Edward \u201cTeddy\u201d Kennedy III and Rose Esselstyn can never agree on exactly how they met, but they both remember the location. It was her first week of sophomore year after transferring in and his first of junior year at Wesleyan University\u2014and they were both in the Usdan dining hall. \u201cI remember seeing her and waiting for her to put her dishes away so I could \u2018run into her\u2019 at the dish conveyor-belt station,\u201d Teddy says of their meeting in 2018. \u201cShe remembers it the other way around: She got up and followed me, and I said, \u2018Are you following me?\u2019 to which she replied, \u2018Would it be okay if I were?\u2019 After this, we had our first coffee date, and I knew in my heart that she was the one.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her version might be slightly better supported by evidence, as Rose had seen Teddy speak on a panel for first-year and transfer students like herself, where people from different backgrounds discussed their lives and the lessons they\u2019d learned. He had spoken about sailing and how wind alone is only one factor. \u201cI lamented the loss of my grandfather and talked about turning a sailing career marked by last- and second-to-last-place finishes into a resounding success thanks to his direction,\u201d Teddy recalls. \u201cThat summer, I won a championship and was grateful my grandfather was there to see it. This message echoed with Rose, who also shared a sense of family values, among those perseverance and a reverence for those who came before us.\u201d<\/p>\n
After dating for nearly seven years, the two got engaged on May 31, 2025, at Rose\u2019s family\u2019s historic farm in Claverack, New York. \u201cI arranged for her family to join us and for mine to come up clandestinely so as not to alert her to their presence until the time was right,\u201d Teddy says. \u201cIt was a rainy day, and I had to push back my planned \u2018walk\u2019 until the clouds broke. I also organized a surprise private dinner at the Klocke estate later that night to celebrate with our families.\u201d<\/p>\n
The couple\u2019s wedding took place just over a year later on June 13, 2026, at 4 p.m. at the same location. The ceremony was atop the Tank House Hill, overlooking the Catskills and the Hudson Valley, at a farm that has remained in Rose\u2019s family for nearly 350 years across 11 generations.<\/p>\n
At one point, the couple considered marrying in Hyannis Port. \u201cBut my love of the countryside\u2014and the sense that the venue should be the bride\u2019s choice\u2014led us to the farm,\u201d Teddy explains. \u201cI have no doubt we\u2019ll spend a lot of time in Hyannis Port, though.\u201d<\/p>\n
Once the venue had been decided, Rose and Teddy jumped into planning. At first, it was harder than they both anticipated. \u201cRose has tremendous project-management skills, which I wish I shared,\u201d Teddy jokes. \u201cI contributed by taking on ceremony design, seating charts, music, and lighting.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the months leading up to the wedding, Rose\u2019s parents, Ted Esselstyn and Anne Bingham, devoted countless hours to planting, painting, and beautifying the farm. Ted also sketched the intertwining tulips that became the wedding emblem, appearing everywhere from the invitation suite to Teddy\u2019s wedding band. \u201cThe easiest part of the process was that Rose and I had shared visions for the day from the beginning,\u201d Teddy says. \u201cThe harder part was executing on that vision. Neither Rose nor I like superfluous details. We like things classic and simple.\u201d The two worked with Amanda Serroukas for event planning and Main Course for catering.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Edward \u201cTeddy\u201d Kennedy III and Rose Esselstyn can never agree on exactly how they met, but they both…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":644597,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[6491,96,56,54,55,48003],"class_list":["post-644596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-wedding-inspiration"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=644596"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644596\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/644597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=644596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=644596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=644596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}