Wedding / Cooling Castle Barn – Kent / Lisa & Mark

Lisa & Mark

WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY AT COOLING CASTLE BARN, KENT

 

It’s an unusual mix of excitement, curiosity and pressure when you’re asked to photograph a wedding of a distant relative whom you’ve only met perhaps once or twice when you were much younger! I was honoured that Mark (my something cousin… we’re not entirely sure…) and his fiancée, Lisa, wanted me to capture their wedding day!

They had decided on an intimate guest list but a grand venue, Cooling Castle Barn, which made for a thrilling sense of VIP luxury! They kept everything simple, classic and elegant, from Lisa’s bias-cut wedding dress to the gentle decor, which drew our focus simply to them as a couple. There is a current trend with weddings which sees brides and grooms clambering to make their weddings the most memorable, the most entertaining, the most cool, the most alternative, the most dazzling, the most creative, the most individual, the most fun, the most lavish… but this was a wedding that truly stood out, and not for any of the aforementioned superlatives, but for the fact that it was stripped back to capture what the wedding was truly all about… love.

As a photographer, photographing a wedding on a rainy Monday on the verge of winter with relatively little decor and definitely no time outside, I was given this golden opportunity to really observe and focus (no pun intended!) on the relationships between people. I spent more time than ever before just looking, waiting and capturing moments and emotions. This, is, I think, the element of wedding photography which truly tells your story. Yes, your bouquet is incredible and your centre-pieces fit your theme perfectly and though in future you’ll want photos to remind us of your well-planned choices and the trends you loved at the time of your wedding, you and future generations will totally treasure the images that convey who you are, the ones that show you feeling happy and in love. Trust me.