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A beautiful summer wedding with Laura and Adam

July 23, 2008 – 10:30 am

Laura and Adam had an absolutely gorgeous summer wedding last weekend. The weather was perfect, the sun was shining and everyone looked stunning! Here are some details that we couldn’t wait to post about!

As usual, Rene and I split up and we each spent some time with Laura and Adam as they got ready before the ceremony. Adam’s family and his groomsmen were with him and everyone enjoyed a pre-cermeony toast by Adam’s mom just before leaving for the church:

Rene also got some fabulous portraits of Adam, too. We both love this next one so we knew it was a “must” for the blog!

Meanwhile, back at Laura’s house, the girls were all getting ready as were Laura’s mom and dad. While in Laura’s room, just before she got dressed, I saw something that made me giggle out loud. For everyone who knows Laura, she’s probably the most organized person you’ll meet. So seeing this “To Do” list on her dresser should definitely come as no surprise at all:

We see all different kinds of unique dresses every single week and one of my favorite parts of the day is getting to see what dress we’ll get to photograph that day. I saw Laura’s dress and just got so excited - it’s STUNNING. Laura is so gorgeous and has the most perfect shape for her gown and so the result was just exquisite. Here, her mom was expertly tying up the corseted back:

Laura and Adam were able to pull a few strings and had their ceremony at St. Paul’s Cathedral in Worcester. It’s such a breathtaking and very grand cathedral and an extraordinary place to have a ceremony. After the ceremony, Laura and Adam said they’d like to have a couple of portraits of the two of them in the cathedral showing off it’s grandeur. It just so happened that as the ceremony ended and their guests exited the church, the most amazing ray of light fell through one of the large stained glass windows. (Rene and I get very excited about rays of light! :) ) So we all ran over to that very spot, took this portrait and within minutes, the ray of light had moved on. It was just gorgeous:

We then headed over the the Charter Oak Country Club for their reception and for a few more portraits of Laura and Adam and their wedding party. When we got together with Laura and Adam just before the wedding, Adam was brainstorming with us about some possible ideas for a very cool guy portrait that he could use in his “man room.” I love the end result!!

Laura and Adam just returned from their honeymoon and we’re so excited about getting started on their album together! Thank you so much for having so much fun with us - and we can’t wait to see you again in just a few weeks!

By tiradophoto | Also posted in weddings | Tagged | Comments (0)

A Boston wedding for a New York couple!

July 17, 2008 – 2:35 pm

Katie and Lou now live in Long Island, but Katie is originally from Boston, so they decided to plan their big day here! We’re so happy that they did and that they asked us to be there with them to capture everything with our cameras. There was definitely no shortage of laughter, and having fun as all of their family and friends traveled to downtown Boston to celebrate with them!

What an amazing day - and it’s been taking me forever to even know where to begin! Let’s start with Katie… She’s just stunning and had some of the top professionals in the city helping to make her day perfect. Her florist was actually none other than her brother’s partner who works for Winstons Flowers and designs arrangements for all of the major hotels in the city. He is so incredible talented and how special is it that Katie is so close to him! It really made it so personal and all of the arrangements were just stunning. Here is Katie’s bouquet which was a very delicate arrangement of cascading orchids - just amazing!

Katie and her girls took over the entire Admiral suite at the Seaport Hotel to get ready. It’s the largest suite in the hotel and it was wonderful for everyone to be able to stretch out and relax in luxury while enjoying the gorgeous view of the city around us. Here Katie was getting some last minute touch ups to her gorgeous hairstyle:

It’s funny… On your wedding day, you can sometimes start the day and not feel anything different. You go along with your routine as you’re having your hair done, your makeup done, and sometimes you start to wonder, “Shouldn’t I be feeling really nervous? Or really excited? Or something??” But then there’s always a moment when it suddenly hits you. Sometimes it’s right after you’ve put on your gown, or maybe when you catch a glimpse of yourself for the first time in the mirror. It can be different for everyone, but it always happens. And for Katie, I think this was that very moment:

