Mon - July 16, 2007

Motherhood 

In the midst of all the paperwork, accounting, etc. that comes through the studio it's so nice to take some time and connect with what drove me here in the first place - my love of telling the story of relationships through photography. I was excited to be able to capture this photo in the studio last week which tells a nice story of a mother and her little boy.

 

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Fri - July 13, 2007

Margaretta in Martha Stewart 

some words of sage wisdom from the very lovely Margaretta in this month's MS weddings:





 

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Thu - July 12, 2007

invites : check 

now that the June wedding blast is coming to an end, it's a bit easier for John and I (and all the other wedding vendors involved in our wedding) to move forward on different aspects of the planning process. On Tuesday night John and I drove to Two Paper Dolls in Wayne to meet with my friend Vanessa, owner of Two Paper Dolls, and discuss invites. We had so much fun looking at the different card stocks, printing options and layouts available. Vanessa is a design brain child, she is so talented at putting invites together. I remember one of the first times I worked with her, years ago in 2004, I thought she was immensely talented and wrote her immediately to tell her so. It's so funny to think that here we are several years later creating designs for my own wedding!

If you have not already, I highly recommend paying Vanessa a visit in her cool urban boutique.










Vanessa is thinking carefully about one of John's ideas:




Vanessa is so cute:




So many wonderful selections! We chose a long horizontal layout with letterpress text and left the rest up to Vanessa - I can't wait to see what she comes up with!






 

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Tue - July 10, 2007

Kate & Mark : 06.02.07 

Kate and Mark's wedding had it all - a beautiful bride, a handsome groom, wonderful weather, and perfect green and pink details by Michelle Rago... all in the quaint beachside town of Spring Lake, New Jersey. Their reception was at the Spring Lake Bath and Tennis Club which has a long white deck overlooking the ocean on which Kate brought in white furniture with bright pink pillows. The details of each color used came together to create a perfect beach themed decor.

Kate also wins the award for sending me the funniest thank you note that made me both laugh out loud and cry:

Laura,
Two things have happened to me in the last two days:
1. Yesterday, in the middle of the world's most boring professional seminar (insurance bad faith law), I miraculously found a way to view your slideshow on my Treo (after trying for the majority of the afternoon's scintilating presentations). Surrounded by no fewer than 200 attorneys, I lost it. I was sobbing before I could even get out of my chair to excuse myself from the room. The slideshow captured our wedding day better than I ever dreamed it would. You are truly (in my expert opinion) the world's best photographer.
2. Despite the emotional wreck I turned into upon viewing the slideshow, nothing could prepare me for the actual photos that I just finished looking at. Once again, on my stupid little treo, and surrounded by all kinds of serious, stuffy professionals on the train back to Philly, I opened the photo link and actaully was breathless- not to mention an emotional wreck once again. These photos are the best that I have ever seen. They make me cry, laugh, and smile, and I can't thank you enough for allowing me to relive my wedding day. You are the best.
Now excuse me while I try to clean myself up in the train bathroom and walk through the sea of passengers who must think I'm certifiably crazy.
Thank you!!!!
Kate

Both Kate and Mark share a warm personality, a great sense of humor and a deep love and friendship. Thank you both for allowing me to be part of your amazing day!








































 

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Fri - July 6, 2007

Professional Photographer Feature 

Thanks so much to the great people at Professional Photographer Magazine for their ongoing support of my photography business! I was really excited to see this article appear and I think that the writer, Lorna Gentry, and the layout experts did a wonderful job putting together the piece. The cover photo is by my good friends The Bebbs who I will be speaking with this October in Vancouver!



















 

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Fri - June 29, 2007

cake : check 

John and I are having a great time moving along our wedding 'to do' list - some things we're behind on but of course cake tasting quickly became a high priority task item once John realized we were going to be able to actually taste the cakes, not just look at them.

So last Tuesday we went down to local favorite Liz Marden's brand new cake shop here in Delaware to take a visit and taste some cake flavors.




We had a great time chatting with Liz and thinking about different types of ideas for the cake. I gave her free reign on the colors and design of the cake, as we happily tasted several different yummy flavors! I can't wait to see what she comes up with.





Happy fourth of July to everyone and I hope you have a great holiday week. I'll be back to blogging at the end of next week with some very exciting wedding updates!  

