Wait Chapel Wedding | Emily and Zachary | Winston-Salem, NC

If I was ChatGPT, which I’m not, but if I was and I had transcripts of all the Zooms and emails and texts between me, Emily and Zachary over the last year and a half, I might have expected their wedding to be in a hockey rink, in Paris, with cats in the stands, a lawyer as the ref, and the starting lineup of the Carolina Hurricanes as the wedding party. Though that would only be if I was ChatGPT, which as I already said I am not and computers can’t lie, or can’t lie well. But their wedding day didn’t take place in a hockey rink in Paris, there was no need for a ref, pretty sure I never saw a cat, though I am sure they would have loved for Andrei Svechnikov to make an appearance at their Wait Chapel wedding - but the dude never showed.

Last week, I had the pleasure of delivering all of the artwork from Emily and Zachary’s wedding to them while over Zoom. And over the two weeks of editing, building an album, and putting together a rad highlight reel for them, I got to thinking about their wedding weekend and I shared with them this following thought.

Wedding weekends are a lot of work, or they can be. I recall my own wedding almost 17 years ago and we had to invite all sorts of people I didn’t know. The classic parent’s friends from back in the day who remember you as “this tall, and now look at you” but in reality, you have no memory of them maybe outside a few sharings your parents made over the years about the Smiths, or the Jones’, or the McWhatchamacallits (they were Scottish). Let alone the fact you barely knew the ones your own parents invited, not to mention the ones your partner’s parents brought to the show too.

Listen, on a scale of dreamy to burning alive, this is a wildly first-world problem. I get that. My point here, and I have one, is that as I watched Emily and Zachary move around the room on the night of their rehearsal dinner, how they made time for everyone, they were intentional in the conversations with everyone, and you could tell that all felt welcome and wanted and cared for. I especially loved watching Zachary spend time with his grandmother and watching Emily cheers with the officiant - there is something so joyful watching someone wearing the white collar throwing back some beers.

This level of attention and intention didn’t end there. After their ceremony, Emily and Zachary both took time to share a hug and a conversation with almost every person in attendance as we stood out in the sun outside Wait Chapel. It was really awesome to witness this level of care from start to finish.

Then I had the distinct honor of getting to steal them away for one of the most badass portrait sessions I have ever had the opportunity to do with a couple.

If you remember, I mentioned Paris earlier. Emily and Zachary got engaged there along the Seine. And if you know me, you know that I love Paris…Midnight in Paris is one of my favorite films, Monet was the first artist I fell in love with, and seeing his massive works a L’Orangerie was 38 years in the making, French was the first second language that I would shortly forget (just keeping it real), I made this art print there, this one, and this one too…you get the point…I’m obsessed.

So when I heard from the wedding planner, Katherine of Katharine Mann Events, that someone was coming to ring the bells in the bells tower which has this massive clock face, I got excited! When I found Katharine, I said “I have a weird question for you”. Jennifer of Green Bee Floral said “uh-oh”, which made me realize I need to stop starting questions with “I have a weird question” and just ask the questions - so thank you, Jennifer! I asked if there was any way to get into the bell tower, fully expecting a solid no. But Katharine was ridiculously cool about it and said she’d just need to ask the carillon when he arrived.

Tang, the carillon, got there shortly after and welcomed me up to the tower. After climbing the grated spiral staircase (note: I am terrified of heights) we entered the clock tower and I instantly knew that I had to somehow convince Emily and Zachary to come up. It looks wildly similar to the interior of the clocks that overlook the Seine at the D’Orsay Museum in Paris. So after very slowly making my back down the staircase, coming up with a bulletproof case against two lawyers as to why this would be awesome, I went and asked Emily and she was in before I even got the full question out, and so it was on to Zachary who was instantly in as well. No arguement. No counter. No bailiff. Just all in.

No wedding is made on a couple of photos, but these had something extra special in them. It connected two places, maybe even three as we sat on the campus of the law school they both attended. It’s moments like these you can’t make up, you can’t really plan, and then as we headed back down the elevator (that comes after the spiral staircase and I had wiped the sweat from my brow and released the death grip on my cameras), Tang said he didn’t think that any couple had done that before and that was the icing on the cake for all of us. Probably how Tenzing Norgay and Sir Edmund Hillary felt when they stood atop Everest that first time. Kidding…kidding.

From there we headed to the trolley, and then on to Milton Rhodes Center for the Arts for the reception where everyone talked, drank, ate, and danced the early evening away.

So excited to share this wedding with you all, as always enjoy the show!

Much love to all of the wedding pros who made Emily and Zachary’s wedding day what it was:

Wedding Planner - Katharine Mann Events

Ceremony Venue - Wake Forest Wait Chapel

Reception Venue - Milton Rhodes Center for the Arts

Caterer - Providence Catering

DJ/Music - Dow Oak Events

Hair and Make-up - The Beauty Tribe

Florist - Green Bee Floral

Officiant - David Rose

Transportation - Triad Trolleys

Organist - Susan Bates

Carillon - Anthony Tang

Wedding Gown - Bellisima Bridal

Bridesmaids Gowns - Birdy Grey

Groom and Groomsmen Attire - Jos. A Banks

Invitations - Decree Company

From Asheville to Paris and well beyond, I would love to help make your wedding and the time leading up valuable and memorable for you. If this wedding resonated with you click the link below to reach out.