NYC Marriage Bureau Wedding at the City Clerk Hall
Apollo Fields | NYC Wedding Photographers | New York Wedding Photography | Long Island Wedding Photos | City Hall Wedding Photos | New York City Hall Wedding Photos
Jess + Yi
City hall weddings will always have a place in my heart for their simplicity. Some of the couples who choose this option still host a larger celebration, while others are just happy to get a couple handfuls of friends and family together to enjoy a night on the town. It doesn’t even have to be New York City to enjoy that kind of intimate celebration. It’s the same kind of vibe of hosting a dinner party at your home.
NEw York City Wedding Photographers
When Heather and I lived in New York we didn’t tap into our love of hosting yet. I guess we were too busy taking care of people at our respective bars while pursuing our college degrees. It wasn’t until we moved to Colorado that we started putting together curated dinners where we would invite people who didn’t know each other to meet and share a meal. There was something wonderfully simple about it. I know a lot of people who get anxious at the idea of company, but I remember one particular dinner of ours when we didn’t have enough silverware for everyone! Instead of feeling ashamed we just asked the couples at the table to share. That has since become the dinner our friends talk about the most often.
New Jersey Wedding Photographers
And that’s the beautiful thing about focusing on the people rather than the things—whether we’re talking about a wedding or a dinner party. The right people can make anything work, but the right things might not meet expectations. It takes a good partnership to arrive at good decisions, big and small, the first of which is commonly either a big move or planning a wedding. It’s kind of like the “take a road trip” test with someone you’ve been dating except times 1000. Ever since we hosted that first dinner party we’ve never looked back at any of our decisions—instead—we pass the fork back to one another when we share a meal. It brings us back to that party and always brings us closer together.
Long Island Wedding Photography
Long Island Wedding Photography | North Fork Wedding Photographers | Apollo Fields
Meredith & Vince
Long Island City Elopement Photography
Long Island City Elopement Photography | Apollo Fields Wedding Photographers | NYC Weddings 2020
Lauren & Jayram
Summer 2020 Wedding in Long Island, NY
Billy & Cara’s Summer Wedding in Long Island | NY Weddings on the North Shore | Apollo Fields Wedding Photography
Returning to work has felt like going back to my childhood home, rolling the garage door up, grabbing a basketball, and heading out to the hoop in the street. Even though my old hoop may be long gone; I still remember the give of the plexiglass backboard, the strange bend on the rim from when it fell during a storm, and how I used to countdown from three right before I heaved up a game-winning shot. Those memories literally feel like a physical part of me. Then this past weekend, when I walked into Billy’s mother’s house and began joking with the groomsmen as they bent their wrists as they put on their helicopter cuff links, I realized that Apollo Fields is becoming part of me in the same way.
Billy and Cara, like many other 2020 couples, have been run through the gamut of rescheduling their wedding (twice). On top of that, Hurricane Isaias knocked power out of Cara’s parents’ house and the location where they planned to have a small reception. Resilience, patience, and kindness are the first words that come to mind when I think of the way that Cara and Billy handled all of these obstacles, but even they don’t do justice for their wonderful relationship.
A couple of Long Island natives, their engagement story is one of my favorites. Billy planned a kayaking trip on a bay on the south shore, going beforehand to bury a small box in the sand and marking it with an ‘x.’ They brought a couple of sandwiches with them on the trip and while Billy was doing his best to nudge Cara to hunt for buried treasure, all Cara could think about was how hungry she was and that she wanted her ham sandwich. “Who passes up buried treasure for a ham sandwich?” Billy playfully asked in the questionnaire we give to our couples to get to know them better. I’m sure any groom that has taken romantic lengths like this one knows all too well the anxiety of trying to maintain the surprise while trying to play it cool. “Just hunt for the treasure, damn it!”
You would never have guessed with Cara and Billy’s cool and calm demeanor during their wedding that they’re actually fierce competitors. Bowling and mini-golf are games in constant rotation, and Cara refuses to leave the alley until she wins a game (Heather does the same). Cara even disclosed in the questionnaire that she won’t play Clue with Billy’s family until they learn to play by the right rules (lol), showing the integrity of a competitor that we 100% respect. Whether it was from this backbone of competitiveness against the events of 2020 or the sentimentality behind buried treasure and a ham sandwich, we’re so happy that the celebration of their love prevailed.
It’s crazy how our memories and our work entangle with our identities, reinforcing who we are even though we think we are just living our lives. I definitely err on the side of reflection and contemplation as opposed to impulsivity, and am grateful that my job, through Heather’s undeniable artistic talent, continues to shape my reality through stories of love and basketball. Cheers to the love of Cara and Billy, who helped me realize that work can be just as powerful as nostalgia.
