Annabelle Agnew 6/3/22 Annabelle Agnew 6/3/22

Lighthouse Weekend Wedding on L'Ile Verte

This wedding was published in Together Journal a while back ago :)

When I met Rosalie and Connor in a park last summer, they shared with me their vision of having their wedding on Ile Verte - a beautiful rugged little island on the St Lawrence in Quebec - where they felt the island itself could speak to their shared values and connect their family & friends to the parallels they shared in their Quebec and Irish roots.

It’s no secret that I love water and that I love venues that are close to water. I love how the colors and light change from one day to the next, it’s so inspiring. But I also want to speak to being present for the whole weekend — it allows me to really consider and observe moments like these without the stress of a packed timeline.

I was able to float around the island and pick strands of grass, rocks, flora and incorporate those elements into the detail shots. I went on long walks all over the coastline to see how the light fell and how the Charlevoix horizon changed across the St.Lawrence. I was able to have idle chit chat with every person at the wedding and get to know the bonds that united them all to this one moment. This is how I would ideally connect to every wedding. It can’t always happen that way, but when it does, it feels like a gift.

The evening of the Rehearsal Dinner, we had a sunset that had me glowing from the inside out. I couldn’t capture the way the light fell fast enough. So let’s start with that gallery:

On their wedding day, the weather had subdued itself with overcast blues and it could not have been more fitting with the slightly warm suiting; while Rosalie’s elegant Pronovias gown stunned against the rugged backdrop.

This was a wedding weekend that hit all the right notes - so much fun, so much beauty, so much love — all celebrated with laughter, tears, lobster and a grand finale of pushing all the tables to the edges of the room to have a big ol’ dance party. Huge shout out to the Maison du Phare kitchen for over-delivering in the food joy.

Finally, I can not thank Rosalie & Connor’s family & friends for making me feel like I was a part of the party, not just a witness. I ate, I toasted, I sang, I danced, I learned about their stories, I cried along with them. It’s a weekend we’re all lucky to have shared.

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Annabelle Agnew 9/3/20 Annabelle Agnew 9/3/20

Kristina & Liam || Wedding Postponement Session

As mentioned in my first post about these sessions - I came up with Wedding Postponement Sessions for my clients because we needed a few silver linings.

I thought that by visually marking the occasion of original wedding dates we’re acknowledging and celebrating the tough decisions that couples are making together. In my own personal experience, these types of moments in life are what create stronger bonds, give greater depth to our connections, and lead us to appreciate the joy and gratitude that arises.

Kristina & Liam were originally getting married this coming November of this year. Because we did a winter engagement session, I thought we could take advantage of my recent time in Ottawa (for a wedding) and the summer weather (given that they’re wedding is postponed to next November). We landed on Mont St-Marie, where Liam has a family cottage that they can escape to.

The pandemic, they told me, has not been easy for them. Adapting to work-at-home and isolation was already proving difficult, when Kristina’s grandfather went into the hospital unexpectedly. Sadly,

We weren't able to visit or speak to him until his final days, and on May 3 he passed. This was especially difficult for both of us - as he was the person that raised me, and who was going to walk me down the aisle, and who I had hoped to have my father-daughter dance with. After dealing with such a large loss already, the idea of having a wedding when the grief was still so fresh, and in needing to adjust our expectations for our perfect day (we don't think we'd be allowed to have any where near our guest count, for example), it didn't feel right to move forward with our date.

Postponing for them meant also delaying a celebration of the challenges they had gone through together. The good news is that these two adore each other and if anything, strengthened their love for each other.

Kristina says of Liam:

He's always so positive, about everything (a glass half-full kind of guy).

And when I asked Liam for one of the things he loved about Kristina, he laughed and said:

Everything

Instead of a celebrating with a wedding this year, Liam took to making a fire with a few firestarter cubes (because hasn’t this year been challenging enough??). There is such a marked difference in the summer heat wave when you drive up to the Gatineau Hills, a fire is welcome! I got to know these two even better over a lot of laughter and getting creative in creating photographs that acknowledge the time they had in the summer of the 2020 pandemic.