Jess Steele & Ronan Larvor. Civil Partnership. 21st June 2025



Mark Caffrey: Good evening everyone and welcome to the celebration of Jess and Ronan, and to the first gathering of community in celebration at the top of the Observer Building. How fitting that we are able to enjoy the roof, with the expanse of Hastings all around us, as we celebrate Jess and Ronan.

My name is Mark Caffrey, Jess and Ronan’s humanist celebrant.

Before the ceremony begins, let me point out Alice – the official photographer. There are going to be so many photo opportunities this evening. For the length of our ceremony, Jess and Ronan ask you leave the images to Alice - and just relax with them into enjoying the moment. They welcome all of your personal photographs throughout the rest of the evening. And please now put your phone on silent or airplane mode.

You’re here as the people Jess and Ronan want to celebrate with, and they’d love to hear a huge round of applause from you to warm the roof and launch the ceremony for them.

‘Baby Elephant Walk’ by HENRY MANCINI plays as the Best People enter the ceremony space in pairs, walking from the back to the front, and taking their seats as they enter. When the last pair have arrived Jess & Ronan emerge from the building behind the stage.

Eve greets Jess & Ronan as they arrive - before moving to her seat.

WELCOME REFLECTION

Today is an intentional celebration of Jess and Ronan, an opportunity to celebrate the relationship they care for and nourish - and a moment to value their 24 years together. 24 years that are not behind them, but inside them.

It’s a moment to be celebrated with their community of family and friends, good people who they care about. And so, a special welcome to all of you - important guests who have travelled from across the UK, and from Canada [Jess’ nephew Danny]. This rare occurrence of having you all in the same space, on this Summer Solstice in this wonderful town, is a real joy. Some of you haven’t met before this evening, and Jess and Ronan hope you’ll enjoy mingling, making new connections and new friends.

There are important people who aren’t here today. People who are missing, people who should be here. They are much-missed and very present. As is dearly-departed Scuffle, the heartbeat of the family home for 16-and-a-half loyal years. Jess and her Dad were each other’s biggest fans, and her Dad was very keen on standing up and having something to say at important events like tonight.

Jess’ first speech in front of people - aged 12 - was about her Dad; his practical care for and nurturing of his daughter. As a publisher - working in partnership with Jess - he sold words, right up until the last book order under his watch, a week before he died. He taught Jess that if you want something to happen you have to make it happen…and to do that with the mighty pen and not the dangerous sword.

Her Dad is present in every page of all the books they made together. His own life stories were sometimes typed up in Word documents, often erratically dated, or not at all (Jess now has these backed up with dates and pictures and maps!). He was good at making memories. At sustaining friendships. Leading with an abundance of pride and confidence, and drawing on that agency to create opportunities for change. Jess and her Dad served as father and daughter for more than half a century, and all her nature and nuture inheritances are from him.

He is here with us in spirit, invisible but not absent, in every cell of Jess’ body and Ronan is wearing his suit.

There’s much to admire in Jess and Ronan’s energy and care, their creativity, kindness, drive and passion - and their pride in each other; the differences they value in each other, and the possibilities they explore together.

To Jess and Ronan!

A STORY OF JESS AND RONAN

They knew of each other. They’d moved in the same social circles, with lots of shared friends in Deptford and right across SE London. Ronan had been looking after their mutual close friend, Jani Llewllyn - who was godmother to Jess’ baby daughter, Eve. Chance was going to roll these two together at some point.

Jess put a call out around her friends for a handyman, and Sue Laws promptly delivered. One evening, Jess answered her front door to find Ronan there with Sue. Sue pointing at Ronan in front of her. The ‘handyman wanted’. Ronan was good company: practical and fun. Hours of drinks and chats followed before Sue left Jess and Ronan totally at ease in each other’s company. There was a spark. An unspoken agreement to hang out over the coming days. Sunny days relaxing in the garden together, watching Eve. Connecting. Ronan produced his French skills to help Jess get a holiday booked for her and Eve and then excelled himself by producing a carbonara from meagre ingredients in Jess’ fridge - which they enjoyed with Jess’ Mum who’d dropped in. It was a good carbonara. It was an adventure that started on 21st June, 2001.

Their first actual date was to the Brockley Jack pub near the Rivoli where they both had history. They were getting a sense of each other, when Ronan offered: “You’re driven, aren’t you?”

It didn’t occur to Jess that someone wouldn’t be - “Yes, aren’t you?”

“No.” It was a curious provocation and one that immediately recognised their difference, the potential in their dynamic and the freedom, the air, that this offered them.

