A True Tesco Wedding...

And true it was. A fairy tale. A bride in the supermarket. I loved it.

I met the bride to be a couple of weeks after I decided that I had gotten bored with weddings. Some of the British brides are not very likable, they don’t mind spending a fortune for a venue, but they do mind to feed the photographer. And I don’t like to take my lunch wrapped in cellophane when I go shoot a wedding. We wedding photographers often work from 8 in the morning till nine at night, and some brides think you can live of air. A lunch for a photographer is nothing when you bring it in against the total wedding costs, if you can order lunch for 300, you can order 301 is what I say. So I had decided to stop doing weddings. Hard work, no play and hardly any pay...
Until one day I got an email begging me to do one more wedding, and I could not refuse. I had found my match, a bride as crazy as I am. Wanting to do something out of the normal, go wild all the way. My kind of gal. So I accepted. If all weddings would have been like this one, I would still be trying to get more in my agenda.

I had just landed in the bride’s parental home, as I got called in the kitchen already, for a bacon sandwich the old way. Good, juicy and smelling like heaven.
Tea was hot and waiting for me, I felt taken in immediately. Which helps. It is more fun to shoot if you are accepted by the family. Something you rarely achieve in some of the posh weddings. I love it when people invite me in the kitchen to have tea. I am a kitchen kind of girl...

Little figurines on the window pane in the kitchen, I am not very much into china, but there little thingies were cute. I knew this was going to be a grand day when I saw the dad glancing at his daughter when he first spotted her in her wedding dress. I could see the love he felt for her.

This girl was loved dearly by her parents, and the love came from both ways.
As I always try to snap relationships, how people relate to one another, I could feel it in my toes that I would have lots of occasions as the hours passed.

The preparations ran to an end and we were ready to get the whole circus rolling. No limousines outside the door to take the bride on the road, nope, two land rovers.
We are in a rural area, and the groom is a landscaper, so I could see where they were coming from. Time to go to the first stop for the day: Tesco in Thirsk...

I am following the land rover, along the Busby Stoop, where in the 18th century a murderer was hanged, therefore the Busby Stoop is a haunted pub.
We don’t stop for a drink, it is a wedding after all, things have to stay pleasant.

It is very surprising to see what we see when we arrive on the parking of Tesco, just at the entrance of Thirsk.
A big group of colleagues is standing outside, making for a welcome committee. The store is embellished, wedding music coming from the speakers. My eyes are getting wet and I am choking up. Not a good thing if a wedding photographer gets emotional...

A lot of camera’s and phones are used to snap the events, we do live in a photographed society, it is a nice thing on this wedding day.
Emotions run high, there is hugging and embracing, the bride is obviously loved by her colleagues. I am having a ball, and feel very privileged to be able to snap it all.
A wedding not like any other wedding I have ever shot.

The people waiting outside seem happy. It is not every day that a bride visits the store. People doing their normal weekly shopping look somewhat strange when they find a bride in between the flowers and the deli.

In our paranoia and bad news world, this is a bit of good news. A girl being so happy to get married and wanting to share the joy with the people she spends a lot of time with.
Nice idea, and it has proven to work. Everyone is is cheered up and giddy. Love the atmosphere of excitement. One of the collegues baked a special wedding cake, and they had made a small bib like thing to protect her dress. Tears were general and plenty.

Others had small presents, big smiles all over the place. Customers seemed happy too with the not often seen bridal showing in the store. It is something special, everyone likes to look at brides. I remember my grandmother reading all the news about the weddings, and present at the church to see the bride “come out”. It was a small interruption of happiness in their otherwise calm life. I think that by looking at a bride, we all remember our dreams and hopes we had when we were young.

A lovely thing to do on a wedding day, instead of driving straight to the registrar’s office, make a detour to do something silly. Have fun, enjoy the day a while longer by doing something that you always wanted to do but never got to do...
We leave Tesco and head the road to Fountains Abbey, the banquet house, where the ceremony will take place. A beautiful setting, hidden in woodlands, the perfect place for a perfect day.

I arrive a while before the bride, after a hectic ride through Ripon. A small town, but on this day, they had planned to make a new city layout, and all the normal driving routes had changed. It meant that I was standing on Duck Hill, and saw the car with bride and her dad pass me by from the other direction. Buggers, taking the route through town was a bad idea, wished i had taken the bypass. Turning right out of Duck Hill is not allowed, but you know what, for this one time, and no other traffic around, I just turned right and managed to pass the bridal car. I arrived at time, in a total state of panic, as I also first had to pick up moms and grandmothers. I arrived at the banquet house with a full car and a full heart.

