I LOVE Canadians! And destination weddings! Canadians on Destination Weddings?? Can’t beat it. Kate + Shaun are two amazingly gorgeous and genuinely nice people and I honestly can say that I can shoot them all day long.
I met them personally the day before the wedding and we hit it off very quickly and felt like best friends without knowing anything about each other. But we share a couple of things: the love of togetherness and the love of good photography. Kate is the second of two sisters, and Shaun is the middle one of a set of triplets (I’m so glad that they don’t look all alike, because I’ll be really having some trouble during the wedding day! :). Both were born in Canada, but Kate’s family moved to Roswell, NM and then she went back to Vancouver to pursue her studies as a communications major. Shaun on the other hand went to the Netherlands before long he moved to California. They finally met through a mutual friend, who interestingly is marrying Shaun’s brother! I’m always amazed with how people meet each other, especially when they live so far apart for most of their lives.
The wedding day was a gorgeous day with perfect weather. Held at the amazing Olowalu Plantation house, we had the luxury of having the whole wedding celebration outdoors, basking in the fresh breeze of the beach nearby. They have a smaller-intimate wedding where all their family friends travel pretty much all around the world to be around them. I can honestly say that the whole party was so nice, I felt like a part of their circle immediately. This really made my job a lot easier and a lot of fun. The day started with Shaun going surfing in the morning (love this!!) and Kate doing the more serious prepping and getting ready with the girls and the moms. They all finally converge at the Olowalu Plantation House, where all the beauty, goodness, love, and drinking collides :) After the long 12-hr wedding, we got invited to party up with them at a nearby bar (that apparently is the only one that is still open at that time) and had amazing chats, laughs, over drinks.
The Details:
Getting Ready location: Puamana Resort
Ceremony + Reception location: Olowalu Plantation House
Wedding Coordinator: Stacey Jones of White Orchid Weddings
Bride’s Dress Designer: Watters Bridal, Vancouver
Bride & Bridesmaids’ Hair and Makeup: Heavenly Spa, Westin Resort, Maui
A very special thanks to Brandon Wong for second shooting with me and providing me with incredible images.
Now on to the images!
Kate & gang’s getting ready
Prior to getting to Kate’s getting ready location, I had some time to shoot where Shaun was staying and found him writing his vows
A sweet private moment between Kate & her dad, right before the ceremony.
My whole thought process during this wedding was to capture moments and I decided to do something a bit different with my portraits, instead of creating something cool I tried to go back to basics and focus on the simplicity of beauty itself:
A hilarious moment during the start of the speeches – Kate’s sister lugging around this toilet paper roll the whole day because she was anticipating lots of crying. In reality, she was correct.
Slideshow
And I love this moment by Kate’s mom as she watched the slideshow.
The first dance
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