Although we love our favorite Tacoma-area wedding venues, we do enjoy heading out of town to venues we’ve never been to before. For Amanda and Dan’s wedding, we ventured across the bridge to Cedar Springs, a primarily outdoor venue hidden away in a rural area outside of Port Orchard. We hope our first wedding there won’t be our last, as it’s beautiful!

If I had to pick one word to describe Cedar Springs, it would be BRIDGES. There are no less than four sturdy wooden bridges spanning the tranquil ponds that are fed by this venue’s namesake springs. Those bridges help divide the multi-acre property into separate “rooms” for the ceremony, reception, and parking lot. Those bridges also played an important role in our photos, as you can see from the beginning, as we launched into a tour of the grounds for bride and groom portraits.

The ceremony was on a small island, surrounded by water and encapsulated in trees. The procession brought the ceremony’s participants across one of the bridges to a large arbor. Amanda and Dan have a strong Christian connection, and their sweet ceremony included communion — an uncommon event outside of the church, yet it felt perfectly fitting in such a beautiful location.

The reception was — you guessed it — only a short walk across a bridge from the ceremony spot. Next to a large pond is the white tent, wooden gazebo and restroom facilities that provided welcome shelter from the sun without taking anything away from the outdoorsy feel of the place. Dan, a talented singer-songwriter-guitarist, serenaded Amanda with the song he wrote to propose to her, substituting “you just married me!” for its key line “will you marry me?”. After toasts from every wedding party member, cupcakes and first dances, their many friends packed the gazebo with some wild dancing.

Amanda and Dan left their reception dancing through a tunnel of arms, hopped in their well-decorated car, and set off for honeymoon and married life in a new town, Vancouver. We wish you all the best!

The day we’ve been eagerly awaiting for — for over half a year — has finally arrived! We’ve just completed the massive task of selecting and formatting favorite photos from 8+ years of weddings, writing new text, and designing our new website — and we are so thrilled to announce that we launched the brand-new www.wallflowerphoto.com over the weekend.

For us, there’s a little bit of a bittersweet feeling, as our old website, designed by our talented friends at MediaKatalyst, served us very well since 2004. Of course, we’ve periodically updated the photo galleries and text since then, but with the major business restructuring we took on this year, the old site no longer fit our new business model. Now that we’ve spun off our baby/maternity portraiture into our new Bump & Bambino studio, and our high school senior portraits into the even-newer Senioritis Photography, Wallflower has transformed from an all-purpose studio into a highly specialized shop entirely dedicated to engaged couples. This shift allowed us to create a website focused exclusively on our wedding photography and engagement portraits.

If you’ve seen our Bump & Bambino and Senioritis Photography websites, you’ll feel right at home with the new Wallflower Photography site, which is based on the same platform. We’re loving how it allows for much larger photos than our old site, and has autoplay slideshow functionality so you can sit back and enjoy the imagery. We’re excited to share so many new images with you! We’ve thoroughly tested the new site, but if you happen to come across any bugs or typos, if you get confused or lost, or if you want to offer any suggestions or comments, please do so by emailing us at info@wallflowerphoto.com. In the meantime, enjoy!

When you think about a city hall wedding, what image pops into your head? Yeah, probably nothing too spectacular — but if you’re in Puyallup, prepare to be surprised! Puyallup City Hall has a lovely, hidden courtyard about 30 feet off the ground, and that’s where we photographed the wedding of Laura and Justin in early July.

We launched right into bride and groom portraits, as Laura and Justin opted to skew their six hours of photography toward their rockin’ reception instead of getting-ready time. We started on the upper courtyard, then descended a huge concrete staircase, posing the wedding party on it on our way down. The gardens at ground level feature a river of cobalt blue glass flakes that was begging for bride and groom portraits, and our cute little umbrella helped us keep going during a brief rain shower. We ended our portrait time with a quick stop at the war memorial in Pioneer Park, and paid tribute to Justin’s grandparents at their personal bricks.

The upper courtyard was the site of the wedding ceremony, officiated by Justin’s sister. The courtyard’s long, narrow shape made for a unique ceremony layout. A platform in the center made certain that the bride, groom and officiant were visible to all their standing guests, who clustered on either side. The wedding party processed into the ceremony up the grand staircase, and then, once vows were exchanged and high-fives slapped, Laura and Justin led the way back down the stairs, where they enjoyed a long hug at the bottom.

The reception was held at Pioneer Park Pavilion, a spacious building that easily accommodated Laura and Justin’s several hundred guests. The couple went to great lengths to incorporate family history, favorite foods, and personal hobbies into their decor. Laura wore her mother’s wedding dress, and the wedding cake was modeled after their grandparents’ wedding cake — with vintage photo nearby to aid in comparison. The kids in attendance were particularly lucky, with facepainting and a bounce house to keep them well-entertained. We loved that Laura and Justin climbed in as well!

