Blog Masonry – Page 12 – Hazel Photo Weddings

Classic Church and Topsail Tent Wedding – Jocelyn and Tom

The story of how it came to be that I photographed Jocelyn and Tom’s wedding is on the complicated side of things. Jocelyn reached out to see if I was available to photograph her wedding on the Sunday of Memorial Day. She is an incredible storyteller, and went into detail in her initial query about the history of her grandma and grandpa’s house where the reception would be held. The house actually had it’s 300th birthday this year. There was a fabled apple tree, apple pies, peach jam, and a grapevine Robert Frost had written a poem about. Jocelyn and Tom were high school sweethearts at Exeter where they both rowed on the crew team. Very sad for me! I was booked Sunday, but I was available Saturday, so I cheekily suggested they change the date of the wedding to Saturday.

By mere chance, or some celestial tinkering, Jocelyn and Tom changed their wedding date to Saturday, and booked me as their photographer! I anticipated the wedding with excitement all year long, and when it finally came to pass, it did not disappoint.

The wedding was a classic. It started in the Exeter church, and ended with joyous dancing under a topsail tent. The thing that struck me most about their wedding was how right it felt. They were surrounded by family and friends who could see with great clarity how happy Jocelyn and Tom made each other and what an incredible match the two made. Each, in their own right, is a force to be reckoned with, but together, they are indomitable. Woe to anyone who should impede their path. They had their first look on a worn marble staircase at Phillips Exeter Academy where they had first met and forged their connection. I made couples portraits of the two down at the Exeter Boathouse, the site of their first date! I could go on and on about the wonders of their wedding… Thank you again for being so lovely to work with, Jocelyn and Tom.

Many many thanks to the talented Cara Brostrom for coming on as a 2nd photographer.

Sitting Bride Groom Portrait San Francisco Wedding Photographer

Bride’s Dress: Amsale from The White Gown

Groom’s suit: Custom made by the Black Lapel

Florist: Cymbidium Floral

DJ and/or band: DJ Jodi Entertainment

Catering: Stone Oven Catering and Las Olas

Invitations: Crane & Co

Road trip across the USA black and white photos

Road Trip Across the USA Black and White Photos

My wife, Adeline, and I moved from Cambridge, MA to San Francisco, CA in June of 2017. We packed most of our worldly belongings into vaguely ominous padlocked metal boxes, left them under the care of some shipping company in the Boston suburbs, and crossed our fingers that they would be waiting for us when we arrived in the Bay Area 18 days later by road. Yes, by road, thus a road trip across the USA! This was my first time driving all the way across the USA from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. If you know me, you know that I had to make it a bit more complicated by flying back East from Denver to photograph a pair of weddings in the middle of our road trip, but I rejoined Adeline in Denver, and the point is, I’m going with “legitimate cross country road trip” on this one.

I made these black and white photos of our road trip across the USA during the segment that included Boston, Massachusetts, Buffalo, New York, Niagara Falls, New York, Ailsa Craig, Canada, Detroit, Michigan, Dune Acres, Indiana, Lee Center, Illinois, Dubuque, Iowa (more on that later,) Badlands, South Dakota, and Laramie, Wyoming.

When I was growing up, my family wasn’t much for road tripping. To be honest, our vacations that were not built around visiting family, were countable on one hand, nay, one finger. It was a lovely train ride up to Montauk from NYC, and we saw whales spout! I don’t want to mislead you though, our family is far flung, and we certainly had adventures: barefoot photo ops on snowy fields on Mount Ranier, alligator sightings in the Florida Everglades, encounters with bioluminescent algae in Nova Scotia… etc. More road trip photos to come and more stories about childhood family vacations.

How to Cut a Pineapple the Right Way

I cut a pineapple this afternoon. I used a chef’s knife and the light of midday California sun streaming in through my window. At first it was hard for me to remember how exactly one goes about cutting a pineapple. It sure is strangely complex for a mere fruit. Was there a right way to cut a pineapple? Let’s be honest, I don’t know that I cut a pineapple at any point in the last decade. I certainly cut a pineapple in the late nineties, so there’s that. As I thought about it further, I found distinct memories of helping my mother to cut a pineapple in our kitchen on 7th Avenue in Park Slope… so this is probably an eighties memory from before we moved to Sunset Park.

