Documentary Wedding Stories : Mister Phill

Rachel & Ben got married then went down the pub with their mates. Simple as that. Their wedding day had everything that one might expect from such an occasion but they reduced and clarified the philosophy behind it all perfectly, in a manner that perfectly reflected what the two of them are. Having first met each other at the Clapham Craft Beer Co., the two bonded over hoppy imbibements and gratification in sociability.

They found the perfect pub for the job in The Victoria, located on a sleepy back-street of East Sheen in West London. Brilliant, friendly, energetic staff; sublime culinary fare and a perfect selection of drinks a sub-set of which were curated by Rachel & Ben, whose tastes in craft ales I deem impeccable (if only by virtue of the fact that they seem to match mine, perfectly :~). I was impressed by and derived great enjoyment from the fact that the intended vibe of the day came together exactly as intended. It did just feel like an afternoon (and an evening, and a night) in a pub with friends, because it was just that… subsequent, of course, to the all-important marriage ceremony that took place at York House in nearby Richmond upon Thames.

I’ve been bumping in to Ben at weddings – as it happens – since the turn of the decade; a member of a friendship group that I’ve derived great pleasure from photographing the weddings of a number of. It was lovely to catch up with some of them at Rachel & Ben’s wedding, to spend a bit of quality time sitting, eating and chatting with them and to witness them celebrating Rachel & Ben’s turn at tying the knot in the effusive manner that I have grown to become accustomed of from them! It made for a great pleasure too to see Rachel brought into this friendship fold and to spend time with yet another resonantly good character. This is the story of her and Ben’s… day out at the pub (and indeed their marriage ceremony!)… View full post »

I’d first encountered Harriet & Charlie, through my camera viewfinder, around a year before their wedding. They had been guests at Emily & Matt’s wedding in Northern Ireland. On a wedding day itself I gather information, visual information, fleeting moments from a bigger story noticed and captured instinctively and intuitively; waves of such moments washing one across another. The story itself, the visual narrative, is something that is forged when it comes time to edit the image set that has been carried away from that wedding and it was during this process a year earlier that it became apparent to me just how marvellously Harriet & Charlie had conducted themselves in their roles as wedding guests. In my role as an image-maker, I’ll admit that I took self-interested delight in how they conducted themselves as, ideally, I want to deliver to my clients images of their guests fully and sincerely engaged in proceedings and enjoying themselves to the maximum. Harriet & Charlie had certainly done so – the images told me so, unshakeably – throughout the day and I thought to myself that I’d rather like to be able to take them to other weddings and plant them in the scene as subjects. It was a particular delight therefore when they got in touch about their own wedding plans; a particular delight to get to know better the character of people that had somehow spoken to me without actually having… spoken with me.

In communicating with Harriet & Charlie in the run up to their wedding and then all the more so in spending time with them throughout their wedding weekend, I took particular pleasure from discovering just how rounded was the sincerity that I had read in the images of them from that earlier wedding; palpable interest in people and firmly rooted kindness towards them. It’s nice to be treated kindly when going about one’s work and on a broader level, reassuring to know one walks the surface of the Earth with people of a certain ilk out there.

I took great comfort too from the kindness of family, being accommodated for the weekend in a little cottage of my own that saw my commute to work being no more than a thirty second walk to where much of the action would be taking place. Harriet & Charlie celebrated their wedding at Harriet’s family home in the Aberdeenshire countryside, a place imbued with a tradition of welcome and hospitality that manifested itself fully not just on the wedding day itself but across the surrounding days. This is the story of their wedding… weekend! View full post »