2021 Year-in-Review Bay Area Wedding Photography

In 2021 I photographed 24 weddings in the greater San Francisco Bay Area. All but a couple happened in the 2nd half of the year. I feel overwhelmed with gratefulness as I look back on all of the beauty and connection I was invited to witness and document. There’s nothing like a pandemic to remind a person how incredibly good it feels to gather friends, chosen family, and family to celebrate love.

2022 is looking to be a fuller year for weddings… My year is 70% booked, and will bring me up to Mendocino Sonoma and Napa, out to Walnut Creek and Lake Tahoe, and down to Half Moon Bay and the Santa Cruz Mountains.

I can’t wait for all these adventures to come.

-XO

Paul


Reconstructionist Jewish Wedding – Commander’s Mansion

Reconstructionist Jewish Wedding – Commander’s Mansion – Alex & Adam

Alex and Adam held their wedding on a pleasant cloudy June day at the Commander’s Mansion in Watertown, Massachusetts. The Commanders Mansion is a stately old building dating back to 1865. The history of the building is not without minor controversy, and is certainly worth a read. Take a look at that light filtering in through the old glass windows, that, my friend, is a photographer’s dream. The ketubah signing, in particular, shows off the charm of the building.


Rabbi Alex Weissman and Rabbi Adam Lavitt are both, well, rabbis, so, as you can imagine, the day’s ceremonial bits were very well orchestrated. This was to be expected, but still, the eloquent and heartfelt words of their friends and family during their tisches, and Rabbi Jacob Staub‘s words as he officiated under the chuppah, were overwhelmingly moving.


What I couldn’t have seen coming, was that Adam and Alex would be so delightfully, infectiously, playful. This made our portrait session a total pleasure. The duality of attending to the spiritual realm with intelligence and intention, while holding deep reserves of playfulness, was brought to light metaphorically in their dress. Both wore a harmonious and subtle blazer-shirt-tie-pocket square combo, that matched their boutonnières to a T, but down below, they wore silver and gold Chuck Taylors!


One of my favorite moments of the day happened during a toast Alex’s mother gave. She quoted at length from a beautiful poem, and not until she was through, did she reveal that she was quoting Rabbi Adam Lavitt, her new son in law. I leave you with the poem:


This is balance:
The world is entirely consumed by darkness,
then brimming with light.
The seasons approach one after the other,
bring unbearable heat, bitter cold and everything
in between. Joy fades. Loss
makes space for growth and new life.
Balance is not a perfect blend
of extremes. It is something that takes place
inside a larger system. It is a perspective,
an awareness that makes space for us
to fully experience winter and then spring,
light and then darkness.
Darkness and then light.
Life of all Worlds, thank you
for giving us the strength
to allow our world, our heart,
to be big enough for it all.



Venue : Comander’s Mansion

Catering: Cuisine ChezVous

Officiant : Jacob Staub

Florals : Celebrated Flower

DJ : DJ Red Dawn


East Bay Regional Parks Botanic Garden Wedding Berkeley CA

East Bay Regional Parks Botanic Garden Wedding Berkeley, CA

Eli and Tobie were married in a shady grove of towering redwood trees in the East Bay Regional Parks Botanic Garden in Berkeley, California. They are both super charismatic, and they were great in front of the camera. When the connection between a couple is electric, like it is between Eli and Tobie, my job is easy.

Yes, Eli and Tobie’s wedding was overflowing with glorious colorful outfits, but Tobie’s pants — come on! They brought a burst of color to every image he was in. Tobie’s parents constructed a freestanding chuppah that looked like an erector set in the best possible way. There is one image of Tobie’s dad seeming to summon the chuppah from the earth. Poems were read, songs were sung, Eli’s family staged a production of the Owl and the Pussycat, replete with costumes and props. Eli is a talented musician, namely a singer songwriter. Throughout the ceremony and toasts, there were references to songs Eli had written, including a love song he wrote when he was first falling in love with Tobie. At the reception, guests were served the fanciest, most delicious, vegan barbecue you might ever encounter, especially that chimichurri sauce, yum! It was a typical Bay Area day, sunny and hot in the middle, cloudy and windy in the afternoon. I loved how one couple grabbed their travel quilt and got cozy.

Vegan Catering by It’s From the Garden


Charles River Museum of Industry Wedding – Joanna and Diana

Charles River Museum of Industry Wedding – Joanna and Diana

Joanna and Diana were married in a sweet wee park in Waltham, MA on a sunny September day. A family heirloom served as their chuppah roof. I adored their vows; each wrote their own history of their love, and their dreams for their collective future. Joanna and Diana were particularly attentive to the way that a wedding is a gathering of community. It is not only the couple who make a vow to nurture and protect the partnership, it is also their extended community who make that vow. Family and chosen family eagerly hoisted the two on chairs for the hora, which made for fun photographs. Thank you, Joanna and Diana for your thoughtfulness, exuberance and kindness.

The reception was held at the delightfully antediluvian Charles River Museum of Industry.

Shot for Grasi Favoreto of Rocker in Love.

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