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Thu - June 28, 2007

Wed - June 27, 2007

Photography : check 

So since I got engaged people have been asking me "who's going to photograph YOUR wedding?!!" I always come up with some sort of cheeky reply like "oh I've been thinking about setting up a tripod on a timer all day as an artistic experiment" to which some people laugh and others look extremely concerned. Choosing a photographer for me has really hard - not because of trying to find someone who's work I love, but because there are SO many photographers whose work I adore. Many of those people are also friends and people I really respect, and others are those who I would just like to be a guest at my wedding and not work.

After talking for a while about it with John, we both decided that we wanted Anna Kuperberg to photograph our wedding. We love her sense of humor and her ability to capture emotion... on a deeper level Anna and I have become close friends since John and I got engaged and I feel like in a lot of ways Anna is one of those friends who 'sees' people. Not just sees people like "yeah i saw her walking on the street" but sees people, gets them, understands them. She gets who John and I are and what we are about; in the same way I really try to see who my clients are and photograph them in a way that represents their personalities.

So we are very excited and sent Anna our contract this week - so far we are not the model clients with a month long wait on returning our contract but I've been busy with other people's weddings!

Here are some of my favorite images of Anna's:




















and i have a feeling this is going to be me with February weather!





Thanks Anna, for being part of our day. 

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Mon - June 25, 2007

Vicki & Anush : 5.26+27.07 

Vicki and Anush's beach wedding over Memorial Day weekend consisted of two days, four dress changes, three ceremonies, two receptions and a white horse (no kidding!). What a whirl-whind of beautiful color, merging cultures and a couple very much in love. All of Vicki and Anush's hard work to plan this wedding was a tribute to the families and cultures with traditions that respecting those who mean the most to them.

Everything took place at the Rehoboth Beach Country Club - a wonderful location just yards from the ocean with beautiful views of the Delaware Bay.












































Despite not being Indian, Vicki's sister clearly understood the cultural importance of stealing Anush's shoes after the ceremony only to be returned in the exchange of a bribe.







 

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Fri - June 22, 2007

A great way to end the week. 

 

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Wed - June 20, 2007

Sabrina & Conrad : 5.19.07 

Sometimes I sit down to my blog and think "how can I possibly put into words the fabulousness of this wedding?" which was exactly my sentiments about five minutes ago. Sabrina and Conrad has all the ingredients of an amazing wedding; beautiful bride, handsome groom, wonderful details, a unique location (Sabrina's father's property), even fireworks! It has been such a pleasure getting to know Sabrina, Conrad and their families in the last year and I am looking forward to being part of their lives in the future.

I sent Sabrina a little slideshow for her to watch while on her Honeymoon and she replied with this:

Laura,

We were sitting on the beach when Conrad checked his blackberry and saw that you had sent an e-mail.  We rushed to our room to get dressed and raced up the hill to our Hotel's lobby where they have computers for guest use.

That was the most magical nine minutes!  I cannot possibly begin to thank you for capturing the most special day of our lives with such beauty.  The photos are so unique and so very wonderful.  I have never seen anything like it.  We are speechless.

THANK YOU. 
Love, Sabrina and Conrad.


Which to me, makes my job more fulfilling than I could ever describe.

I loved all the antique furniture scattered about at the property - it really compliments the location of the wedding and the details Sabrina chose.




I love Conrad's look here, it's the face of a man ready to be married!













If you look closely, you can see a painting of Sabrina juxtaposed behind her from when she was a child:






























This car was such a unique and wonderful touch to the wedding! Sabrina's family had it stored in their garages, and it's actually an original du Pont car manufactured shortly after the turn of the century. There were only a few ever produced, and this car is one of them. Even for me (who couldn't tell you the difference between most cars) I was incredibly impressed with the construction and architecture of the vehicle.



























 

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Tue - June 19, 2007

save the dates, check. 

Our save the dates finally went out this past weekend, and i can't wait for people to get them! They were printed on this very cool pearl paper that is new with our lab with a 5x7 horizontal fold which we've never done before. The response so far has been great (Ok, so my mom loved them).

In the save the date we put a separate little card that links people to our wedding website, which my web designer Adam Cambridge created for us with his wife Amber called Amber Chic. They have a new venture that allows couples to purchase cusomizable flash wedding websites designed to match your wedding print media. He also gave me the idea of photographers including the websites with engagement session packages, which I love!