Meanwhile, Rene was with the guys in another room at the hotel. Before they all left for the ceremony, though, Rene spent a few minutes with Lou and was able to get a few portraits of him. Meet the incredibly handsome Lou:

At nearly the same time, Katie and I were upstairs having our own little private portrait session. (Many thanks to Katie’s bridesmaid who helped hold the videolights for me!!):

Once the girls arrived at the church, the ceremony was ready to start. We had just enough time to line up as the music began, signaling the start of the processional. Once the doors opened and Katie and her dad began their walk down the aisle, Rene was able to capture this gorgeous and teary moment with Lou as he saw Katie for the first time as a bride:

After the ceremony, we headed right back to the Seaport hotel so we could take advantage of their beautiful gardens for some portraits. Here are just a few!

Showing off Katie’s dress and her gorgeous bouquet again:

We also escaped to a room inside the hotel so that Katie and Lou could spend a few quiet moments together and take a few more portraits alone:

By this time, it was time to get the reception started. You may remember hearing me rave about a florist that we worked with just a couple of weeks ago at the State Room (Katie and Brian’s wedding below…). Well, we got to photograph Blue Guava’s beautiful arrangements again at Katie and Lou’s wedding and were again completely stunned by the transformation of the ballroom! I just love these fabulous tree centerpieces that are laced with beautiful delicate flowers and hanging votives:

So remember when I said there was no shortage of laughter and fun at Katie and Lou’s wedding. That definitely wasn’t an exaggeration and I think this next photo from their first dance pretty much shows how they set the tone for the entire evening!

Everyone was having so much fun that even the saxophone player in their band came out on to the dance floor later in the evening to live it up with all of their guests:

We are so excited for Katie and Lou to see the rest of their photos as soon as they come back home from their honeymoon!

More details from Katie and Lou’s wedding:
Getting ready location:Seaport Hotel
Makeup artist: The unrivaled Katrina Hess. I love, love, love her work. She’s truly an artist!
Ceremony location: St. Francis of Assisi, Braintree
Reception location: Seaport Hotel (Nicole was their coordinator and absolutely phenomenal! We’ve worked with her at many of our past weddings and love her to pieces because everything always runs so smoothly with her!)
Reception Florist: Blue Guava
Videographer: David Bettencourt Again! We’ve been working together with David almost every week lately. He’s so cool to be around and we just love his work.

By tiradophoto | Comments (1)

A beautiful wedding honoring a Jewish heritage and lots of love

July 17, 2008 – 1:43 pm

We had the opportunity to photograph Jessie and Josh’s wedding recently at the beautiful Glen Magna Farms in Danvers. There were so many wonderful details and moments to photograph and Jessie and Josh are just a beautiful and warm couple. Josh has a wicked sense of humor and Jessie is his calming balance. Just like Rene and I! (I only wish I was as funny as Josh, though….) They’re so perfect for each and so obviously and completely in love and I still get chills when I think about some of the beautiful moments during their ceremony.

Jessie and Josh incorporated many Jewish orthodox traditions into their ceremony and it was just beautiful to be able to step back and document each moment for them. Before the actual ceremony, there is the signing of the ketubah. Here is their rabbi during that portion of the ceremony:

Jessie also had the honor of having her grandfather in attendance at their wedding as well. Her grandfather is in his 90s and it was very apparent that he is the patriarch of their family and is given so much well-deserved respect and love.

While the ketubah signing was taking place, the girls were upstairs in the estate getting ready with Jessie! Here are some details of Jessie’s dress and her flowers. What was especially wonderful about this is that Jessie is wearing the same dress her mom wore when she got married! It is absolutely stunning and looks so gorgeous on her. How special is that!

And something a little different with their rings. Josh’s ring is completely custom made and the center portion actually moves and spins! It is just stunning!

Up to this point, the men and the women have been kept separate. But when it was time for the bedeken - or veiling ceremony - Jessie and Josh would finally be able to see each other for the first time on their wedding day. While Jessie waits in one room, all of the men form a circle around Josh in another part of the house and then escort him in to see Jessie, while a melody is sung aloud by everyone present. It was truly an exciting and very special moment to witness.

