Wedding Photography at the Shard, London: when the impressive doesn’t have to be pretentious

The most important to me when I photograph a wedding is… well…: you. Sounds like a cliché already? Bear with me.

When I got an email from the bride back in November asking if I had an availability on the 7th March to shoot a wedding at the Shard, I can’t hide I was a little excited. And fast-forward a few months, when I rock up at one of London’s most iconic buildings, again, I can’t hide I was a little nervous. Good healthy nerves though, the type that make sure I put 500% into my work.

But to be fair, the nerves totally dissipated when I met the bride in her room. I was met with yes, an extremely nervous bride, but within minutes, I felt like I had known her and her two bridesmaids for a long time. And this really set the tone for the rest of the day.

Sure, the views were breathtaking, the environment overwhelming and the ceremony very impressive, but not a single minute of my day at the Shard felt pretentious. I spent hours with the bride and groom and their guests, and by the end of it, felt like I was part of the family. I had spent the day enjoying being around… you. And that’s my point. Of course I don’t expect to become friends with my clients, but I do want and need a connection when I work. That’s my drive to tell your story, so that your story is yours and no one else’s. I don’t approach my work with pre-set templates or boxes to tick. I approach every single job differently, because you are all different. “I am 52, love. I ain’t going to wear a white dress, if you see what I mean, wink wink.” And that’s the point, we don’t all have to wear the same at our weddings, we don’t have to follow traditions that make no sense to us. We can all go at our wedding plans differently.

And it is your differences that keeps me passionate in what I do. As you can see from my site, you aren’t faced with hundreds of images of standard instagram-perfect brides and grooms. And that’s because my brides and grooms are real people. Pretences are boring, aren’t they? I’ll go with impressive any day, but pretentious, nah. Life is too short.

So thank you to Kathryn and Andy who made my time at the Shard a very impressive one, but totally unpretentious, simply by being 100% themselves with open arms.

My job truly doesn’t get better than this.