after dinner at Butcher and Singer, he made me walk all the way to  Midtown II Restaurant, where the hostess sat us in the very booth where we first met, and everyone turned to stare as John made his public announcement. He was so choked up, it was the worst performance of his musical career, but it was amazing and personal and so emotional that we both cried—and the wait staff and diners loved it!