Paola & Riley
Oakland Estates

Getting Ready

The detail shots in the getting-ready space told me what kind of day this was going to be before the day had properly started. Champagne-crystal heeled shoes. A bottle of Prada perfume beside a cluster of deep red orchids. A copper key favour with a tag that read "thank you for being a Key part of our lives." Every object in that room had been chosen on purpose, and together they formed a still life that was entirely Paola's.

Paola was getting ready with her bridesmaids at the venue itself — a bright modern farmhouse space with white walls and a stone fireplace. The bridesmaids were in blush satin, which turned out to be a deliberate echo of what Riley was wearing on the other side of the building. That colour harmony — blush everywhere, deep red florals for punctuation — carried through every frame of the day. I noticed it first in the getting-ready room and it never stopped being the visual thread that tied everything together.

Her gown was an off-shoulder layered tulle — the kind of dress that catches any available light and holds it. The floral pins in her dark hair were small and precise. Everything about how Paola had put the day together had that quality: decided, specific, beautiful without trying hard to be. She was holding a baby from the bridal party by the fireplace when I came in, kneeling on the carpet in her robe with her hair already done, and I stopped and shot it from the door. Those are the frames you don't stage.

Riley's blush suit was one of my favourite things I photographed all fall. Dusty rose, perfectly tailored, with a deeper pink tie. A small blush rosebud boutonnière. His groomsmen matched him. When I photographed the two of them separately in the morning, the cohesion was already there — the day knew what it wanted to look like long before the ceremony began.

The Ceremony at Oakland Estates

I have photographed ceremonies in churches, on hillsides, in hotel ballrooms, in barns, on lakeshores. The glass marquee tent at Oakland Estates is something I had not encountered before Paola and Riley, and I want to describe it carefully so you understand what made it exceptional to photograph. The walls are clear — entirely transparent — which means that the stand of oak trees behind the venue is visible through the ceremony space as though the trees are part of the room. In fall, those trees are amber and gold. The sky above the tent reads through the ceiling panels. The diffused light that comes through is the kind of light I would order for a ceremony if I could order light: even, warm, directional enough to show texture, soft enough to never be harsh.

The wooden arch that served as the altar had been built for the purpose — raw timber posts dressed with fall florals in blush, burgundy, and dusty peach. Confetti littered the floor from a previous celebration. A small ring bearer walked the aisle with a sign, flanked by a tiny flower girl who showed approximately zero concern for the processional order. It was one of the most genuinely human moments of the day, and everyone in the tent laughed, which broke whatever tension remained before the bride appeared.

Paola came down the aisle to a room full of people who leaned forward in their chairs. The dress moved beautifully in the slow walk — layers of tulle catching what light there was. Riley turned and watched her come and his face did what faces do. I shot from the side aisle to keep the wooden arch and the fall trees visible in the background, because that background was too good to lose.

The vows were written, not read. Long enough to be meaningful, not so long that the intimacy broke. At the first kiss, someone released confetti from the guests' row and it drifted down through the tent air while they held each other. I had been waiting for exactly that kind of unplanned gift and when it came I was ready.

Portraits in the Fall Foliage

Oakland Estates sits in a property that has mature oak trees on most of its perimeter — the kind of trees that are enormous in fall, dropping golden and amber leaves across the pathways and lawns. I planned the portrait time for late afternoon, when the light through the canopy would be directional and warm rather than overhead and flat. Fall light in Manitoba does this thing where it turns everything it touches into something that looks intentionally lit, and I wanted that for Paola and Riley.

They were easy to photograph together. That's not something I say about every couple — some people need to warm up, need instruction, need the first twenty frames to shake off the self-consciousness. Paola and Riley had none of that. She leaned into him and laughed at something he said and I was pressing the shutter before she finished laughing. He kissed her temple while she was looking somewhere else and I caught it in the moment before she turned. Those are the frames that are not posed, the ones that exist because the people in them actually like each other and aren't performing anything.

We worked the perimeter of the property — the path under the oak canopy, the lawn with the glass tent in the background, the clearing where the fall light came through in strips. I pushed the black-and-white conversion on a few frames because the tonal range in that light was too good not to. By the time we finished, the guests were settling in for the reception, the sun was dropping behind the trees, and the tent was glowing from the inside with the first of the string lights.

The Reception at Oakland Estates

The reception was in the same glass tent as the ceremony, reconfigured while we were doing portraits. Farm tables replaced the ceremony chairs, dressed in sheer runners with copper candleholders and fall floral centrepieces in blush and burgundy. The wooden arch remained at the far end and became the backdrop for the head table, which meant the ceremony space became the dining room without losing any of its visual character. It's one of the most efficient venue layouts I've seen — the tent is beautiful in both configurations.

Riley got down on one knee during the cocktail hour, not to propose — they were already married — but to slip Paola's shoe back on after she'd taken it off, which produced one of my favourite reception candids of the year. There was something quietly ceremonial about it, a groom attending to his bride with the same attention he'd given her all day, and she was looking down at him with exactly the expression you'd hope to photograph. I don't set up shots like that. I just stay alert.

The speeches were long, warm, and specific. The kind of speeches where people say the names of other people in the room and those people laugh and cry at the same time. Paola wiped her eyes twice. Riley put his arm around her and left it there. I was shooting from the side of the head table for most of it, close enough to read the expressions and far enough to keep the tent in the background.

The first dance was underneath the wooden arch — the same arch from the ceremony, the same fall floral arrangement — with string lights switched on above and the clear walls now dark with evening and the tree silhouettes beyond the glass. The dancing started shortly after and kept going until late. At some point the bridesmaids lost their shoes. At some point a group photo was taken inside the tent with the string lights above and everyone pressed together laughing. That's the photo you go back to twenty years later and count the faces.

After Dark — Night Portraits

The best portraits of the night happened after eleven o'clock, when the dancing was still going inside the tent and Paola and Riley slipped out to the garden for twenty minutes. This is something I always try to carve out time for when a venue allows it — a few minutes away from the reception to photograph just the two of them when all the day's formality has been shed and they're simply in it together.

The pathways at Oakland Estates are lined with string lights threaded through the oak canopy overhead, which in fall gives you this tunnel of warm bulb light under a ceiling of dark branches and leaves. I photographed them walking it, stopping in it, leaning against each other in it. These are the frames that look like the end of a film — the kind of images that don't need explaining.

The last shot I made that night was the one that opens this post. I set up a long exposure on the patio with Paola and Riley holding still at the centre of the frame, and moved the camera light in long strokes above them while the shutter held open. Rainbow streaks above them, the string lights of the oak canopy behind them, the two of them pressed together in the middle of all that colour. It takes about thirty seconds to make a photograph like that, which is nothing for something you'll keep the rest of your life.