Design, Culture, food and the wedding that was spectacularly intimate
Quintessentially South Florida by design, a grand feel with an intimate setting. Rebecca & Eric pull off a wedding like we have never seen before.
This was taken at a moment we were resetting a scene for a few more formal portraits. Eric was naturally a quiet and reserved guy and I could see him really relax between photos, so I kept my camera up a grabbed this photograph in the between moment.
Rebecca and Eric live in the Tampa area, but Miami and South Florida have always been a meaningful part of their lives. We first got a sense of their style when we met them at the Pérez Art Museum for their engagement session. By the time the wedding arrived, we already understood what they were drawn to: strong architecture, fashion, warmth, and photographs that felt polished without feeling overly produced.
The wedding brought all of those things together.
Setting the scene
Prep is one of our favorite parts of a wedding day because it's usually when we can turn on the documentary part of our brains. There isn't much that needs to happen yet. People are settling in, finishing small tasks, moving around the room. It gives us time to understand the light and the energy of the day before everything starts moving faster.
Rebecca and Eric didn't have a wedding party, which made the morning especially quiet.
When we arrived with Rebecca, she was finishing a few things on her own in a large room overlooking the water. The windows were enormous and the light was beautiful, so there wasn't much reason to interfere with it. We photographed what was happening naturally and then used the room for a handful of portraits.
Some of our favorite photographs of Rebecca came almost accidentally. While video was being filmed, we'd use the few seconds between resets to make another frame — turning her slightly toward the window, asking her to look toward us, or simply letting her settle into the space.
Nothing elaborate. Just good light and gentle direction.
Getting ready
Six Minutes with Eric
By the time we made it to Eric, the timeline had slipped a little bit. There were family logistics happening elsewhere and we had roughly six or seven minutes to photograph his prep and make his portraits before we needed to move on.
Fortunately, that was enough.
Eric is naturally reserved and incredibly laid-back, and because there wasn't a room full of groomsmen to organize, we didn't need to manufacture much. We found a window, positioned him in the light, and worked quickly. It's a good example of something we think about often on wedding days: more time doesn't necessarily make better photographs.
Sometimes you just need to recognize what you have and make a decision.
After the ceremony, we had about twenty-five minutes for portraits.
We started near the water and kept things deliberately relaxed. Our goal with portraits is rarely to build an elaborate pose. Usually we're trying to put people into good light, give them just enough direction to feel comfortable, and then leave enough room for something natural to happen inside of it. We made several portraits there before heading inside to sign the marriage license.
The Marriage License
Some of our favorite portraits from the entire wedding weren't planned at all.
Rebecca and Eric were signing their marriage license at the bar inside the reception space when we noticed the way the light was falling across them. The room looked good. They looked good. So before leaving, we stopped them for a minute. A small adjustment, a casual pose, a couple of frames.
That was it.
Later, we stepped onto the balcony outside the prep rooms as the sun was disappearing and made a few more portraits there. None of these locations were part of some elaborate portrait plan. They were simply things we noticed as the day unfolded.
That's a big part of how we photograph weddings.
We plan enough to know where we need to be and when — but we don't want the plan to make us blind to something better happening right in front of us.
Food was an important part of the evening. Rebecca and Eric had spent a lot of time curating a menu that felt coastal while incorporating pieces of their respective backgrounds and heritage. It mirrored the rest of the wedding remarkably well.
Elevated, considered and beautiful — but never unapproachable.
The details were beautifully crafted and staged, Rebeccas reaction to the room reveal was priceless
There was a formality to the entire day without any sense that everyone needed to behave formally.
Ceremony
The ceremony was set against the Intracoastal with the Miami skyline in the distance, right as the light was beginning to turn toward golden hour. Normally, shooting directly into that much backlight isn't our first choice. Here, it became part of what made the ceremony interesting.
Looking directly down the aisle meant shooting almost straight into the sun, creating frames that became hazier and nearly silhouetted. Moving only a few feet to the side completely changed the light to this split lighting style we love to use in portraits.
Instead of fighting the conditions, we could move around them.
Portraits
A curated dinner & Details to die for
Closing Thoughts
Rebecca and Eric created a wedding that felt distinctly South Florida without relying on cliché. The florals, fashion, water, architecture, food and music all belonged to the setting. It was formal and fashion-forward, but there was still an ease to it.
That's probably what we'll remember most.
From the outside, it looked like a big wedding. From inside of it, it felt incredibly small.
And because Rebecca and Eric built the day around the people they cared about rather than around the performance of having a wedding, we were able to photograph it the same way — paying attention, moving when we needed to move, stepping in when a photograph needed a little direction, and otherwise letting the day be what it was.