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.