 

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Mon - June 18, 2007

06.13.07 : Dress Shopping 

Last Wednesday I went dress shopping with one of my bridesmaids Tracy, and two of the three women who work at Jennifer's Bridal in Delaware: Jennifer and Debbie (the owner). I was so excited for this day, it's been something I've been looking forward to for a long time. I love fashion and shopping so wedding dress shopping at couture designers in NYC is, for me, the perfect day!

I knew we were going to have fun when we drove by Mecca on our way to our first appointment.





Tracy is on the left, with Jennifer in the middle and Debbie on the right in the backseat of our cab. Here you can observe the face of small business ownership: a cell phone permanently attached to your ear!





Our first stop was Amsale:









I tried on all these dresses! And I loved them all! What a decision.





Emily, who works at Amsale, is a goddess. She knew exactly what would look right on me and was really open to creativity with the dresses. I highly recommend paying her a visit if you are in NYC dress shopping!





After that we were on our way to Melissa Sweet





I was so overwhelmed by how pretty the salon was that I totally forgot to take photos of it! I did get a shot of the fabulous Melissa Sweet (on the right) and her right hand gal Joy (appropriately, on Melissa's right) with all the beautiful dresses in the background:





And our last stop was Birnbaum and Bullock, which is truly a custom shop in every sense of the word. All the dresses are chosen, fitted, sized and produced right there on the floor. Here is Robert Bullock explaining something to Tracy, Jennifer and Debbie (who are looking very fascinated with Robert).





Their studio reminded me a lot of the resourcefulness of a small business (like my studio!) using fabrics and textures to create space.





So throughout the day I tried on all these dresses:









but I didn't get any of them! I got a totally different dress than anything you see above.

Overall I found dress shopping fun, but extremely difficult - Melissa Sweet said something to me when I had one of her designs on that I think is very much true; "You are going to find a lot of dresses you like that work well on your shape so it's going to be a matter of which one is 'you,' which one represents who you are and what your personal style is." No wonder so many people find dress shopping challenging, it's like going to a spiritual self-discovery retreat amongst hundreds of yards of silk tulle and chiffon.

But I did find a dress that I think is very 'me' and I created some modifications with the help of the designer to make it truly custom. Tune into the blog after Feb. 2nd 08 to see what it looks like!

 

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Fri - June 15, 2007

Tips: Dressing for an Engagement 

A lot of times people ask me how they should dress for an engagement session and it's a tough question to answer, really. You want to look casual and fun and not to formal, while wearing something that really is very 'you.' I loved how Jennifer and Corey (getting married July 14th) dressed for their engagement session last week. Jennifer's black and white polka-dotted dress is fun and fits her really well and her flats add a nice casual look to it. Corey's red shirt and jeans look great against the b&w dress and he also looks comfortable and casual while still being stylish.





















 

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Thu - June 14, 2007

People Magazine Real Weddings 

I had such a blast dress shopping yesterday - today I will download the photos and share with you how the day went. But in the meantime, I was so excited to hear that People Magazine : Real Weddings had been released on the news stands with a beautiful photo accompanying Angie and Ed's love story:








Angie is an amazing person and I could not be more thrilled that she is my first full page features in a national magazine. At times I might hear brides talk about weather not being what they were hoping, or the limo wasn't what they were expecting. And while I can completely understand that can be disappointing, I never once heard Angie express any words of frustration that she spent most of her wedding day in her wheelchair (or figuring out how not to have it shown in the photos!). She approaches life with such grace & humor...Ed is her best match, biggest supporter and one of the most good-natured people I have ever met.

I have to share that when this editorial request came up, I ran it by Angie and she was thrilled with the opportunity. When I found Angie and Ed were going to have going to have a nice sized spread, I closed my office door and started to cry at my desk. Not necessarily because of the press opportunity that existed for me, but because I had this sudden realization that there are probably thousands of women out there challenges - not just physical but all sorts of types of challenges - in their lives that could be inspired by Angie. And what more could I ask for in my life than for my art to be a channel of that message?

Thank you, Angie & Ed, for giving me the opportunity to be part of your day. I can truly say I am a better person because of it. 

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