Here the men are leading Josh into the room where Jessie waits for him. Josh is there on the left, trying to catch a first glimpse of Jessie.

As the melody being sung crescendos, the excitement builds and as you can see from Jessie’s reaction, it’s a wonderfully exciting and very emotional part of the ceremony:

And then the actual bedeken takes place:

Jessie and Josh then had beautiful ceremony in the perfectly manicured gardens on the property which included a dove release at the very end! Afterwards, we spent a little bit of time with them alone for their own portraits. We were walking around the house and just fell in love with the grand old library and especially how this beautiful light fell on them:

We just couldn’t get enough of Jessie and Josh and are just dying to share the rest of their images with them. They are on a VERY well deserved honeymoon - for an entire month! - in Thailand. It’s somewhere we are dying to visit ourselves so we’ve promised to hold their photos hostage until they come back and share all of photos from their trip with us! :) We hope you guys are having a wonderful time and we can’t wait to see you soon!

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A beautiful Boston wedding at the State Room

July 11, 2008 – 3:53 pm

Here is a wedding that we are super excited about posting on the blog! Katie and Brian are actually still away on a two week honeymoon in Bora Bora, but we really just couldn’t wait to post some teaser photos from their wedding!

I began the day with Katie at the beautiful Boston Yacht Haven right on the Boston waterfront. This place is a hidden gem that not too many people know about. I’ve lived in the Boston area my entire life and had never even seen the Boston Yacht Haven before. So it was so much fun exploring it while we were all getting ready. Katie and Brian had a suite that included a giant deck overlooking Boston Harbor. I mean REALLY overlooking. We were pretty much standing over the water out there! So needless to say, the view was absolutely stunning. We started early enough so that I could take all of the formal portraits of Katie and her mom, the girls in her bridal party and all seven - yes, count them - SEVEN flower girls and one ringbearer. And they were all under seven years old. They were absolutely adorable - how can you get any cuter than 8 adorable kids completely dressed up in gowns and tuxes?? They made everyone’s heart melt wherever we went!

Katie and Brian had their ceremony at the quaint Our Lady of Good Voyage Chapel on the Fort Point Channel. It’s a Boston landmark and was a perfect location for a true city wedding! Just before the ceremony started, Katie and her girls gathered in the back of the church waiting for the music to begin. I absolutely love this moment because it shows how happy Katie was all day long and you can just feel the excitement that everyone was feeling in those last few moments before walking down the aisle:

Just after the ceremony we all boarded a water taxi back to the Yacht club for some family and wedding party formals. It was definitely the first time we had taken a water taxi during a wedding! And as you can see here, one of Katie and Brian’s youngest flower girls was completely fascinated with my camera. I couldn’t get her to smile or laugh, she was just so completely and totally fixated on the camera. I just wanted to eat her up, she was so cute!

Also, with that many kids in the wedding party, Katie and Brian told us that they had no expectations of things going perfectly as far as they were concerned. That really made it a lot of fun for the kids since there was no pressure and it worked out really well since not everyone was in the mood to have their photo taken all the time:

One of our absolute favorite parts of any wedding (and I know you hear us say this over and over again…) is the time that we get to spend with our couples alone. With Katie and Brian, they decided they wanted to walk over to the State Room with us and they wanted us to find little locations along the way for their portraits. It was such a unique and fabulous idea and we were completely in heaven. I can’t even tell you how much fun we had together on that walk over. Here are some of our favorites:

The absolutely stunning Katie:

And an excuse to show off a great skyline and a gorgeous couple…

And probably some of my favorite images were taken in an ordinary stairwell right in historic Faneuil Hall. We were walking through Faneuil Hall just as the sun was beginning to set and as we walked past a stairwell, the beautiful warm light began to create shadows on the wall. The shadows only lasted a few minutes but we caught them and created some gorgeous portraits with Katie:

And just as we arrived at the State Room, we captured this moment which absolutely begs to be made into a giant canvas print for the studio. (Thank you, Katie and Brian!!)

