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Blackheath & Canary Wharf London Wedding Photographers

By London Wedding Photographer, Wedding VenuesOne Comment

So what does a groom do while he waits for his bride to be at the church? Well if it’s a sunny day in August, and his church is All Saints in Blackheath, then he hangs around the ice cream van that has parked itself bang in front of the matrimonial church! We’ll give the Rossi ice cream dynasty points for entrepreneurship, actually we did have quite a bit of fun with those guys in the end, and a few of the wedding party were pretty grateful for a cold treat after the service.

Laughter at Canary Wharf London wedding

The lovely Julie and Sean (yes they are that likeable) wanted to get married at the church right by the bench in the park where they first got together as a couple. We’re assuming that was with a bit of kissing and canoodling. Very romantic idea though, and there’s a photo here towards the end of the post of the two as a newly married couple on the very same bench after the service at All Saints’ Blackheath.

First look between couple at All Saints Blackheath

After covering Julie’s preparations at her parents’ house nearby, we shot off to the church to capture Jamie’s meet and greet of all their many many friends and family – such a popular couple. The church itself dates from 1857 and is much loved by the locals and is a dominant part of the skyline of Blackheath.  A lovely service followed, with plenty of laughter and quite a few tears shed for good measure.

Wedding at the Parlour Bar London

All Saints Blackheath confetti shot

After a group photo of everyone on the steps, and a joyous confetti throw on the heath itself, it was everyone off to Canada Square in Canary Wharf. This was the final destination and the location of the reception venue The Parlour Bar. A great entertaining space in a chic industrial setting with super friendly and efficient staff – with a special mention of Ella as hostess for the evening.

Bride and Groom stood in Canary Wharf photo

The couple and guests were serenaded by an accordionist and live singer, and after a little while Julie and Sean went off with myself and Joanna around Canary Wharf for some couple photos, a very small selection shown here. In fact it’s always a compromise with what gets showcased in a blog post, because there are so many images with so much variety to choose from. Anyway we all had a good time.

wedding couple pose at Canada square Canary Wharf

Bride posing at Canary Wharf London wedding image

Great Parlour Bar food followed,  with speeches, cake cutting and a good live band to round off a fantastic day. Julie and Sean’s dancing was pretty good too!

wedding couple sat on bench Blackheath London

That’s all folks – from some people’s favourite London wedding photographers…

Blackheath wedding photographers image

Take a look at the many stories and images on our blog, and also our dedicated wedding galleries here: Wedding Galleries

The Parlour Bar London's Canary Wharf

By David Green

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wedding couple with London love sign photo

Rock My Wedding rates Big Day Weddings as “fabulous” and “striking” and “contemporary natural and fashion inspired”

By London Wedding Photographer, Wedding VenuesNo Comments

Read all about it, read all about it! The famous cry of the newspaper seller of old has been replace by a well placed tweet, a facebook update and a blog post on a website. It’s an ever changing world and that’s no bad thing. In our ten years of London and destination wedding photography we’ve seen a massive change in the industry, and that’s been in a very positive direction in our opinion. Everyone has had to raise their game continuously or be left behind. Not just in camera and lighting craft, but also the way you promote your wedding business. It used to be you paid your money and put an advert in Yellow Pages, and worked on word of mouth and perhaps networked a little or a lot. Then it became essential you got yourself a website, bowed down to King Google, learned social media, tweeted, blogged, updated everything and the like while still finding time to photograph your weddings and meet new couples! But you know what? That new knowledge, change and fresh horizons has been really exciting and part of the joy of being well known London wedding photographers. Plus we got to indulge in our love of people as well as capturing incredible days in couple’s and their friends and families lives.

Rock my wedding Big Day weddings reviewAs part of this change in the industry was the rise of the dedicated wedding blog, not run by photographers, but by people with an interest in all things wedding, and/or entrepreneurs who realised this was a commercially viable area to blog and advertise services in. Now in the UK the most powerful and popular of these seems to be at the time of writing, Rock My Wedding or RMW as it is sometimes referred to, and rightly so. It has high standards, is innovative, and always on the cutting edge of current and high quality wedding photographers and all other related suppliers in the industry.

We were therefore delighted to be reviewed by them (we’ve put a screen grab of their article above) and to receive their seal of approval. The link to the article is here if  you fancy reading it in situ: RMW rates Big Day Weddings

To quote the first line: “The fabulous images captured by Big Day Weddings just exude the love and laughter of a wedding day in a contemporary natural and fashion inspired style.”

