Love is in the air at Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival.
For years, couples have searched for love on “The Farm,” the sprawling Bonnaroo grounds in rural Coffee County, Tennessee. Some met at the festival, while others tied the knot in campground ceremonies or at the House of MatROOmony, a barn inside the festival that provided a one-of-a-kind way to exchange vows.
At past events, festival-going lovebirds donned costumes and glitter while being married by a colorful array of officiants – from drag queens to artists who just stepped off a nearby stage.
For longtime attendees, Bonnaroo may be the perfect place to say “I ‘Roo.” Since its inception in 2002, the festival represents a place for many to gain community, meet lifelong friends or find a love interest (a Bonnaboo, even).
Sidelines talked to three couples who declared their love on The Farm. These are their stories.
‘Everyone was just showering us with love’
Middle-school sweethearts Alyssa and William Higgins wed at the House of MatROOmony in 2024.
After making the 13-hour drive from Pennsylvania to Tennessee, the couple settled into their campsite on Wednesday, where news spread throughout the Mars Colony that they would marry the next day.
With bright matching hair, Alyssa and William Higgins made their way to the House of MatROOmony Thursday afternoon, where Alyssa Higgins walked down the aisle to Twenty One Pilots’ song “The Craving.”
Ordained by Virginia SlimJim, a New Orleans drag star, they shared vows and walked out as a married pair. The friends they made just the night before cheered from the crowd. Strangers ran up to offer trinkets, take pictures and share congratulations.
“The whole day, everyone was just showering us with love,” said Alyssa Higgins. “I definitely cried like a baby after that.”
The couple celebrates their first anniversary at Bonnaroo this year, a tradition they hope to continue for years to come.
A campsite wedding
Jeffery Melton and Katie Hamlin didn’t meet at Bonnaroo, but it’s where they’ll start their marriage.
After falling for each other in 2020 and attending the festival together for three years, they got engaged under the landmark Bonnaroo arch last year. The couple plan to tie the knot during this year’s festival.
“Bonnaroo has been my favorite place since I started going in 2011, so I couldn’t wait to take Jeff along with me, and he’s fallen in love with the festival as well,” Hamlin said.
After discovering the removal of the House of MatROOmony (a speed dating “love shack” replaces the wedding chapel this year), a close friend of the couple got ordained and plans to officiate the ceremony. They’ll exchange vows under the arch, the same spot where Melton popped the question a year ago.
“Getting married in the same spot we got engaged in is actually more meaningful for both of us,” Hamlin said.
And this Bonnaroo love story likely won’t end after the wedding. The couple already plans to spend their first wedding anniversary under the arch in 2026.
From meet-cute to “I Roo”
Kyle and Katy Hollingsworth experienced a real-life meet-cute in 2016 when Kyle Hollingworth was Katy Hollingsworth’s Lyft driver. They became “a little more than friends,” and stayed in touch, on and off The Farm, before attending their first ‘Roo together in 2017.
During a psychedelic experience at the festival in 2019, Kyle Hollingsworth realized that he and Katy Hollingsworth were in love. The couple moved in together one month after that ‘trip’ to the Farm.
“I think Bonnaroo is a great place to fall in love,” Kyle Hollingsworth said. “Everyone is, hopefully, being the truest version of themselves when they are there.”
Kyle Hollingworth planned to propose at Bonnaroo in 2021, but the festival was cancelled due to flooding from Hurricane Ida.
“I had Katy’s engagement ring picked out and packed for Roo with plans to propose under the arch,” Kyle Hollingsworth said in a Reddit post. “[I] had to settle for a Louisville proposal, but she said ‘yes.’”
On a sunny, dusty day at The Farm that they love — and where they fell in love — Kyle and Katy Hollingsworth said “I Roo,” literally, at the House of MatROOmony in June 2023. The couple married as each other’s “favorite person in the world” at their “favorite place in the world.”
The rest is Bonnaroo history.
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