I love spontaneous weddings.
Eliza and Warren decided to get married while in Australia, on holiday from the UK, with a grand total of NINE WEEKS to organise an 80+ person wedding. What did they manage to pull off? Only a glorious, sunbathed, genuine, heartfelt and stunningly elegant affair. Obviously, to plan a wedding from another continent with just over two months, they are ridiculously relaxed people, and it was this happy and easygoing attitude to wedding planning that caught my attention when they enquired with me. Chilled out people, planning a chilled out simple wedding, with all the bells and whistles but none of the stress or drama? Sign me up!
They were married at Athol Hall in Mosman, around the corner from Sydney’s Taronga Zoo, in the late afternoon sunshine, surrounded by their nearest and dearest. They booked a fantastic two man band called Hype Duo, who tore the roof off the place, and their wedding cake was an ice cream cake – AN ICE CREAM CAKE!!!! I put a lot of exclamation points there, because I feel like you really should know how much I love ice cream cake. In fact, I’m pretty sure it was the ice cream cake that attracted me to their wedding.
Eliza and Warren wanted a photographer who would blend in with their relaxed day, who wouldn’t try to create moments but instead be there to document whatever happened naturally, and who wouldn’t drag them around the city for portraits while their guests were waiting for them inside. I think we were a perfect match for each other on this day, because as a documentary photographer, I absolutely love being part of the moment. I love great conversations, I love sharing the excitement of the event and the relationships that form there – but mostly I love fading into the background and just using the camera as a tool to capture the day without anyone really noticing that I’m there. They wanted unposed wedding photography. They got it.
What do I mean by unposed? Well, of course, you almost always have to have SOME posing. You want to capture everyone looking great, after all. We had about twenty minutes, at high tide and at sunset, to create some sweet and fun portraits of the happy couple and the bridal party, and then it was party time. I spent about five minutes saying “gimme a smile… give her a kiss… whisper in his ear how much you love him… flowergirls, your giggling is adorable, show me your flowers!…. groomsmen, my GOD you’re handsome devils, why don’t you show me your teeth?” and then fifteen minutes just letting Eliza and Warren talk and hug and kiss and totally ignore me and have a quiet moment to enjoy this enormous day in their lives.
That’s my ideal wedding portrait session, right there. Is it yours?
A gorgeous day and a wonderful couple. I wish I could show you all of the images from this day, but frankly I can’t decide, so here is a brief overview. I feel like this won’t be the only blog post I write about this day.
Thank you so much Prue, everything about the day was just perfect including you! We had so much fun having you around and the photos are just magical. I must have looked through them all 100 times. They never cease to make me smile. You caught so many gorgeous moments, it’s like you were everywhere! Eliza xx