Bridal Photos at Greystone Estate
You absolutely, positively, 100% do not need a bridal session.
But, if you get one anyway, make it epic. I’m kind of kidding here, but also kind of not. The truth is that prior to me living in the south I had absolutely no idea what a bridal session even was. I can easily recall conversations with brides from years ago about setting up these sessions and me wondering a bit what the point was. It felt redundant right? Fast forward a bit and different conversations with the same brides kept coming up again and again. Often it would start with an awkward question “do you shoot boudoir photos?” I had a quick, almost practiced answer to that question that rolled right off my lips in completely sincerity : you can’t even imagine how awkward I would be with you in your underwear. It’s true, it’s just not my thing and to top that I tend to get super close to our grooms and can imagine the weirdest moments high giving a dude on his wedding day just moments before handing him a book filled with half naked photos of his fiancé… that I took. All of it is cringy to me but hold up because there was something really good that came from this whole thing. I started asking simply “why?” - “Why do you want to give him this book of risky photos of you and what on earth do you think he’s going to do with it?” The truth is I saw men for years blush and smile and then kind of wonder where the heck they’d hide this thing. For years I told girls to skip the session altogether and simply buy him a camera, let him take the photos and have a fun flirty evening like that and I can promise the photos will be horrible but the experience will be twice as fun and then it kind of all hit me at once.
I had a bit of an epiphany.
The issue I had with those sessions wasn’t that they existed, it was just that they couldn’t be shared. I saw grooms that couldn’t wait to show off the beauty they were marrying. Couldn’t wait to share the woman they got to call their wife. They wanted photos of her on their desk, on their wall, albums filled with those photos locking in exactly who she is right now. These guys were so proud of her and the boudoir sessions were kind of painted as this celebration of her beauty but in a way they couldn’t share. (Side bar here, I think I’ve really come to understand that that perhaps the most beautiful thing to come out of those sessions is the empowerment of the beauty that the bride’s feel, regardless of how much the actual images really mean to the guys. That’s pretty cool actually, and super valuable but again - maybe not the best gift on a wedding day? Just my thoughts). Anyway, I started searching for a solution. How can we shoot photos of this woman in a way that has legacy value to her kids, her grandkids, and her husband? How can we celebrate her beauty as a wife, a woman, a bride? The solution was staring at me right in my dumb slow to learn face : The bridal session.
The Bridal session!
It didn’t need to be this overly perfected high pressure situation where the bride feels like she’s supposed to fill some stereotypical vision of a “bride”. It could simply be a celebration of her beauty. A chance for her to play dress up and feel pretty and have photos that capture all of that with the express intent on the sharing. The gift of capturing this beauty isolated from the moments and pressure of a wedding day, and separated from the emotion and relationship with the groom. Just her. When I realized this, my entire vision for a bride’s beauty shifted.
She is bold, brave, vulnerable, trusting, strong in this session. A bride has to trust so much that her insecurities are ok, that what is coming forward is her best self, that she is enough. There’s a fleeting few moments between being a fiancé and being a wife where there is a true celebration of the beauty of being a bride. It connects every woman that has worn a white dress and walked down an aisle for generations and this session somehow extends that a little more. It doesn’t just capture this bride, it captures the bride. How cool is that?
So as we pulled up to Greystone Estate and the absolute brilliance of Samantha’s Garden florals decorated the front entrance and Alie popped into this dress that feels more like something an architect dreamed up than a designer I was struck with the simple truth. These photos could be shared. To Justin her dad who adores every breath Alie takes. To friends who couldn’t wait to see just how beautiful she would be as a bride. To her kids and grandkids who will get to see the beauty they come from and most of all : to Hunter, the guy that would have married her no matter what she looked like but who really hit the jackpot anyway.
My advice on having a bridal session?
Search your soul a bit and think through what this moment in your life is worth. If being the bride is something you want to share with your daughter when she too is a bride, or your mom from when she was a bride, or with friends or coworkers who have also been brides : book this session and don’t look back. Don’t show up perfect but trust that the beauty that is inside will come out.
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