“The ring means so much more since it came from Spoon.”
It was clear from the first time our team spoke with Kate and Lauren that they are absolutely enamored with each other. They called in the early morning from a beach in Maui, where they were vacationing together. The two were energetic and giggly as they told us the story of how a stainless steel Spoon came to be a central instrument in their romance.
Lauren first met the Spoon on her first date with Kate. Kate explained that she took the Spoon everywhere in memory of her grandfather, who had handed it down to her. After hearing the story, Lauren held onto the Spoon, saying she’d return it if Kate went on a second date with her.
From then on, Kate used Spoon to record moments for Lauren. Spoon’s Instagram account @OurSpoonAffair, was the perfect vessel for Kate to express herself. She took photos, immortalizing the places where she thought of Lauren and by writing her thoughts down. On Instagram, Spoon came alive, and became a hopeless romantic.
The Spoon went everywhere with Kate. It travelled from the lush wine country, to the streets where it marched for water access and migrant rights. Spoon took showers, visited the glasses store, and yodeled from the Bavarian mountaintops. It luxuriated, indulging in rice cakes and rolling in cash. Spoon visited some of the most beautiful places on Earth and pined for Lauren.
Two years after their first trip with Spoon, they were both thinking of proposing to each other. Kate knew that Lauren had always loved the androgyny and precision of Todd Reed. Lauren explained that it was “feminine without being feminine.”
Kate hatched a plan. She took Spoon and contacted Todd to see if he could transform it into a custom ring set. The team agreed that they could work with stainless steel, which Todd doesn’t normally work with, and turned it into two rings. From there, Kate worked with Todd and Melissa to reshape Spoon into two wedding bands. They planned for Spoon to be visible — the exterior of both rings are made from Spoon’s stainless steel, and the interiors contain a subtle gold sleeve.
On May 29, Kate sent Spoon down to Boulder to be transformed.
Spoon took one last picture with Todd outside of the Todd Reed headquarters before its transformation.
Finally, Kate proposed in Leavenworth, where the two shared their first kiss and where they returned every year for their anniversary. The two were camping out for a 3AM hike the next day. They sat together in a hot, dusty parking lot, fighting off mosquitoes and sharing laughs. Lounging in long johns, with a container of cold spaghetti in her hand, Kate recalled thinking “This is perfect.”
She proposed right there in the parking lot, and the answer was a resounding yes.
“We just want to thank Todd and the team for helping,” Lauren told us. “There are still cake makers that won’t serve gay couples. We live in a place where we expect people to be accepting [but…]” She trailed off.
“It’s perfect.” added Kate.
