Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/1545128
62 stools, benches, candleholders, and side tables scattered through the nave like friends who arrived early and chose their seats carefully. Each piece is composed of individually selected stones whose colors, veining, and mineral character give them something close to personality. A custom metallic carpet by Verdi, woven from copper and stainless-steel threads, shimmers across the chapel floor beneath. British floral artist Hamish Powell contributed living sculptures — stabilized I t a l i a n d a n d e l i o n a n d p re s e r v e d amaranthus — that introduce a fleeting, botanical tenderness to the scene. A harp plays. Candles burn in monumental stone holders carved to suggest flowers. At the altar — created from a stone console — two sculptural scent diffusers, made in collaboration with British perfume house Penhaligon's, fragrance the air like incense. "Weddings are one of the most universal rituals in human life," says Jose Schnaider, creative director of Sten Studio. "When visitors first enter the room, they might think they are simply walking into a design exhibition — but as they move through the space, they realize they are witnessing a wedding ceremony designed to take their breath away." Based in one of the world's richest stone-producing regions of Mexico, Sten Studio produces collectible f u r n i t u r e a n d b e s p o k e objects, treating minerals not as raw material but as muses. Aurella and Vireon are priced at $35,000 each, produced as a limited edition of eight — with variations in the bride's necklace stones and the groom's brooch ensuring that no two are exactly alike. Till death — and several geological epochs — do us part. stenstudio.com. Below: Lucerna floor candleholders and Orlena table Unara bench in blue calcite and six colors of onyx The abandoned Milanese chapel where the nuptials took place