Wedding Vendors:
Photography: Apollo Fields
Ceremony Venue: St. Kilian Parish
Videographer: John Morelli
Officiant : Deacon Bill
Florist: Bloominous
Dress : BHLDN
Suit: Generation Tux
Rings : Blue Nile
Hair and Makeup: Luxe and Co
Invitations and Save The Dates: Minted
Transportation / Limo: All Star Limo
Northport Long Island Elopement Photography
Jamie and Allison's Crab Meadow Beach Wedding Portraits | Northport NY Photographer | Apollo Fields Wedding Photography
The birds of the beach soared over our heads, higher than the early morning rising summer sun, taking turns plunging into the Long Island Sound. Their impacts sent a sputter of splashes on the surface, wings flapping amidst the spray, almost like they were cooling off in a ceramic bird bath at the center of a peaceful garden. The air was fresh and only slightly saline as high tide swept up the shore, covering the thousands of small, hollowed-out sandy homes of Crab Meadow Beach with a shifting layer of foamy water. Allison and Jamie bowing their heads, gently closed their eyes, bringing their foreheads to softly rest upon one another like wings spread in the wind, floating above the earth, ready to take their dive at any moment.
Jamie and Allison took the proverbial “plunge” or “dive” a couple months prior under the tree cover of a forest in Maryland at the height of quarantine. They, like many other couples who planned to get married in 2020, had to decide what the celebration of their love would look like during a pandemic. It’s so hard to shift expectations when they’ve already been set, but if it’s anything we’ve learned from Jamie and Allison and the difficult situation in general, is that love, like water, will always find a way.
Jamie and Allison’s Zoom wedding celebration in June was intimate and endearing, heartfelt, and natural. Figuring out how to get hundreds of little faces to fill a series of screens on several different devices changes the physical landscape of the audience but not the nature of the celebration. Love is—and always will be—at the core of weddings, and we’re watching in real time how we are all adapting to our expression of it. While a few family members were on hand to photograph the ceremony and first dance on the day of, Jamie and Allison decided they would take a trip up to us in Long Island, NY, to further honor and document their love and connection.
The idyllic found a home in circumstances less than ideal that morning on Crab Meadow Beach. Jamie and Allison moved effortlessly in the sand in their stunning wedding clothes as we watched and snapped away in awe. Heather is a sucker for evening golden hour and sunrise wedding photography and our morning with Allison and Jamie further solidified her resolve. The golden shape of their smiles and the aura around their faces hit the lens and our hearts with equal emotion. It was hard not to be happy.
And that’s what many couples think they are missing during this tough time. There’s definitely some truth to it but Heather and I and Jamie and Allison are the silver (or golden) lining kind of people; we are the kind of people who know that our love and our effort will carry us through the tough times and lift us even higher in the lighter ones; we are the kind of people who commit and take a plunge when we need to but extend our wings and float in the breeze while we can.
Enjoy some of the pics from Allison & Jamie’s Wedding portraits:
Planning a wedding can be stressful —especially if the cost is coming out of your own pockets
Planning a wedding can be stressful —especially if the cost is coming out of your own pockets!
Wedding etiquette used to be that the bride’s family shouldered the entire cost of the wedding and the groom’s family would cover the rehearsal dinner. The couple was only expected to pay for the gifts that they would exchange with one another and their wedding party… Well, it’s 2019 and we happen to think that this uber-traditional arrangement is a bit antiquated and unrealistic. According to WeddingWire, about 44% of modern couples are paying for the majority of their wedding themselves. At Apollo Fields, we probably see an even higher percentage of our couples footing their own bills and honestly, we think that’s super rad! We really “click” with the word hard / play hard kind of couples who are more focused on their weddings being a unique and sentimental experience rather than a trendy, over-the-top social affair.
QUOTE FROM A PREVIOUS COUPLE
Planning a wedding can be stressful —especially if the cost is coming out of your own pockets. Around every corner there seems to be an expense waiting for you; from bigger costs like renting a venue, catering, and stocking the bar, to unforeseen expenses like chair and table rentals, glassware and silverware rentals, and single-use items like decorations and stationery. That’s not even to mention services like a DJ or live band, the serving staff, and the totally unbiased, most important cost of your wedding: photography! Well, coming from a couple of industry-tested wedding photographers who have seen the good, the bad, and the ugly, including the full planning and execution of our own wedding in October 2018, please heed our advice from one proud, professional couple to another!
