May is always a hit or miss month for me as a Wisconsin wedding photographer. The midwest can be a little bit fickle with weather and I’ve seen couples overwhelmingly opt for those beautiful Wisconsin falls for their weddings and skip the volatility of Spring.
However, the last two years I’ve had some absolutely beautiful weddings in the spring and this year I had a trio of weddings in May that all had beautiful warm and sunny days for their celebration.
My first wedding was in Milwaukee and we had our wedding portraits in Lake Park in Wauwatosa, which is one of the most popular parks in Milwaukee. It was sunny and warm, but not hot. The groomsmen weren’t boiling in their suits and the bridesmaids weren’t chilly in their sleeveless dresses. It was perfect.
Alex and Nick were married in Saint Sebastian Parish Church in Wauwatosa and had their reception in the fifth ward area of Milwaukee at The Factory on Barclay. It was a wedding that had that classic Milwaukee feel and showed off some of the best aspects of our midwestern city.
Milwaukee is sometimes called a collection of neighborhoods rather than a city and that’s what this wedding felt like. At the Factory on Barclay we were able to walk the neighboring streets for sunset portraits and at Lake Park the couple was consistently cheered on by people that were passing by; enjoying the park by going on walks, bike rides or having picnics.
Saint Sebastian being in Wauwatosa also was in the midst of some of the most beautiful, quiet and quaint neighborhoods of Milwaukee. Just arriving at the church makes you want to smile and look around with a hopeful look on your face as you dream of maybe buying a house and moving to this section of town.
Alex and Nick were incredible and made our wedding portraits absolutely breathtaking. They made my job as a wedding photographer incredibly easy.
Also, if you’re still searching for a trendy “in the city” type of reception, please check out the Factory on Barclay.
It has an incredible amount of space if you have a large guest list and an upstairs with different creative spaces that had an overall industrial chic vibe.
My second wedding was really unique because it started as a small town Wisconsin wedding and finished up in the heart of downtown Milwaukee.
We started the day at Amanda’s home in Fredonia, Wisconsin where she had a spacious property with a beautiful backyard featuring blooming trees that I used as a backdrop for our wedding details like the dress, shoes and rings.
When you have space to maneuver it makes things so much easier to be creative and get the wedding pictures that make the client happy.
Amanda had all of her bridesmaids and her mom at her house to get ready with her and I got some amazing pictures of her with her mother. One portrait that I loved was simply the two of them looking at each before things became overly hectic for the rest of the day. Another one was of Amanda standing next to the window holding her wedding dress.
I just love taking wedding lifestyle and photojournalistic portraits like this, because they’re so quiet and sweet and are full of expectations toward the rest of the day. And, that’s what “getting ready” is all about!
After getting ready in Fredonia we moved to Holy Cross Chapel in Belgium, which was a beautiful orthodox country church. I love these churches, because they are classically beautiful with stained glass windows and older architecture that features strong triangular peaks and lines.
This reminds me of the Lutheran church my sister-in-law attends and resembles other country Lutheran churches. My favorite location was the entry, which had beautiful light and I took advantage of it to take a couple quick portraits of Amanda with her flowers after the ceremony.
From there we went straight to the reception which was at Hilton City Center. This is one of the busiest downtown areas of Milwaukee, just a block south of the main drag Wisconsin Ave. and a few blocks south of Fiserv Forum and Old World Third.
As a bonus to this location, which was big enough to host multiple weddings and still feel secluded, they have an outdoor gazebo area that was isolated and gave us a secluded location for portraits.
My third May wedding was a departure from the first two is that I traveled to Madison for it and it was a fun low-key and no fuss affair for Beth and Chris.
Just sitting a handful of blocks from the actual Capitol Building, Beth and Chris were married in a music venue/bar called High Noon Saloon on Washington Ave.
It had this beautiful indoor space and outdoor patio area and it fit all of Beth and Chris’ 200+ guest list.
Beth and Chris got ready and had their first look at Hotel Indigo and I was happy that the lobby had a neon Madison sign that I could put in the background of the photos. Sadly, it didn’t light up (I made sure to check with the front desk). But, Beth and Chris love Madison and I was still happy to get the photo.
This was more of a rock-n-roll, creative and artistic atmosphere, so I got a couple more creative wedding portraits on this day. I’ve been experimenting with using my wide angle 35 mm fixed lens and I used it to take a picture or two of Beth and Chris in front of various warehouse/industrial looking buildings.
One of my favorite things to do was that I also used High Noon’s pinball machines as a colorful and bright background for my closeup ring shots. If you think of pinball machines they typically have a lot of different colored lights that blink on and off. It was fun to get a photo of Beth’s ring with a red/blue and purple circle of light in the background.
The most adventurous shot of the day was Beth and Chris walking across Washington Avenue and me getting as low as I could in the street and dodging traffic to try to get a picture of them walking Beatles’ style with the Capitol building in the background.
Thank you so much to my wife/assistant who kept giving me warnings when I needed to run out of the way of oncoming traffic. One of the biggest reasons why I love bringing her along on wedding days!
