Several years ago we photographed Adam and Sarah’s New Year’s Eve wedding at the Waverley Golf Club. I can say with no reservations, that I’ve never seen a wedding where the couple, family and friends had more fun than this night. Guests arrived around 8 pm for a sweet ceremony in the round. From there, the festivities gathered speed. Cocktails, a swing band, the biggest cake I’ve ever seen. And the evening’s surprises went on: a Sinatra impersonator, a trumpet player in a chicken suit, a fire dancer. When the clock struck 12, there were kisses and hugs for everyone.
Sarah and Adam’s wedding is a fun reminder that every wedding needn’t take place on a Saturday afternoon at 4pm. There are so many good ways to combine your wedding with an existing holiday. A fireside ceremony on Christmas Eve? Maybe post Easter Brunch? Putting together a wedding that incorporates a holiday might be just the way to make your wedding different and provide you with a whole set of new options.
Happy New Year from the both of us to all our clients and our friends.
And a warm shout-out to Adam and Sarah. Happy Anniversary!
I “met” someone new this week via email. Dani, a wedding planner with great style, writes a cute blog about weddings. Today, she posted a few of Altura Studio’s winter wedding images to share with her readers. Pop over and check out the rest of her blog. She’s got some of the yummiest wedding fashion. In particular, I really enjoyed this post about “preppy wedding details”. Makes me wish I could tie the knot all over again.
About a year ago, I ran across this terrific article at the ISPWP website. ISPWP is the International Society of Portland and Wedding Photographers, of which we are proud members. Jen Capone’s brilliant essay about the ebb and flow of time on wedding day has stuck with me all this time. She’s given me permission to reprint it here. She writes:
As I pull out my client’s charts and review their information, I immediately form an image in my mind about the Time. I think visually. Time becomes a shape, and the shape of the client’s day, and all the things that need to fit into it, begins to morph. This might be an odd concept for you. Let me try to explain how I particularly see time on a wedding day. Not every photographer thinks this way, that would be scary. But we do have a subliminal list of things that we anticipate, and these things are what add or subtract time to a realistic photography schedule.
I begin while the bride prepares. I ask who is doing the hair and make-up. And who else is getting their hair done at the same time. And do we know this person? And is there enough time? I don’t usually ask what the back of the dress looks like or if they have practiced getting dressed. However, I do ask what time they believe the dress will go on. Then I will already have mapped out how long it takes to get from here to the ceremony location. Then there’s some wedding algebra about how many bridesmaids there are, which determines how many bags there are to carry, how many elevators will need to be used, and how many times someone will stop to look in the mirror to check their lipstick. Not to mention how many phone calls those bridesmaids will make to their dates or husbands about getting something that they forgot. These are the things that I subconsciously have in my mind. I use them to edify my client’s choice or to suggest a different time to put on the dress. Here, Time is a sphere that gets bigger or smaller according to when we need to leave.
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I contribute weekly to a great website of Portland wedding photographers. It’s a forum for us to share our work and stay in touch with our colleagues. Besides enjoying and supporting one another’s work, we also function as an informal support group. If a fellow photographer is ever seriously injured or ill, someone from this outstanding group will help save the day.
Check out myportlandphotographer to see the work of 20 great Portland wedding photographers.
December 3, 2009 Posted in colors
It’s dramatic and simple to design a wedding color scheme around a single hue. Dana and Joel chose a rich red for their decor and flowers for their late summer wedding at the Shogren House in Portland.
Dana’s red satin shoes were a bright surprise under white full length dress. The bride’s bouquet and bridesmaid’s flowers included orangey-red gerberas, dark red dahlias and dark orange freesia. The groom’s boutonniere was a single, happy gerbera. The table cards were tied to a single long rudbeckia stem pushed into a shiny red apple. The tables themselves were designated by the couple’s favorite places around Portland. And when the evening grew cool, Dana had handy a yummy red pashmina—beautiful and striking.
