As part of the slate of events leading up to their Venice wedding, Amazon titan Jeff Bezos and his journalist fiancée Lauren Sánchez have thrown a foam party to honour Sánchez’s son Evan’s 19th birthday. The party took place on their $500 million superyacht, no less. 

Evan, who Sánchez shares with her ex-husband Patrick Whitesell, and his friends joined the couple on the superyacht Koru. The couple were pictured dancing covered in foam bubbles, as well as cuddling on a lounge chair while Evan and his friends indulged in luxurious activities such as hitting golf balls off the boat’s deck into the sea. The couple also hosted their engagement party on a megayacht in Italy’s Positano back in August 2023.

Page Six have reported that there will be more themed parties as part of the nuptials, including a pyjama party, a cocktail party (maybe more than one, in fact) , a rehearsal dinner and a reception. The rumoured A-list guest list for the wedding includes Oprah Winfrey, Leonardo DiCaprio, Kim Kardashian, Bill Gates, Barbara Streisand and Ivanka Trump, and the nuptials are reported to cost around $48 million. Guests are expected to have clothes, outfits and various accessories for different events. 

When it comes to the wedding itself, reports say Bezoes has arranged for $32,000 suites for guests to stay in, and that the aforementioned $500million superyacht will be used as a taxi.

Bezos and Sánchez originally went public in 2019 and got engaged three years later, and there has been much speculation about where they would get married. Back in March, the mayor of Venice Luigi Brugnaro confirmed that Bezos and Sánchez would be getting married in The Floating City.

‘The many speculations and fake news circulating about Jeff Bezos’ wedding are completely unfounded,’ the mayor wrote in a statement, assuring that the wedding guests would not cause disruptions to the city. ‘We are mutually working and supporting the organisers, to ensure that the event will be absolutely respectful of the fragility and uniqueness of the city.’

There have been protests around the couple getting married in Venice. Greenpeace unfurled a banner in Venice’s St Mark’s Square which read: ‘If you can rent Venice for your wedding you can pay more tax’. 

The caption to Greenpeace’s video of the banner being hung reads: ‘Jeff Bezos pays his staff poverty wages and dodges tax. No wonder he can afford to shut down half of Venice for his wedding this week. Tax billionaires NOW.’

The wedding planning firm that the couple have employed, Lanza & Baucina Limited, have released a statement about their efforts to recruit locally. ‘From the outset, instructions from our client and our own guiding principles were abundantly clear: the minimising of any disruption to the city, the respect for its residents and institutions and the overwhelming employment of locals in the crafting of the events,’ the statement to Page Six reads.

‘Before the recent news of protests arose, we had worked for there to be minimal negative impact or disruption to the lives of Venetians and the city’s visitors.’

The couple are using Venice-based vendors for 80% of their wedding, according to reports from the Associated Press. One such vendor, local pastry company Rosa Salva, will bake sweets for the guest’s goody bags. The wedding venue is being kept under wraps, but there is speculation that the couple will marry at the same venue that George and Amal Clooney exchanged vows at, the seven-star Aman Hotel, a luxurious boutique 16th century palazzo.

A spokesperson for the mayor of Venice has added: ‘Only 200 guests will have been invited and therefore it will be easy for Venice to accommodate such an event,  without any disruption whatsoever to the city, its residents and visitors”. Besides, Venice has an extensive past when it comes to holding huge, glitzy events with numerous guests, such as the G20 Economy, the Venice International Film Festival, as well as other high-profile parties and weddings.

Back in December, speculation circulated that the pair were getting married in Aspen, Colorado. Bezos soon took to social media to refute these claims.

‘Furthermore, this whole thing is completely false – none of this is happening,’ he said on X. ‘The old adage “don’t believe everything you read” is even more true today than it ever has been.’

Sánchez has, however, opened up to Vogue in a November 2023 interview about how much she is ‘looking forward to being Mrs Bezos’. The couple have been engaged for two years. ‘When he opened the box, I think I blacked out a bit,’ she recalled.

‘We love to be together and we love to work together. We fly together. We work out together. We’re together all the time,’ she told the Wall Street Journal back in January 2023, describing Bezos as really funny. ‘He makes me laugh all the time. He can be goofy.’