When Kara Hermes was 27 and working at a now-defunct bridal shop in her hometown of Basking Ridge, she was asked to model some of the store’s headpieces for a local photographer.
While she was flattered, she wasn’t dating anyone at the time—and wasn’t getting married anytime soon—so she worried that posing in bridal accessories could be bad karma. “I thought, ‘I’m going to curse myself with these photos—I’m never going to get married! The universe is going to see that I’m already wearing a wedding dress and move on to the next person,’” she remembers with a laugh.
At the time, many of her friends were getting married and having babies, but she wasn’t the relationship type, she says. Most of her dating had been either short-lived or very casual.
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“I didn’t have these grandiose plans to be a bride. I was a bit more of a tomboy, so dresses and pretty little dainty things weren’t really my thing. But ironically, I started working for this bridal headwear designer,” says Kara.
It wasn’t until she was 42 years old that she met the love of her life—before him, she says, she never even got close. Now the owner of FITloft, a boutique gym in Montclair, Kara was married in October 2024 to Ron Solewski.
Kara and Ron initially met on Long Beach Island one summer when their paths just happened to cross. They both grew up in Basking Ridge, but Ron was six years older, so they didn’t really know each other, despite having mutual friends. But Kara always thought Ron was handsome.
When they connected at the Shore, Kara was living in Hoboken and working at a gym, while Ron was working in construction. It was a Sunday evening, and she’d planned to go home, but at the last minute, Kara decided to go to a Beach Haven bar with some friends. There, she ran into Ron—who she thought was still married with kids (he was divorced).
“I walked in, and he came right up to me and said, ‘Come and find me before you leave,’” explains Kara, “And I said, ‘For what?’ And he said, ‘Because I want to kiss you.’ So, I said, ‘Why do we have to wait until later?’”
Then, right there on the deck of the bar, they kissed in front of everyone. “And I thought, ‘Oh my God, he’s the one,’” continues Kara. “I’d never had a kiss like that before. It was fireworks and something else—something different. I already felt like I was falling in love.”
On the seven-year anniversary of that kiss, Ron proposed to Kara at a surprise party that he threw for her at their home in Stirling.
Last fall, they had an outdoor ceremony and a reception at the Somerville Elks Lodge in Bridgewater. They spent their honeymoon in St. John. “I used to joke with him and say, ‘Why did you ask me to marry you? I wasn’t going anywhere,’” says Kara, “But he is a romantic. And now, I couldn’t be happier. It took a long time, but getting married just three weeks before my 50th birthday is my own Cinderella story.”
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