Bit of Ivory Photography | Chelsea LaVere | Williamsburg Virginia Wedding Photographer: hawaii

Since I'm headed to photograph a destination wedding press event in Cabo next week, I thought the blog should get some bright, colorful, and oh so tropical pretties! :)

We tied a bit of the history of Hawaii with beautiful vintage details at the wedding shoot, so Sara and I wanted this beach bridal session to be bold and vibrant with a nod to Hawaii without being "too Hawaii."

So a fun little story is that we got a text from Shilhi of Passion Roots the day before the bridal shoot: "I decided I want to freehand the crown!" With my obsession of watching florists create, I kinda squealed. This amazing girl had woven florals and shells into our gorgeous inside-and-out model Sarah's hair. Seriously.

And it was just sheer perfection that our model Sarah danced hula professionally and was already used to heavy hairpieces. I'm pretty sure #canteven was spoken multiple times the entire morning, especially when we arrived to the beach and I saw that a little island would be photobombing all my captures. :)

Want to see the full feature? Head over to Burnett's Boards!

And I had to throw in this little amusing nugget of a behind the scenes... :)

It all started with a tweet about cats, and then one thing led to another, and soon, Sara and I were emailing back and forth over a year's span planning what we would end up calling Ku'u Lei (my beloved)-- a truly once-in-a-lifetime experience. When they say there is an Aloha Spirit in Hawaii, they're not telling tall tales. It really does exist. The Hawaiian wedding industry seriously has to be one of the most friendly communities I've ever had the privilege of working with. To plan an event 5 hours BEHIND you with constant contact with the state government over permits and insurance policies... well, that was an adventure in of itself. But when you're playing ukelele music for your "on hold" telephone music, even that can't be that bad. :)

We dreamed of Downton Abbey meeting the beautiful tropics... and we experienced it with this part one of our three-day event. Sara built an inspiration board around it, Pinterest inspired us, and the creative team drew a dream into reality.

It's hard to put into words how this event and experience changed my life way beyond the professional, but into the personal realm. It may have started out with a tweet, but it now continues with future adventures, cat mom socks twins, Hemingway to my Radcliffe, collaborative partnerships, and one special friendship.

And like all poignant moments of my always-a-literary-reference life, I feel only Jane Austen has the words for this:

"There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature." ― Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey

To see the full feature on Burnett's Boards (without behind the scenes snippets), head on over there! Stay tuned over the next two weeks to see the other two shoots from Ku'u Lei! :)

Ku'u Lei - The Bridal | Orchestrated Stylized Shoots

Ku'u Lei - The Wedding | Orchestrated Stylized Shoots