Establish Your Priorities As A Couple
As soon as you post your engagement on social media, every aunt and uncle, sister and brother, mother and father, and friend will have an opinion on what your wedding should be like. Where you should get married, who you need to invite, what food you should serve and what music should be played. As you will see (or already have seen), the planning of your wedding can quickly become less about you and more about the people who surround you. Don’t forget that the biggest benefit of paying for your own wedding is that you don’t have to answer to anyone! It doesn’t have to be as cliché and rigid as “this is your day” or “this is the bride’s day,” of course you can listen to those closest to you for advice, but the fact of the matter is-- you’re paying for it--so don’t allow others to dictate the way you want to celebrate your love. Your wedding day is just as much a romantic symbol of your relationship as it is an opportunity to showcase its strength by making important decisions together. So take the time to sit down and hash out what’s most important to each of you individually, that way each of you feels represented in the atmosphere of your wedding day, from the decorations to the guest list to the dance floor.
Apollo Fields List of Priorities:
1. Location – Family hobby farm in Ramsey, NJ.
2. Guest List – Immediate family and close friends (tough to keep <100 guests)
3. Food and Beverage – Beer, wine, and N/A bev., whiskey/scotch room, homemade fresh pasta bar, salad, candy apple dessert bar.
4. Photography – Associate/friend of Apollo Fields.
5. Entertainment – Inexpensive but trusted DJ of family friend.
6. Décor – Mainly rustic tools from farm’s history, table cloths from amazon, glassware, dishware, and silverware from second-hand stores.
7. Rentals – Tables, chairs, portapotty.
QUOTES FROM PAST COUPLES?
Tackle One Thing At A Time
When you have to pay for your own wedding, you have to work the planning around your already busy schedule. The best way to do this is to start at the top of your list of priorities and work down one at a time. This way it is more manageable, enjoyable, and hopefully never becomes overwhelming. If a venue is at the top of your priority list, start there, and then determine your guest list as per different venue’s respective guest maximums; if the guest list is paramount, then start there and find which venues are best for your guest count. Leverage your priority list into the planning process. Take a weekend to hit a few venues, taste their food, and check out nearby towns and hotel accommodations. Over dinner at a restaurant, discuss who or what is not negotiable come wedding day. Let it be light and fun, it doesn’t have to be stressful! I still remember putting the playlist together for the DJ in our cottage in Colorado, laughing and singing to all of our favorite tunes. But bear in mind, get a start as far in advance as possible, as venues, DJs, and photographers become booked up as far as a year to two years in advance, and we all know the feeling of being in the mall the day before your significant other’s birthday, only to settle for a gift that doesn’t truly represent how much you care. Don’t let this happen for your wedding day.
Apollo Fields Planning Workflow:
1. Location - Heather and I planned trips to New Jersey from Colorado in advance of the wedding, purchasing things that wouldn’t spoil, measuring space as per rental table dimensions, and helping set up the property as much as possible.
2. Guest List - The guest list is a common battleground for couples. There are going to be those left behind. You can try to divide the count 50-50 but it’s never that cut and dry. For us, we began with what the space allowed, and then it was all about who was currently contributing something to our lives that made the difference.
3. Food/Bev. - Getting a Costco membership can save you tons. We shopped around for the best prices for whiskey, beer, and wine, and grabbed a package or two of non-alcoholic beverages.
4. Photography – This was obviously easy for us as it is right up our wheelhouse.
5. Entertainment – We prioritized cost effectiveness on this one, and a family friend who had good reviews online came at the right price and delivered (literally and figuratively).
6. Décor – We built these purchases into our trips to NJ from Colorado, and found things on Amazon that were much better quality and cheaper than renting from a wedding company.
7. Tables and Chairs – At first I wanted to build all of them. In the week leading up to the wedding. Yeah, I was over-ambitious. We rented them at a great price from a company that dropped off and picked up at the location. We also rented a portapotty, which was a funny conundrum getting stressed about where people were going to use the restroom.
Tangible Items vs. Intangible Services
Similar to creating a pros-and-cons list to help make tough decisions, separating costs into tangible items and intangible services can help clarify where you should direct the bulk of your time and budget. It’s easy to fall down the rabbit hole of designing your wedding to be the perfect, dream-like experience, all the way down to the way the napkins are folded, but to be honest, the quicker you depart from that pipe dream, the better. The reality is that something always goes wrong at weddings and the more value you put into each small detail the more you risk that stress eventually coming back on you when/if it doesn’t pan out. If you do have your heart set on a lavish extensive wedding experience, it can pay to hire a wedding planner, but if not, or they’re too expensive, we say cut the corners on immaculately matching silverware, dishware, glassware, and single-use items like decorations, invitations, wedding favors and the like. It will drive you crazy and the pursuit of perfection will make everything else seem imperfect. Instead, consider hiring a Day-Of Coordinator to take the stress off without breaking the bank. This is one of the biggest “I wish I had _____” feedback that we hear from past couples. Having a point of contact for the day to make sure things are running smoothly and on time will take the pressure off of you guys without maxing out your credit card.
