Something Borrowed

On an April afternoon at the stone Chapel at The Cliffs at Glassy, the day was awash in springtime blues, from the sky overhead to the hydrangeas tied into soft bouquets.

The wedding party wore pale-blue dresses and suits, echoing the tones of the Blue Ridge Mountains beyond. 

“It was all of our favorite people in one of our favorite places,” recalls the bride, Lara Weisbeck. 

Though she grew up in Buffalo, New York, Lara spent many holidays and summer days at Glassy. As the oldest granddaughter among dozens of siblings and cousins, she joined a lively crew of aunts, uncles, and extended family who gathered here year after year. When Lara was sixteen, she stood at the very same altar and watched her mother, Dana, marry her stepfather, John LeMar, in the Glassy Chapel. Those memories, layered over years of family gatherings, made the place feel like a second home.

And at the heart of it all was one person: Mimi.

Diane McGlothlin, affectionately known as Mimi to her twenty-one grandchildren, was one of the earliest club members at The Cliffs at Glassy. In the early 2000s, she built a house on Stony Road with plenty of room for family and friends. In 2009, McGlothlin hosted the reception for her daughter Dana’s wedding. And at the April 2024 wedding of her eldest granddaughter, Lara, to longtime beau Joe Weisbeck, McGlothlin also played a key role. 

The bridal party dressed in their gowns at Mimi’s large, airy home with tall windows and ivy-covered walls, and on the wedding day, she was the one decked out in a blue blouse and chic, cherry-red trousers, along with a beaming smile. Lara says Mimi has always been known for her radiant beauty and impeccable style, and she considers her eighty-two-year-old grandmother to be one of her very best friends.

“Mimi’s so well-traveled and graceful,” Lara says. “She’s one of the most incredible people I’ve ever known.”

When Lara was a child, she reveled at being among the cousins chasing each other through Mimi’s tall house, known for its views to Georgia on a clear day. Her grandmother had decorated one of the bedrooms in an Alice in Wonderland theme, and the children would all pile into the basement to play games and perform skits for the grown-ups. Outside on the property’s windy perch, Lara and her cousins clambered over mountain boulders and marveled at Mimi’s garden statue of a woman with a billowing skirt, “Gale Force Nun.” (Along with the house, the bronze work by British sculptor Philip Jackson withstood last year’s Hurricane Helene just fine.)

During annual summer day camps organized by Glassy members, the kids played golf and tennis and tried ziplining and whitewater rafting. McGlothlin recalls those summers fondly. “It was a chance to spend some bonding time with my grandchildren…while also entertaining them with enriching adventures.”

McGlothlin smiles at recalling birthday parties and other festivities at her home, “and a multitude of family gatherings, including celebrations every Thanksgiving with my big extended family.” Mimi loves to travel and would also lead national and international trips with various cohorts of her grandchildren. Lara recalls a trip with Mimi and family to museums in Paris and to a Harry Potter-inspired excursion in England. Another time, Mimi brought a different group of her grandchildren to Alaska. “She has always been there for her grandchildren, and she liked to share her knowledge of the world with us,” Lara says.

When she was a student at High Point University in North Carolina, Lara studied art and recalls often meeting Mimi for shopping trips in Charlotte. “Those trips were very special,” remembers Lara. “We’d laugh so much.” The fun has continued ever since. “Mimi can turn something so simple into art,” according to Lara, who says her grandmother shared with her the secret to putting together an outfit—always add one thing you wouldn’t expect.

Lara and Joe, now in their early thirties, began dating on summer breaks while they were in college. Lara soon invited him to join her on family trips to Glassy. “When I saw how amazing it was, I never wanted to leave,” says Joe, an avid golfer who owns a landscape construction business. “With the courses winding through the mountains, the conditions are fantastic.”

On one of his earliest visits, Joe followed a trail that begins near the Glassy Chapel and leads to a lookout point. He and Lara began going there together, every visit. Sometimes they’d invite other family members to join them. “We made it a tradition—to follow the path and look out at the view, and it became a special place for us,” Lara says.

The couple was captivated, and each knew that Glassy would be where they would marry. After college graduation, Lara became an administrator at a preschool, work that she notes is inspired by her mother and grandmother—“filling our childhoods with fun, life, games, and laughter.”

And when their wedding day finally arrived, Joe remembers looking out over the escarpments below the chapel that had become so familiar. “Luckily, we had a perfectly clear day, and everyone got to experience the beauty.”

He and Lara will never forget their wedding celebration at the Glassy Chapel, surrounded by dearest friends and family—and that Mimi was there for it all.