Three months in they were on their first holiday, together with Eve, to Turkey in October.

End of the season. Cheap holiday, rich company. It was warm, blowing a gale the whole time, and it was all you can eat - so they did. Fun days with Eve learning to walk, cheered on by the hotel staff as she made her way around the pool. Sitting on the tiny balcony one evening, Ronan turned to Jess: “I’ll be around for as long as you’ll have me.” From then on, it felt like they were all-in - a relationship cemented. Their early days were not a tale of linear starting points and the certainty of milestones but in time turning, movement, intention, return. And fun: love, fun, sunshine and the very special spirit of early noughties Deptford.

After both having spent many years fully embedded in Deptford, they moved to Kirkbymoorside, Yorkshire when Eve was two.

It was the early days of the internet. The promise and frustration of the Rightmove search bar: Where would you like to search? E.g. York. Bored of searching SE London, one night Jess typed in “York”. The perfect house appeared. Precise to budget and with an abundance of rooms: a converted Coaching Inn, on the edge of the North York Moors. They made the long journey there and stayed in a B&B just across the way from the property in Crown Square. Jess sat in a lovely window seat looking at the house, making notes, while Ronan had a nap. By the time he woke up, Jess was clear - “I want to buy that house.”

Kirkbymoorside was two trains and a rural bus away from London. Or a 270-mile drive in an old Passat. The house was amazing, the town was perfect, but they were barely seeing each other. On chance days when they could be together at Crown Square, it was idyllic. But everything they were involved in was pulling them back to London, where they stayed in Ronan’s council flat with practically no furniture, while sofas, cat and Jess’ mum were all in the big house in Yorkshire. There was a big map of England on the wall in Kirkbymoorside. If we could just pick up the house, town and all and move it, it would be perfect. But it wasn’t working for now. They had to make a choice.

They were closing the door on Crown Square, their first shared adventure. Ronan felt the weight of that act, a weird responsibility, as he pulled the door for the last time. There was a recognition that their relationship had grown beyond Deptford, beyond Yorkshire - their lives had expanded beyond any single resting point they had secured. Eve was growing. The freedom of raising a toddler was ending - she needed school, and they needed somewhere to settle

Hastings! On a reccy mission to the town, they bumped into The Mad Hatter and The March Hare at the FILO. That confirmed it - they were moving to the right place. And in 2004, Jess, Ronan and Eve made their move. Their first shared long adventure started in a beautiful Edwardian red-brick in St Helen’s Park Road, Hastings. They’re still there.

They might not always have a fully articulated shared vision, but by being present for each other - by being a support to each other, and allowing each other to be supported - they enable good stuff to happen. Building themselves a stable environment to thrive in. Home was a house full of tools, drums, paper and books. Of ideas and plans to turn them into reality.

And Scuffle – “the best of all possible dogs”. Back in 2008, Eve could get a dog if she learned to ride a bike. That was the deal. She didn’t, but Scuffle joined the family anyway: Ronan expertly weighed up the nine pups and decided that this one was the best value. Scuffle came home with them that day and spent 16-and-a-half loyal years as the heartbeat of their family home.

Eve is a big part of their shared story. She’s been a constant and constantly changing over these 24 years. She did learn to ride a bike – she’s been e-biking to work this last year. Eve is so important to Jess and Ronan – their individual and collective love for her is an additional forcefield in their partnership. A strong character, like her Mum, the kind of kid who’d insist on dressing herself before going to nursery - or turn puce in stubborn defiance. As a teenager, the first time she tried for a Saturday job she decided it would be as a florist. She turned up at every Hastings florist shop with her totally overblown CV - delivering the document in person and with a show of utter confidence, and she has shown this tenacity ever since, including moving herself to Bristol for work. Her creativity includes a sideline as a theatre director - making her directorial debut with a production of the Rocky Horror Show. Ronan and Jess supported by arriving as Brad & Janet: giving Jess getting a second chance to show off her shiny white boots bought to see the ABBA show on her 55th birthday. She won prize for best Janet!

Home for Jess and Ronan is still a house full of tools, drums, paper and books. The same house. Now there is also knitting, yoga, and tons of blue-green-shimmer paraphernalia! The house is much improved, mostly by Ronan himself, but his projects do take a long time and generally don’t quite get completed. Jess calls him, affectionately of course, the 90% man. She has learned to be patient because it’s usually worth the wait. Ronan single-handedly converted the attic and opened up the house to light flooding in from above. He dug up the rotten old floors and laid underfloor heating and oak planks. They lived with a disconnected cooker in the centre of the kitchen for two years while waiting to demolish a wall.