MAYBE GET A QUOTE FROM A LOCAL DAY OF COORDINATOR HERE?
Invest in the things that people will remember: your beautiful ceremony in an historic barn, the tunes blaring from horns and reverberating from the strings of an electric guitar, and of course the photography that will capture all of these moments for you “to have and to hold” (see what I did there?).
(INDUSTRY SECRET: You wouldn’t believe how much cake goes untouched (and often thrown away) while your guests are tearing it up the dance floor. We say ditch the elaborate multi-tiered cake and direct the funds elsewhere. Dessert bars with cupcakes and cookies are great alternatives. Or think outside the box-- we had an autumn wedding so we went with bite-sized pumpkin pie nibbles and caramel apples).
Apollo Fields Tangible Items vs. Intangible Services Cost Breakdown
1. 70% Services: DJ, photographers, venue, staff.
2. 30% Items: Rented tables and chairs, second-hand silverware, avoiding glassware via bottled beer and large stock of wine glasses.
Indian Fusion Wedding Photography in Pennsylvania
Krishna and Nikko’s Wedding | Fusion Indian Wedding in NYC | Apollo Fields Photography
What exactly is a “fusion wedding”? Simply put, it is when partners from two distinctly different cultures, religions, and/or traditions choose to celebrate their marriage with elements from both backgrounds. Personally, I love photographing fusion weddings because there is such an opportunity for couples to handpick the traditions that they choose to honor and quiet the ones that maybe don’t resonate as much with them.
Fusion weddings can also serve as a platform for education and acceptance across cultures because oftentimes, you are bringing together generations of family and friends whose own beliefs and practices might differ from about half of the ones being honored during the wedding. For me, personally, I always appreciate when a couple creates a ceremony program that gives a little explanation about the customs that are being honored. This is a great way to gently explain what is happening for guests who are curious, but might be timid, to ask about the traditions because they either don’t want to come off as ignorant or say something that might accidentally be offensive.
Fusion weddings are also a great opportunity to use attire to celebrate one another’s culture. Each culture has its own version of traditional wedding clothing and goes far beyond the western version of a bride wearing a white gown and the groom in a black suit. For example, many Chinese brides wear red as a symbol of good luck and posterity, many Scottish grooms choose their family’s kilt, a lot of African couples are adorned in intricate patterns, etc… With Nikko and Krishna’s wedding, I loved the moment where Nikko gets adorned with a traditional turban as a symbol of supporting the culture he is marrying into, and being likewise accepted. Nikko later changed into a more traditional western suit for the second half of the wedding day, which is a great example of how both brides and grooms can embrace their cultures simultaneously.
The food being served at a fusion wedding is also something that I always take a lot of care to notice. The menu can be another great place to honor traditional foods and also play with combining recipes a bit. I tend to think that menu cards that explain the different foods are the most helpful for a few reasons: First, put the name of the food and perhaps its pronunciation next to it. I find that food is a great way to get multicultural conversations started— hey, we all love to eat, right?— and if someone isn’t anxious about a mispronunciation, then they are more likely to talk about it. I also recommend a description of the food (particularly if it is vegetarian friendly, gluten friendly, etc) and perhaps even a guide to whether or not it is spicy. I see a hesitation in a lot of westerners when it comes to sampling new Indian foods because they are worried that they will be too spicy, and I’ve found that a simple heads up about what to expect is more likely to empower someone to try a foreign food.
The last element that I find really intriguing about fusion weddings is the music for the day. Many cultures choose to celebrate weddings with traditional dances, songs, and performances. This can be a great way to blend different backgrounds and get everyone dancing together and supporting one another. I find that music can be a powerful tool for bringing cultures together and some of the baraat photos at Nikko and Krishna’s wedding highlight that the best because you see both sides coming together to escort the groom to the ceremony with the best energy and celebratory vibes possible. Everyone was just celebrating and supporting the couple rather than worrying about strictly abiding by cultural norms.
Fusion weddings are more than just two people from different backgrounds choosing to get married. They are two families and backgrounds finding their middle ground without having to sacrifice ones beliefs. They can be an opportunity for understanding and personal growth as well as a platform for acceptance and nurturing. Being able to capture weddings across so many different cultures and religions is one of the core reasons that I love being a photographer in the first place, because it does oftentimes serve as my ticket into being an accepted member of this celebration, and even if only for a few hours. I have had nothing but positive experiences throughout the years that I have been doing this, which is why I am always especially proud of these photos.
