Iscoyd Park is a privately owned county house wedding venue surrounded by 18th Century parkland and beautiful gardens, on the border of North Wales near Wrexham. Recently restored to award winning acclaim, the venue if perfect for weddings of up to 160 guests and can sleep 30 overnight too.
For Le-Anne and Ben's wedding I arrived early to photograph the bride getting ready on-site. Le-Anne made use of one of the venue's large bedrooms for her bridal preparations. This is one of my favourite images from the day (and in fact one of my favourite ever photos) for many reasons. It shows the bride, now mostly in her wedding dress, standing in the mirror with her head looking out towards the window. It's a stunningly elegant pose - which wasn't posed at all. When you look closely at the image you might be able to see Le-Anne's maid of honour under the dress making a few adjustments! Whether you can see her or not, there's no question that this is an absolutely timeless wedding photo.
Ben was getting ready near-by and was going to travel to Iscoyd Park for a 'first-look' with his bride to-be. A first look is a relatively recent idea on the UK wedding scene, but has been popular in the United States for the last 5 years or so. So what is a first look? In essence, it's an orchestrated moment between a bride, groom and their wedding photographer. The idea is that the bride and groom are unveiled to each other in a way that means the photographer can capture both of their reactions before the wedding. It's very difficult to capture both the bride and groom's reactions of seeing each other in church, but when it's set-up like this, it's a whole lot easier! Have a look at Ben's reaction to seeing his bride for the first time below:
