Rose Parade set to feature first gay marriage
In a Tournament of Roses first, two Los Angeles men will celebrate their gay marriage on a Rose Parade float as it goes down Colorado Boulevard on New Year’s Day.
The wedding of Danny Leclair, 45, and Aubrey Loots, 42, will happen on the giant wedding cake-shaped float sponsored by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, according to a press release. It is the third float sponsored by the foundation.
This Rose Parade is the first year gay marriage has been legal in California following the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in June.
Loots and Leclair own Studio DNA Salons, a chain of L.A. area hair salons that carries Gleam by Melanie Mills, the cosmetic line created by Loots’ best friend and professional creative collaborator, Melanie Mills. Mills’ was over the moon about their pending wedding. “Aubrey is such a gifted hair stylist and dear friend. I have waited years for this day for them.” Loots styled the hair of most all the models in Mills’ book “Glitter & Glam”, released by Penguin books in 2012.
The float’s theme is “Love is the Best Protection.” It will feature a large wedding cake, decorated in white coconut chips and maroon-colored kidney beans with white roses and dendrobium orchids.
The first-ever live wedding during the annual Rose Parade took place in 1989. It was called the “most widely witnessed wedding in American history.”
Leclair and Loots will take their vows before the nearly 500,000 people who will line Colorado Boulevard on Jan.??1 and millions of television viewers watching around the globe.
Leclair, a native of Canada, and Loots, who is from South Africa, met 12 years ago at a Los Angeles nightclub.
The couple is starting a social media campaign and urging people to declare their love for a person, group or place on their wedding day, Jan.1, and share it on social media with the hashtag #loveexperiment. They will then compile the messages on a website.
The couple’s impending wedding has caused some controversy