To top it all off, at the end of the evening the couple drove off in the cutest bright red Mini Cooper.
While cruising though our photo archive, hunting for bright color story, I rediscovered Amanda and Alec’s cute-as-ever images from their wedding at Kruger’s. What struck me for this post, was not only how lovely the flowers were, but also that it might be possible for a crafty gal or guy to tackle something similar as a do-it-yourself project. Of course, that would come with a warning that you’d have to be insanely organized or a masochist to want to, but hey, you could.
I think the key to why these flowers are so lovely is that they don’t try too hard to be anything but simple. There’s nothing exotic or overly-constructed. Every flower pictured here is readily available in the Portland area in the summer, and based on the look, it wouldn’t matter if you had a particular bloom. For example, if you had more dahlias and fewer gerberas, it wouldn’t change to the whole look. The key, in my opinion, is keeping the color scheme tight–stick to a relatively narrow range of colors adjacent to each other on the color wheel.
I can see this working with a range of rosy colors, say soft pink through magenta and purple. Or white through cream all the way to pale yellow. Choosing your scheme this way insures that no matter what blossoms come your way at wedding time, you can surely find a pretty assortment without having to pay extra for a particular shade or shape.
One more plus: it’s easy to pick an accent color when your color scheme is analogous–for example here, Amanda used burgundy and yellow ribbons to tie her personal flowers, but nearly any soft color could have worked. Think about how well a soft, grayish blue would look with cream and white, or also be a great companion to a pinky purple scheme.
Brave? Try it.
“Baby, it’s cold outside” would be a good theme song for Stewart and Connie’s cozy wedding at Silcox Hut, perched high on the flank of Mt. Hood. However, icy gusts were no match for warm hearts and warm wishes at this wonderfully simple wedding celebration. We appreciated that Connie and Stewart were game to be outside for pics–it was sooooo cold. Connie was adorable in her white fur shrug, and Stewart accessorized with the smile of a happy, happy man.
About 30 friends and family gathered by the big fire in the hut to celebrate with this sweet couple as they tied the knot, and then after, toasted the newlyweds to the music of 3 leg torso. After cocktails, the entire party rode down the hill in the giant snow-cats for more celebrating over dinner in the Raven’s Nest at Timberline Lodge.
Congratulations Connie and Stewart. We are so glad you found us all the way from New York. Here’s a selection of our favorite pics set to music. Update Dec 8, 2009: Here is a link to Connie and Stewart’s wedding gallery.
I’ve been thinking about a photo shoot with a model, and while researching props, came across Bella Umbrella. They have a collection of the sweetest vintage and fashion oriented umbrellas, and the cool part is that you can rent them for your wedding. Prices range from $10 for simple versions all the way up to $30 for the best and most rare umbrellas. And since they are in Seattle, you probably can have them shipped to Portland fairly reasonably. Learn more at their website, Bella Umbrella.
November 12, 2009 Posted in venues
On Saturday, we’re shooting up at Silcox Hut, and while we are there, we’ll be delivering some new display prints to our friends at Timberline. When we were putting these display prints together, we were struck by the variety of character of each different wedding. If you’re considering a wedding at Timberline Lodge, you might use these images for inspiration.
There are a few things in life that are perfectly classic: satin pumps, a black sheath, candlelight, pearls. Lovely Emily’s October 24 wedding to the ultra-handsome Nick would fit securely in this category. Before the wedding, Emily and Nick met up briefly in the park, where the fates had unrolled a perfect canopy of fall leaves, and then after, the couple joined up with their wedding party in the park blocks. And from there? The quintessential ballroom celebration: touching vows, happy smiles, gorgeous flowers, sexy lighting and the most romantic first dance I’ve seen in a long time.
Here’s a slideshow of our favorite photos from the day.
UPDATE November 24, 2009. Here’s the link to all Emily and Nick’s wedding photos.