The included images in the article are from these related weddings and posts: Smithfield Wedding Photographer

London Southbank Engagement Shoot

Islington Town Hall Wedding

Ultimate London engagement shoot graphic

Clerkenwell wedding dress in the wind

Smithfield wedding photographers

London Eye Wedding Photographers image

 

By David Green

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Southwark Cathedral wedding with Butlers Wharf, Tower Bridge & Vinopolis reception

By London Wedding Photographer, Wedding Venues2 Comments

Southwark cathedral wedding ceremony

Ed drives a nice car, I know, I saw it at his engagement shoot with Julie…(in-joke). Actually I know lots of people with nice cars. I just wish some of them were more like Ed…..Anyway, I liked Julie and Ed from the moment I met them, and that is something that motivates far more than where people are choosing to get married and what their budget may be. They had strong personalities and strong ideas about what they wanted to achieve with their wedding plans, one box ticked. They loved London and wanted to feature the locations as much as the events and emotions of the day, another box ticked. We learned later that they got engaged in Green Park and spent the rest of that day by the Thames and visiting the View from The Shard, bit of back story there, and also places we have greatly enjoyed ourselves.

wedding couple with London love sign photo

We’ve photographed weddings at cathedral’s before too (in London that would be Westminster Cathedral) so we knew what to expect when Julie told us they would be marrying at Southwark Cathedral close to London Bridge. What to expect? Well grandeur, history and of course…tourists. Yes, they may well be allowed to sit at the rear or actually walk around and visit the building while you are getting married. They certainly mill around the outside of the central pews at Westminster, but we were quietly pleased for these guys that they were confined to a few rows at the very back for their wedding gatecrash!

wedding recessional Southwark Cathedral

Borough market next to Southwark Cathedral as anyone that has ever visited there knows is a very bustling busy place indeed, so in many ways Julie and Ed had a very public wedding. In my opinion that added to the fun atmosphere as everybody loves a wedding couple. Confetti throwing had plenty of onlookers, as did the wedding party’s short walk to Vinopolis their reception venue.

Wedding photo Butlers Wharf London

This very unique event space is built to incorporate the Victorian arches that help make up it’s distinctive look, and is dedicated to wine with a museum, bars and restaurant. It has a special place in our hearts as London wedding photographers, as it was the very first venue ten years ago that Joanna and I worked together at for both ceremony and reception. Sadly Vinopolis is closing at the end of this year  and we will all miss it.

wedding couple Borough Market shot

While guests enjoyed their welcoming drinks and canopies, the newlyweds and ourselves snuck off down the road in the black wedding cab to Butlers Wharf and Tower Bridge. It is an area we have photographed at many times, but each big day and it’s unique bride and groom creates equally unique and different images, and this time was no exception.

Happy couple at Butlers Wharf Tower Bridge

kissing couple by London Tower Bridge

married near Tower Bridge image

Back to the cab and then back to Vinopolis. Between wining and dining, speeches and the like, we had some fun with a spotlight for shots taking in the wedding venue’s arches and various props. It had to be done, and cutting the cake and dancing the night away was all there in abundance of course too.

Dance at London Vinopolis

Now this blog post may not win a Pulitzer prize, but it doesn’t need to because undeniably and obviously the big winners on the day were Julie and Ed themselves, and that is what we aimed to showcase here.

Also according to some book I bought on Amazon, writing these posts helps our website rankings, not sure about that, because really we just like waffling and putting pretty pictures online. By the way, did we mention Ed drives a very nice car?

wedding reception room London Vinopolis venue

Love heart on wa;; at London wedding reception venue

You can see a related post featuring Tower Bridge and surrounding area here: Tower Bridge Wedding Inside Story

And another here: London Bishopsgate Wedding Photographers

By David Green (yet to win a Pulitzer prize…)

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East End wedding couple

Aldgate Wedding Toynbee Hall in London’s East End

By London Wedding Photographer, Wedding VenuesOne Comment

married at Petticoat Lane London banner

As soon as we met Alex and Matt we knew their wedding would be different. They would be getting ready TOGETHER at their venue. They would go out and about in the East End of London with us for some fun and quirky couple shots BEFORE the wedding ceremony. There would be no wedding aisle, and all guests would stand in a circle around the couple with not a chair in sight! Wedding breakfast would be an indoor picnic with quality ingredients you would put together yourself, and all left overs of any kind would be recycled. Great! We love that Alex and Matt were able to express their values and personality through their wedding day, putting not just their personal stamp on things, but even going as far as to writing elements of their vows to each other.

