Earthy California winter wedding

You can imagine how winter weddings in California are a little different than most parts of the country, yeah? When Jenna Joseph Photography + Kelsey Rae Designs hooked up, they executed their shoot around sun and shade on the venue to truly channel winter vibes. Kelsey set up a dreamy table in the shadows and Jenna worked quickly to capture it + their couple where the light wasn’t harsh, but still captured California. Did we mention they made it look effortless?

Kelsey says, I had been to Journey’s End several times and one day it clicked with me: their stone covered walls and endless trees backing up against their golf course would be the perfect backdrop for our shoot. We brought on Hannah of Modern Bouquet because we felt her arranging style would embrace the organic, whimsical feel we were striving for.

A most romantic Eden Couture Bridal was Jenna’s first piece of inspo.

Some fall dinner party ideas to steal right there…

Now Jenna’s story… Backlighting simply wasn’t an option for our cold, winter theme, as this would add a glow to the images and warm up the feel. I had to find a way to make it look cold on a hot day, which was a new challenge. Kelsey helped me with this by setting up smaller details in full shade while the sun was out. I did my best to shoot into the shadows and keep from any rays of sun from shining through trees. We were fortunate to be in a valley of hills, so we had an entire hour of open shade covering the whole venue. This was where I popped around and photographed everything else with backdrops I couldn’t use earlier on while the sun was hitting them. We had to move quickly, but it worked out well!