Loseley Park Wedding | Maryam & Michael

When I met Maryam & Michael at their church a few weeks before the wedding to have a walkthrough of their wedding day,  Maryam told me that she had been looking at my web site every other day. She’d done so ever since booking me in January. The reason for this, she said, was because whenever she got stressed about the wedding planning, she’d go to my website, look at my images and tell herself, it’s fine, Paul will make our wedding look beautiful. No pressure at all then….

We got very lucky with the weather on the day, it was supposed to be sunshine and showers, with a potential for a thunderstorm. As with all weddings, I try not to worry about the weather, there’s nothing I can do to change it. So my job is to work with what I’m given. It turned out fine in the end, the sun came out for short spells and the only time we had rain was for 2 minutes as the couple came out of the church. So they waited until it stopped before doing a Confetti Walk along the church path. Confetti walks are hard to shoot, but also quite a good idea for confetti throwing as it makes it all very natural. When couples exit the church, there is nobody there to throw confetti at them, as all the guests are still inside. But if there is a back door to the church, as there often is, then they can sneak around and wait inside until all the guests have exited the church, then they can exit for a 2nd time – sounds confusing – but it isn’t. It also gives the couple a few moments alone immediately after the wedding, before everyone starts rushing up to them congratulating them etc. It’s good to have pauses during the day, where it’s just the two of you. I’m there as well of course, but the beauty of the way I like to work (unobtrusively) is the couple don’t even notice my presence and are simply in the moment.

After leaving the church, we all headed over to the beautiful Loseley Park, near Guildford in Surrey. As the weather was nice, drinks were held in the gardens. We took the opportunity though of using parts of the historic house for some formal couple portraits and family groups shots. The couple shots are a little bit more formal than I’d normally shoot, but they really suit that room, which always makes me feel like Annie Liebovitz shooting pictures of the royal family. Afterwards, we headed out to the gardens for something a bit more relaxed.

The meal as always at Loseley Park was held in the Tithe Barn. Where they ended the evening with some emotional speeches and a romantic first dance.

Maryam’s first response when seeing her main gallery of wedding images was

“Hey Paul, Thank you so much for these. As preliminary feedback, I am 10 pictures in and I am already crying (rather embarrassingly in a coffee shop)! These are incredible! I will have some more feedback for you when I have seen them all and when I am not typing through big tears. Thank you so so so much.”

I think that means she likes them. Which makes me a very happy wedding photographer.

Paul