Later on, the reception turned more adult, as the DJ’s lights and beats in a darkened Pavilion made for a club-like atmosphere. Justin has a reputation as a champion of the beer bong, and proved that the rep is well-deserved as he handed out handmade apparati to a dozen or so of his best buds. Personally sporting an old favorite beer bong that has served him and his friends well for more than a decade of use, Justin led his guys in a group beer-bonging that was unlike anything we’ve ever seen at a wedding. He cleared his contents so far ahead of everyone else that he got to participate and observe the whole spectacle!

Congrats, Laura and Justin!

Regular Wallflower blog readers met Heidi and Adam when we blogged about their engagement portrait session at Point Defiance Park last fall. Back then, it seemed like their wedding was so far off, and so it was with a bit of shock that I sat down today to post some highlights from their Museum of Glass wedding last month on a flawless early-summer day.

The guys and girls got ready at the nearby Courtyard by Marriott hotel, then the whole wedding party walked down Pacific and onto the Bridge of Glass, the Chihuly-laden pedestrian bridge that serves as the grandest entrance to Museum of Glass. We took some portraits as we made our way across the bridge to the shade of the museum’s iconic Hotshop Cone, where we took the bulk of our wedding party portraits.

Museum of Glass weddings make us feel like kids in a candy store. The photographic possibilities are so boundless, we really need to form a plan of attack ahead of time or else we’ll skip from point to point like suger-addled youngsters. Since Heidi and Adam’s wedding ceremony would be held in front of one of the big outdoor glass exhibits, we decided to focus on utilizing the excellent views of the Thea Foss Waterway and the rusty metal stairwell of the lovingly restored, historic Albers Mill building next door for our bride and groom portraits. We also had our first opportunity to use the newly rebuilt Water Forest, which had been out of order for several years — that’s where the photo at the top of this blog post was shot.

The wedding ceremony was held on the Main Plaza, the lowest of Museum of Glass’ three outdoor plazas, where a 754-piece installation of translucent white glass emerges from a reflecting pool. Museum of Glass weddings always mean some serious speed-walking for both of us, as we hurry to take advantage of terrific angles behind and above the ceremony to get some really cool perspectives on the ceremony and still get back to ground level in time for the ring exchange and first kiss.

After the ceremony, the wedding party headed back up the long staircase to celebrate for a few minutes (that’s the Thea’s Landing condo in the background, covered up during some renovations), and then ducked into the museum to sign the marriage license. Then Heidi and Adam took us down to the marina, where we took some portraits with their handmade Thank You! sign on Adam’s dad’s boat. They’re using one of the photos we took there for the front of the thank-you cards they’re sending to their guests.

The wedding reception was already decked out in the museum’s Great Hall and ready to welcome guests. You can see the line for the buffet dinner in the back (served by Gallucci’s Catering) and the bar in the near-left corner. This is such a cool room, with the stairstepping ceiling and Hotshop Cone base providing visual interest. A few fun photos of Heidi’s dad’s toast and their first dance follow.

Congrats Heidi and Adam! We wish you all the best.

We’ve had to wait a few years before we finally landed our first wedding at Chambers Bay, Tacoma’s newish high-end golf course that will be hosting the U.S. Amateur in less than two months, and the U.S. Open in 2015, which might just be the biggest event that our fair city has ever hosted. Our experience there was well worth that wait.

Aubrey and Mark’s wedding ceremony actually took place a few miles away at University Place Presbyterian, the church of Aubrey’s family. Following the ceremony, the couple made a “fake exit” in a Clenet — the sweetest wheels we’ve seen at a wedding — while their guests headed off to a cocktail hour at Chambers Bay. They returned a little while later to take care of the family portraits at the church, and then piled into two vans along with their big wedding party to visit some of Chambers Bay’s most scenic spots.

Shooting portraits toward the sun is very challenging, but that’s where the view was. We pulled off some pretty sweet shots with max-power flash and a little after-the-fact Photoshop work.

Then we headed down the hill to the sorting bins, ancient relics of the land’s past life as a gravel quarry that now add character to the golf course. These 40-foot-tall concrete slabs and the hilly terrain around them made a truly unique backdrop for our bride and groom portraits, and we had a blast making use of them!

After getting introduced into their reception and enjoying dinner, Aubrey’s maid of honor kicked off the toasts with a fun game that we hope to see again someday. The newlyweds stood back to back, each holding one of their shoes and one of the other’s shoes. The MOH quizzed them on who better fit a series of descriptions, and answers were made by raising the appropriate shoe. It was certainly entertaining! Dancing followed …

Meanwhile, as dusk began to fall, the sky burst into ridiculously vibrant color, and there was no better place to view the most amazing sunset we’ve seen in our 15 years in Tacoma than the top of the cliff overlooking Chambers Bay. Believe it or not, we actually had to turn down the color in these last two photos!

Congrats Aubrey and Mark, and best of luck as you settle into your new home in San Francisco!