The saga requiring most patience was the garden. Ronan was bothered by the fact that the tired old patio was higher than the airbricks on the house. One day in 2015 he lifted a slab, got a spade and started digging. A few days later started with a pneumatic drill. When Jess got home from a work trip there were diggers in the garden and the old patio was gone! More and more of the garden disappeared, deep trenches appeared. Ronan moving earth from one place to another, building walls, creating small mountains which Scuffle loved to climb. The digger over-wintered in the soggy mud and the following summer nature took over the rubble. Late 2016 Ronan and Shaggy started to build a shed to be proud of – the brick base sat quietly at the back of the garden till the following year when the top went on over a period of 10 months. By 2018 the garden was a complete mess with a beautiful shed. They carried on using the space, sitting out, having parties, even when the whole thing got stripped back to desert, which Scuffle loved to dig up. In September 2018 the turf finally got laid but the patio was still a mess and in March 2019 the old trenches filled up with frogspawn – a low point!

“When is this bloody patio coming?”

June 2019 - the patio is finally laid and they celebrate with a 50th birthday party in the garden. “Eventually this will happen and it will be good when it happens.” It’s been a signature of their relationship, their work, their adventures together.

They bought 64 St Helen’s Park Road as a family home to do up - it’s still in progress. Eve’s moved through and started her own life in Bristol. Renovations ongoing. No end points in sight, but lots of time invested, lots of shared memories.

The patio was Ronan’s idea - but Jess is always encouraging Ronan - into starting projects, building and fixing things, sharing good times - parties, holidays - embracing loud shirts.

Ronan is always steadying Jess - making meals, many thousands of fabulous meals. He’s a practical support, generally kind, and a reliable sounding board - putting forward contrarian viewpoints which force Jess to work harder for her vision.

They still delight in their difference. Differences are important, and important to them. They value the difference, it challenges them to live well inside their relationship together - in the present, with intention and care. Underneath the difference there are two people who love each other, look after each other, and want to be together



SEA GLASS EXCHANGE

Jess and Ronan have already made their legal declaration today, and have decided to exchange sea glass as a token of their love, and as a simple way to involve you all in their ceremony.

Ronan has created two clusters of sea glass and dusted them in gold leaf before polishing them. The blue-green-shimmer theme of this celebration is connected to the ring that Jess wears, and to what Ronan calls these ‘precious things’.

Jess and Ronan would like you to pass them along. When it arrives with you, take a moment to hold the clusters and imbue them with the kindest and happiest of intentions for Jess and Ronan as they make their way through you all and back to them.

‘Annie’s Song’ plays as the sea glass clusters circulate.

These clusters are symbolic of glass that has been tumbled by the ocean, smoothed by the tides, catching the waves and always on a journey. Your exchange of sea glass is a token of the patience and playfulness that has crafted your 24 years. It has taken it’s time to be turned and then returned to the shore and to the ritual of your hands.

Jess has a favourite hymn that she has changed very slightly to leave out God and focus instead on the relationship between humans and the earth, and between people now and future generations. Her colleague Charlie Austen has produced a beautiful version which we’ll hear now.

‘Dear Earth & Future Humankind plays as the sea glass clusters return to J&R.

DEAR EARTH AND FUTURE HUMANKIND

Dear earth and future humankind…

Forgive our foolish ways

Re-clothe us in our rightful mind

In pure lives thy service find

In deeper reverence, praise

In deeper reverence, praise.

Drop thy still dews of quietness.

Till all our strivings cease.

Take from our souls the strain and stress

And let our ordered lives confess

The beauty of thy peace

The beauty of thy peace.

Breathe through the hearts of our desire

Thy coolness and thy balm

Let sense be dumb, let flesh retire

Breathe through the earthquake, wind and fire

Oh still small voice of calm

Oh still small voice of calm.

ANNOUNCEMENT

Jess and Ronan, you have signed your civil partnership today and made your exchanges, surrounded and celebrated by good people and good vibes.

It gives me the greatest of pleasure to announce you both legally and fully celebrated in the civil, and very civilised, partnership of Ronan Larvor and Jess Steele.

Guests, once the ceremony has ended you’re invited to enjoy the rooftop bar just behind us, get food from the Tower Room above and bring it back to the Roof to take in the views as you relax, mingle and eat.

For now, please be standing if you can, in celebration of Jess and Ronan!

J&R walk away down the Green Aisle as the cannon streamers are let off.