Melissa and Gray were engaged and married at their special spot: the beach
Melissa Ramsey Adams & Gray Soapes
March 29, 2025 • Dunes Golf and Beach Club
The wedding day of Melissa Ramsey Adams and Gray Soapes was made even more special as a family affair.
The couple’s children and grandchildren were part of their wedding party, with Melissa’s son, Karson, walking her and her mother down the aisle on the front lawn at the Dunes Golf and Beach Club, their daughters serving as bridesmaids, Gray’s brother standing beside him as best man, and her grandchildren as ringbearers.
“It was truly a magical day,” says Melissa.
Melissa and Gray first met at the infamous Hall’s Chophouse in downtown Charleston, South Carolina, while she was in town for the Cooper River Bridge Run that weekend in April 2022.
“When my friend, Teresa, and I were at dinner, she recognized some friends, and we joined them,” says Melissa. “Gray happened to be with that group, and that’s how we were introduced. … Even though the restaurant was bustling, when Gray and I started talking, it felt like our own little corner of calm. We had such an easy, engaging conversation that night, one that stood out to both of us. Nothing came of it right away, but that first connection stayed with us, and a few months later, we went on our first date.”
Two years later, in July 2024, Gray proposed to Melissa on the beach of Litchfield.
“It felt like a perfect, full-circle moment,” she says. “Back on our third or fourth date, we had planned a picnic dinner on that same beach. But the skies opened just as we arrived, so we set up a tailgate picnic at access 56. Eventually, the rain passed, and we ended up staying until 2 a.m., just talking and listening to music under the stars. From that night on, Litchfield Beach became our spot.”
Another special spot was the site of their wedding ceremony – the oceanfront lawn at the Dunes Club – which took place March 29, 2025. Melissa’s vision was a Southern, Lowcountry theme, featuring splashes of blues, blushes, and browns, and flower bouquets with pops of pheasant feathers to complement the men’s brackish bowties and the bridesmaids’ earrings.
Melissa stepped foot onto the lawn in an ivory gown that was dressed in lace and lined with an underlying layer in a nude shade of fabric. Her bridesmaids were draped in pretty, dusty blue dresses. Gray wore an ivory sports coat from Dumas & Sons in Charleston, and his groomsmen sported suits in a “new blue” shade.
The reception followed in the lavish Dunes Club ballroom, where guests began with a passed hors d’oeuvres cocktail hour of caramelized bacon, ahi tuna, avocado cream, pickled ginger on a wonton crisp with wasabi aioli, and raspberry and almond brie en croute. A Southern-inspired dinner featured a spinach salad, crispy Southern fried chicken, macaroni and cheese, collard greens with crispy bacon, biscuits and hushpuppies with honey butter, a mashed potato bar (sweet potato and Yukon potato with all the toppings), a carving station (herb-roasted New York strip loin with chimichurri and bordelaise sauce), a slider station (hamburger sliders, crab cake sliders, and barbecue pork sliders), a dessert station (banana pudding, red velvet cake, and key-lime pie), and an open bar serving Gray and his fraternity brother’s favorite beer: Natural Light.
Today, Melissa, a membership and communications director at the Dunes Club, and Gray, VP/general manager at WCBD News 2 and VP/general manager of WBTW News 13, will live in Myrtle Beach and Charleston.
