Provided by Sarah Rossi and Alvae Armellini
Venice (Reuters) -The founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos and journalist Lauren Sanchez, was going to exchange marriage vows during the ceremony in Venice on Friday, part of a three -day wedding extravagance that attracted dozens of celebrity guests, but also local activist protests.
Bezos (61) and 55 -year -old Sanchez will change rings on a small island of San Giorgio, opposite St. Mark Square, along with singing from the famous Italian pop-opera tenor Andrea Bocelli’s son Matteo Bocelli.
At the ceremony under Italian law, he would not have a legal status, Reuters told a tall city town hall, claiming that the couple had already married the US, avoiding bureaucracy related to Italian marriage.
It is estimated that the festivities cost about $ 50 million on Saturday, and the climax is with a party at the former medieval shipyard, where Lady Gaga and Elton John are reported to appear.
Bill Gates, Orlando Bloom, Tom Brady, Queen of Jordan, Oprah Winfrey, Kris Jenner, Kim and Khloe Kardashian, as well as Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner and Domenico Dolce from Dolce & Gabbana are among 200-250 guests.
Between strict security, celebrities are moving around the city, women with summer dresses and high heels, slightly growing from boats that accumulate them around the city canals.
The festivities began on Thursday night in Cloisters, Madona Dell’ort, the Medieval Church in Cloisters, which has Tintoretto’s 16th -century painter’s masterpieces.
“This magical place gave us unforgettable memories,” the bride and groom said in his wedding invitation, where they asked “without gifts” and promised charity victims to three Venetian institutions.
Their victims are € 3 million ($ 3.5 million).
“Venice-Dogwind wrapped”
Business congratulated Glitz and Glamour, but the local protest movement, whose members are angry with what they think are Venice, which is characterized by gifts associated with extremely rich outsiders. Bezos is no. 4 on the Forbes billionaire list.
A representative of Giulia Cacopardo, a 28-year-old movement “Without space without space”, complained that ordinary people’s needs were abandoned in a city, which is a magnet of a tourist and is rapidly distinguished by its rapidly increasing livelihood costs. The center of Venice is home to less than 50,000 inhabitants compared to nearly 100,000 in the late 1970s.
“When you empty the city of its inhabitants, you can turn it into a stage of big events,” Cacopardo told Reuters. “(But) the money that Bezos spends on this wedding does not end with the pockets of the Venetians. Luxury hotel owners are not Venetians. “
Cacopardo was one of 30-40 activists who organized a protest on the ST Mark Square Thursday, singing “We’re 99%” when a mask couple posed as a bride and groom, and one man climbed into the pillar to unfold the headline “1% destroying the world”.
The police intervened by forcing the protesters.
The Anti-Beza Front plans a march on Saturday, and their activities have already encouraged the authorities to increase security and move Saturday’s party to a more secluded part of Venice, former Arsenale shipyard.
However, politicians, hotel owners and other Venice residents are delighted with the wedding, saying that such events are more supportive of the local economy than many daytime trippins, which usually exceed the city.
“We are delighted to congratulate Jeff Bezos and his consort to Lauren Sanchez,” said Mayor Luigi Brugnar, who sent white roses from the bride and the maximum bottle of Amarone’s luxury red wine to the groom.
The Italian Ministry of Tourism stated that it had conducted a study worth € 957 million ($ 1.12 billion). The overall economic impact of the wedding, including the benefits of € 896 million from the “media visibility”, and the rest from the direct or indirect costs related to the event.
Bezos, the executive of Amazon, in 2023, four years after 25 years of marriage to the Mackenzie Scott collapse, got engaged to Sanchez.
(1 USD = 0.8545 euros)
(Additional Yara Nardi, Ali KuckGocmen and Cristiano Corvinoeding Reports Frances Kerry)