How to cut a pineapple the right way

It came to me little by little.

1) Cut off the spiky dinosaur flower from the head of the pineapple.
2) Cut away the bottom so you have a flat surface to work with.
3) Cut all that greenish armor away from the sides.
4) Use the tip of the knife to extract the spiky bits that seem like they might be unpleasant in the mouth. It’s probably better to use a paring knife, but I just kept on with the chef’s knife.
5) Cut the flesh away from the core.
6) Cut the flesh into bite-size chunks.

I also remembered that it felt wrong to cut away and discard the core. Pineapples are so precious! (the necklace label on mine read “Golden Queen” or somesuch.) We always ate the core anyway. It’s one of those things that is still too tasty to throw in the trash, but you would never serve to guests.

I can’t tell you why I remember exactly how to cut a pineapple the right way after all these years, but I sure do love that sour golden fruit, and I can still feel the shape of my pucker as I write this.

Mikoshi Japanese Cherry Blossom Festival San Francisco

I made these images of the San Francisco Taru Mikoshi at this years Japantown Cherry Blossom Festival. The energy of the ritual is addictive. Part of me wanted to cast my camera away, and jump into the fray. One kind man took a few minutes to tell me about the history of the Taru Mikoshi ritual. It seems the palanquin, a vehicle with no wheels propelled on the shoulders of numerous carriers, has been around for centuries in Japan. Traditionally it carried gods, or humans who were thought to be closer to god. In the mid 19th Century, when the Meiji came to power, the new Emperor gave out barrels of sake to communities throughout Edo (Tokyo.) The people drank the wine, made a festival, and to show their gratefulness, they paraded through the streets with sake barrels on their shoulders…

Feats of communal strength seem to please god. This is one way to interpret the Mikoshi, The Giglio, the barnraising. Why is god enamored of our feats of communal strength? Or why do we humans imagine that god is enamored of our feats of communal strength. Is Kickstarter a digital feat of communal strength? Does it please god?

Click here for more pictures of the San Francisco Cherry Blossom Festival.

Cherry Blossom Festival Japantown San Francisco 2018 Paul Gargagliano

Cherry Blossom Festival Japantown San Francisco

This is just a small fraction of the excitement of San Francisco’s Cherry Blossom Festival. I made this series of photographs along the parade route from San Francisco City Hall up to Japantown. I love photographing a parade, why? This array of tangentially connected groups come out to fly their flags in whatever way they know to fly them: children in a mobile classroom sitting in rows, singing and doing hand dances; Boy Scouts sweating through heavy regalia, carrying a paper mâché tiger; The elderly waving cherry blossom branches, hoisting one-ton towers of wine (Mikoshi); and the bystanders in their various states of gawkery.

For more photos of the Mikoshi click here.

Big Sur Wedding Photographer

This was my first time photographing a wedding in Big Sur, and the landscape did not disappoint. There are reasons to get married in a setting as beautiful as the Wind and Sea Estate. You need less decor! Just look how the landscape and the light change color as the day proceeds. That’s California for you. Honestly, Big Sur is kind of a wedding photographer’s dream.

Jess and Nick had an intimate wedding with just 20 guests at the gorgeous Wind and Sea Estate in Big Sur, California. I definitely got to know the guests a bit better than I do when photographing a wedding with over 100 guests, and I am grateful for this, because across the board Jess and Nick’s people were delightful human beings. This was unsurprising really, as they are two of the warmest people I have ever had the pleasure of photographing. That warmth was on their faces all day long, and a week later when I saw them again, they were still glowing from deep within.

Late into the night, after Jess & Nick had, surfed, and showered, and donned spiffy spiffy togs, and processed through verdant hills, and spoke their vows, and kissed at a seaside altar (not once, but whenever the spirit moved them, like champs, like people who know exactly what they want) and after they read Shel Silverstein’s The Missing Piece to their guests, after they were showered again, this time with lavender confetti, and after they dined, and danced, and were showered again, but this time with the words of their eloquent friends and family, they had a bonfire, and listened to the sea, and it grew dark.