Not a minute too soon. I just had gotten my stuff out of the car when she arrived. With a big smile, she was queen of the day. And she looked it.

Happy brides are always a joy to look at and be with. So much preparations go in a day like that, Chell had outdone herself. It all went tip top, just on scheme, Fountains had wardens ready to guide family and friends uphill to the Banquet House. The bride and simple me were the only ones allowed to drive up to the house. It is on top of one of the hills surrounding the water garden of Fountains, and quite a hike if you have to do it by foot. For me it was a case of getting there by car of getting there without breath and have to catch up for two hours. The path goes steep up, and it is a good half hour hike. For seasoned walkers. Which I am definitely not.

Family and friends were seated already, inside the folly. A lovely spot on earth to have a wedding. In between all the green, looking out over the water, no sounds except birds.

The mother of the bride had made beautiful flower arrangements, it all added to the peaceful atmosphere of the day.
The ceremony was short but touching, the newlyweds wanted a group shot, that was taken care of first. Always better to have the groupshots done first, to get it over with, so people can relax and have fun afterwards.

A small group, but a tight family. A couple of small kids, some teens, all having special princess dresses. One little boy Ben, sharp dressed man for the day.
I saw more of him, and kept an eye on it when he found a huge worm in the grass.

The worm got his total attention, it had come out of the ground as it was starting to drizzle. Soon enough it would pour down with rain, and not stop anymore for the rest of the day.
We were lucky, it only started raining full on when we were just preparing to go to the luncheon place in Ripon.

And as my grandmother said, a good soldier has his weapons to go to war, I had my weapons ready. My sadly now deceased brollie and my camerabag. Tools of the trade.

Brolly came in handy to protect the bride from the rain, bringing in some more colour. R.I.P. brolly...

The uncles and nephews gathered on the grass, before walking back to the parking lot in the Studley Royal deer park. We had planned on some more shots next to the pond, but the weather had changed for the worst, no more piccies outside...

The happy couple did not mind the rain, they were happy enough to stay inside of the rover, leave it to the photographer to stand in the rain and snap. Grin...

A good thing that I did it, as I found a beautiful swan feather, with drops of rain on it. Even rainy days have good photography opportunities. That was exactly what Ben thought, as he managed to take photographs of all the family there. The bride and groom had put small camera’s on every table, and the boy did do well. A funny kid.

A possible future photographer. I am all for giving our kids camera’s. Now in our digital age, we don’t have to spend money anymore on processing, and it is refreshing to see the world through the eyes of a kid.
This was part one of the wedding. We had a sequel fourteen days after the ceremony, with the bride still crazy, and I still happy to oblige to the crazyness...

I can officially declare this wedding to be the funniest I ever shot. It was a beautiful occassion, I was surrounded by happy people, having fun the whole day long.
Every photographer should at least have one wedding like this, to make up for the ones where some photographers can only cry their eyes out...

In the line of thinking of the whole event, crazy comes first... I was not surprised at all to get snow in July on the opening dance. Hec, the sky was the limit...

Thank you Michelle and Simon for having allowed me to be there for your special day. It was very special to me!

Comments

[Christine]

What absolutely joyful faces and, you are so right, so much love shining through! This was just fabulous - a very special peak and the joy of others - what a way to start my day! The swan feather was perfection.

[mollie]

this was great!!! we used to go to that Tesco often!!! oh my....

ta love for sharing this !!!

[Katie Hudson]

Absolutely fantastic; just the thing to read with my bowl of cornflakes and cup of tea. Chell and Simon's wedding was certainly a day to remember with so many happy memories.

[Chris Hudson]

Some beautiful pictures, brilliant blog, a super reminder of a wonderful day.

[michelle]

We've viewed this everyday since Catherine sent me the link - we've never starred in a blog before! It's keeping alive the wonderful day we all had, that was captured in such a unique way by Catherine and her cameras!

A bride should be happy on her wedding day, and I certainly was! To be surrounded by people who love you makes you feel very special - and lucky!

This is an amazing reminder of the best day of my life - thanks