So now we get to the reception. Wow. Just wow. The State Room is a breathtaking venue to begin with. But with the additional work and attention to even the tiniest details that Katie and Brian did, it was truly jaw dropping. Take a look:

Another little detail - Katie and Brian’s rings were completely custom designed and made. No one will ever have a ring like theirs and they are really magnificent:

All of the floral arrangements were done by Blue Guava. It was the first time we had ever worked with them and I was just stunned by how beautiful these arrangements were. And just to prove that it wasn’t a one-off event, we happened to work with them again just this past week (how’s that for a coincidence??) and their work is so amazing, that I actually recognized it this past weekend. I just knew that they had designed everything. The floral trees that they put together for Katie and Brian were breathtaking and each tree had beautiful tealights hanging from them in delicate glass vases. A close up of what I mean:

Both Katie and Brian’s families are very close knit. Even though their extended family is big with lots of nieces and nephews and cousins, we were just struck by how close everyone was. It was just so cool to be able to feel the love. Here’s one moment that I will never forget. During Katie and Brian’s first dance, I spied two of their nieces just at the edge of the dance floor watching them - completely unposed and candid - and just so, so happy for Katie and Brian. How absolutely precious is this?

And then just moments later as Katie and Brian’s first dance ended, take a look at their priceless expressions:

Another incredibly beautiful moment was when Katie and Brian wanted to dance with their parents. Katie’s dad passed away a few years ago and so Katie asked to her mom to share a dance with her. While Katie and her mom shared that dance together, a slideshow silently played in the background. The slideshow featured images of Katie’s dad from the moment she was born and then through the years. He was right there with them in the background as they shared that special moment. I can honestly say that there was hardly a dry eye to be found anywhere in that room:

Katie and Brian thought of everything to make their wedding truly unique. From their custom designed rings to the Irish stepdancers who delivered an incredible performance - it was truly an evening that none of us will ever forget. We’re so honored that we were able to be there with them and just can’t wait to share the rest of the images once they are back home again!

More details from Katie and Brian’s wedding:
Preceremony location: Boston Yacht Haven
Katie’s hair and makeup: Luiz Filho, Luz Beauty
Ceremony location: Our Lady of Good Voyage Chapel, Boston
Formal portrait location: Boston Yacht Haven, Faneuil Hall, and the streets of Boston
Reception Location: State Room, Boston
DJ: Brett Heaney, Crackerjack Entertainment
Floral Arrangements: Blue Guava

By tiradophoto | Tagged , , , | Comments (1)

A destination engagement session on the Boston waterfront

July 10, 2008 – 3:40 pm

Scheduling Mikki and Scott’s engagement session could have been a little tricky. Because even though both of them are from Massachusetts originally, they’ve been living in Florida and now Maryland so their trips back home before the wedding are few and far between. But when they told us they were coming to Boston and wanted to get together with us for a session, everything worked out just perfectly and we met them in the Christopher Columbus Park right on the Boston waterfront last week. It was beautifully sunny day and we had an absolute blast together! We’ve already activated their entire gallery, but we wanted to post a couple of our favorites as well:

Mikki swears that she’s not a natural when it comes to being photographed, but I’m sure it’s easy to understand why we just don’t believe THAT anymore after taking these photos of them! :) They’re such a gorgeous couple and have the best laughs ever! Their wedding is going to be here in just over a month and we are so beyond excited to spend an entire day with them. So keep watching for an update on them very soon!

By tiradophoto | Comments (0)

Our very own celebrity couple!

July 9, 2008 – 9:24 am

That’s right…these guys have a permanent address right here on our blog and have the distinction of being the one couple who has made more appearances here than anyone else!

I think it would be a fair statement to say that we’ve been through a lot with Colleen and Todd. We’ve had two engagement sessions - a summer time session and then another winter session with them. We’ve been filmed together for a documentary that was being created about us after our 2007 Best of Boston award from Boston Magazine. (You can see the clip from that video here…) Oh but wait there’s more! Colleen booked a boudoir session with me (which I haven’t posted about because it was a surprise for Todd! But I will soon, I promise…) And now at long last there was nothing to do but wait on pins and needles for their wedding to arrive!

