Wedding Photography at The Tudor Barn, Eltham, London.
“The Last remaining Tudor Barn in London”
Getting Married In a Pandemic
2020 was a year of cancelations and postponements and I was booked in to shoot a few weddings at this wonderful venue in 2020. Becky & Paul booked me to photograph their wedding a month or so before as they were originally due to be married in another country.
This was one of those surprise late booking wedding assignments…. I was recommended by a couple of different clients who’s weddings I photographed in the past and it was great to catch up with some familiar faces. Getting recommendations is a great confidence boost to any photographer - it shows that clients do really appreciate what you do. What I didn’t know until I arrived at The Tudor Barn was that two of the groom’s brother-in-laws were old friends of mine from senior school, over 30 years ago… It got even more weird when one of those friends is married to my sons teacher!
There is a lot of pressure on me at a wedding day because you only have one chance to get it right.
Everyone who runs their own business knows that reputation is VERY important and it doesn’t matter about how good you were for the last wedding. You will only be judged by the wedding you are working on that day for that couple.
So, I was recommended, which adds to the pressure, then you know two old friends are there watching you work and then you realise that your sons teacher is there too (the sister of Paul, the groom) So to say I felt a bit more pressure at this one was an understatement. Add to that the fact it was only my third and last wedding of the year due to COVID-19 meant (and I don’t mind saying this) I was a bit out of practice too.
Photographing the bride, her friends and her family getting ready is a fun part of the day and is important to capture. It is a time where I try to blend in and just be one of them. Observing the conversations, nerves, excitement and the amazing multi tasking that goes on too. I do love the candid fly on the wall nature of the images it’s possible to make at this time.
It was now time for me to leave Becky to finish getting ready and join the Groom for some photos of him and the other guests before the bride arrives for the ceremony.
I have found over the last 14 years or so that EVERY wedding is different but most of them follow a similar structure and timeline. So until this point the wedding day felt quite normal - as normal as it’s been up to 2020 at least. But the new 2020 COVID wedding format was going to appear again as soon as I arrived at The Tudor Barn for the ceremony and celebrations - A smaller than normal guest list and a bit less freedom to roam and of course Face masks…
With the ceremony over it was time for the Bride and Groom to say hi to their guests and then go outside for some more photos. Some candid photos, groups, couple portraits and most couples like to have some confetti thrown over them too.
Then it was onto the speeches - where I always find out some embarrassing info on the groom!
I do love to photograph weddings and this one was great to be apart of too. I am looking forward to what 2021 brings and I hope we can get a little more normality back in the wedding industry soon. Seeing old friends and past clients was a bonus too!
Music Photo-Film below:
Thanks for reading and as we look to March / April and the summer of 2021, let us hope it will be a bit more ‘back to normal’ and weddings can once again be a regular occurrence in our diaries.
Suppliers:
Ceremony: The Tudor Barn, Eltham, London
Dress: Together Forever Brides Crayford, Kent
Suits: Reiss
Rings: RPS Jeweller Hatton Garden
Flowers: Highflying Balloons & Flowers Welling, Kent
Need help deciding on your wedding photographer? See my BLOG below for some more inspiration.
““pandemic noun
plural pandemics
Definition of pandemic
1 : an outbreak of a disease that occurs over a wide geographic area (such as multiple countries or continents) and typically affects a significant proportion of the population : a pandemic outbreak of a disease
a global pandemic
Influenza pandemics seem to strike every few decades and to kill by the million—at least 1m in 1968; perhaps 100m in the “Spanish” flu of 1918-19.
— The Economist””