East End wedding ceremony Tonybee Hall London

Venue for this wedding with a difference was Toynbee Hall near Aldgate station in London’s East End. Toynbee was created in Commercial Street in 1884 by Samuel and Henrietta Barnett as a centre for social reform. It dedicated much of it’s diverse work for helping the poor and disadvantaged of London’s East End. It has had many famous patrons and visitors over the years including Lenin, Clement Attlee, and John Profumo (who my own father met, I have the photo to prove it!) to name just a few.

wedding laughter by red London postbox

Newlyweds standing in the Whitechapel road

In the whirlwind of a wedding day we hit the ground running as a centre of calmness (ha!) and took a short tour of Whitechapel and Commercial Street with Alex and Matt for some photos before the meet and greet of their wedding guests. In truth we probably went no further than two hundred yards away from the venue, because we found an abundance of backdrops and objects to help tell the story of their relationship, attitude and special day right there.

wide angle shot of Whitechapel wedding

A great wedding photo/image is not just about backgrounds and equipment, though they have their place, it’s about light, mood, the interaction of the couple and the story being told. It’s easy and tremendously difficult all at the same time!

Toynbee Hall railings wedding shot

Ceremony time and the circle of love was a memorable, moving and amusing time too. We will never forget the wedding vow, “I promise to make you a cup of tea every day…” paraphrasing but along those lines!

The rest of the day was a fun filled time with family and friends and much laughter filled the air.

Great couple, great guests, great planning and execution, great day full stop.

wedding couple on Aldgate bench 1

wedding couple on Aldgate bench 2

You can see another East End London wedding blog post here on the website: Hackney and Hoxton Wedding for Carly and Jim

And of course a ton of our recent wedding images here: Wedding Galleries

Love_on_Petticoat Lane

By David Green

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London wedding carousel image

London Wedding Carousels, we love them!

By London Wedding Photographer, Wedding VenuesOne Comment

Apart from travelling fairs there are only a handful of London wedding carousels in the capital. What does that mean? Well it means merry-go-round’s that are near enough to a wedding venue that they could be incorporated into London wedding photos. Does anyone care? Yes me, David! Originally I grew up in a seaside town with a fair at the end of the pier, the sights smell and sound of it became a large part of my childhood. All those gloss covered horses and carriages moving round and round and up and down at speed fascinated me. It was like a dizzy little world I could be a part of for a while. There was a time in England when these brightly coloured and loud distractions were a common sight, not just in seaside resorts but villages and cities too. These days you would be hard pressed to find one anywhere but a travelling fair.

London_Zoo_carousel

Joanna and I as London wedding photographers have been fortunate enough to photograph couples on their wedding day on these fantastic fairground attractions. There are two main carousels that we are aware of in the capital. Perhaps the most well known certainly with tourists is the one on the Southbank near the London Eye. Recently we photographed couple Natalie and Max there having a great time riding on it, after starting with them at Tower Bridge. As you can see from a couple of their wedding images they certainly weren’t shy! Generally speaking when staff on rides such as these see it is two people in love, on one of the biggest day of their lives, they are pretty welcoming and flexible with allowing you to photograph. Well that is as long as your photographers are as charming and persuasive as apparently we are!

Photos London Zoo weddings

The other much ridden merry-go-round is the one at London Zoo. As veterans of London Zoo wedding ceremonies and receptions, it is definitely on the photographic “to do” list that the newly weds have a ride on the Zoo’s Carousel, as part of their time in one of the capital’s most famous and iconic destination venues. As long as you don’t get motion sickness everything should be ok! We’ve included a photo too of the mini carousel in the small children’s play area, because we found it quite funny when adults ride it looking like giants. As it’s an easily moveable one though so it doesn’t strictly qualify as a London wedding carousel.

Merry-go-round_photo_at_London_Southbank

You have to look hard these days to find permanent carousels (if you didn’t know originating from the French word: carrousel). On our travels in France though, photographing destination weddings,  we often encounter them in towns and villages where they are still big tradition for children and adults alike. In a rapidly changing world its nice to see a little bit of tradition that lasts, and even better when we get to photograph that tradition in action.

To read about the history of carousels you can visit wikipedia for an article here: Wikipedia Carousel  

There’s one of our related posts about all things wedding wise at London Zoo and it’s carousel here: London Zoo Wedding Photographers

By David Green

 

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