So as you can see the four of us have quite a history together. This is a couple that is truly close to our hearts and that we will stay in touch with for a long, long time. By the time their wedding day dawned last weekend, Rene and I felt almost as excited as if we were the ones getting married. Not surprisingly, we have a LOT of images to share from their wedding so here goes!

As usual, Rene and I started earlier in the day so we could each be with Colleen and Todd to get some great images before the ceremony. It always starts with the attire…

Colleen and I literally had about 2 minutes before we need to run out to the limo and meet the boys, but I couldn’t resist one portrait of her just before we left to meet Todd and Rene. Just using the beautiful natural light pouring in from the window in her hotel room.

And now you know why I completely fall in love with her every time I get to photograph her!

Colleen and Todd asked us to help them set up a meeting for them where they could see each other privately before the ceremony and spend a few quiet moments together. A few weeks before the wedding, the four of us took a Sunday afternoon and walked the campus of Wellesley College to try to find the perfect location. This beautiful huge archway partially covered in gorgeous vines was one of the last little spots that we saw before we left that day. And we all knew it was “the place” where it needed to happen. It was just so perfect, the lighting was beautiful here and had so many great elements to work with. Rene and Todd arrived first and just a few minutes later, Colleen and I found them. This next series of images describes all of the emotions of that special moment when they first saw each other much better than I ever could:

We then got to spend some alone time just with Colleen and Todd and have a session for just the two of them. After all of our previous sessions together, this was one of the things we were so excited about!

What you don’t know about that last image is that Colleen and Todd squeezed into this little tiny opening inside a stone archway just so we could get these images. Rene fell in love with the lighting inside and started talking about some of the great ideas he had for that spot. Colleen stepped up to the little tiny doorway, peeked all the way in at the dark dirty space that was there…looked back at Rene and then reached down with both arms to gather all of her dress and dived right in. MY GIRL! The results were stunning and we are so happy that they decided to go for it!

One thing I want to start doing here on the blog is show a little bit of what goes on “behind the scenes” of an image that we take. That way, you’ll be able to see what a location might look like (and I’ll be the first to admit that we sometimes use some really odd locations!) and then you’ll be able to see how the resulting image turned out. I know that sometimes if we’re in an alley or in some other unusual location, it might be hard to imagine what kind of image we could possibly get from it. But it’s actually always about the lighting. And posting these “behind the scenes” photos should help to get some insight into our crazy minds!

So here is an image that I took of Rene photographing Colleen and Todd. This is that little tiny space that I was telling you about. It was dark, dirty and not much room to move around. (Especially when you’re wearing a big gorgeous white dress!) There’s Rene on the left and you can see the videographer (David Bettencourt’s assistant, Jeff) there at the very bottom right corner:

Not the prettiest location, eh? But here is Rene’s resulting image - straight out of the camera:

After a beautiful ceremony we headed over to the beautiful Nashawtuc Country Club in Concord. And from the moment you walked into the ballroom, you could immediately see how much work Colleen and Todd put into every single detail of their wedding. The room was absolutely breathtaking with chocolate brown and soft pink accents. The room was completely transformed with soft uplights and everything was perfectly thought out - even down to the beautiful chocolate pintuck linens.

Near the end of the evening, we snuck outside for a few minutes with Colleen and Todd so that we could do a mini night session with them. So glad we did!

To say that this wedding was special for us is an understatement. We love Colleen and Todd to pieces and are so beyond thrilled that they’re finally officially husband and wife! Here’s to the start of a long relationship together and many more sessions to come!

Some details from their wedding:
Colleen’s pre-ceremony location: The Westin Hotel, Waltham-Boston
Pre-ceremony photo location: Wellesley College campus
Ceremony location: Wellesley Congregational Church
Reception location: Nashawtuc Country Club, Concord, MA
DJ: The Event Experience. Erik Buford is one of our absolute favorite DJs. We can say this from personal experience because Erik actually DJ’d our own wedding 9 years ago!! We loved him then and he was completely amazing again at Colleen and Todd’s wedding.
Videographer: The one and only David Bettencourt
Cake: The Icing on the Cake

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