Did you know that the tradition of not seeing the bride until she walks down the aisle dates back to the days of arranged marriages!? The groom didn’t see the bride until their ceremony so the parents could guarantee the marriage didn’t fall through. There are so many benefits of sharing a first look before your ceremony.

• • • More portrait time
    • You can enjoy your cocktail hour
    • Your hair and makeup will be fresher
    • Removes a lot of pressure
    • Private first look without a ton of people watching
    • Enjoy your ceremony emotions without the need to go straight into portraits

  You will have more portrait time. Without sharing a first look, you will likely only have at most an hour after the ceremony to do wedding party photos, family portraits, and your couple portraits. If you have a larger family, this will reduce your portrait time further. With a first look, you’re almost guaranteed to have 45 minutes to an hour of JUST the two of you. This allows for more variety in your photos and we can take advantage of multiple locations on the venue property.

• If your ceremony is running late, you don’t have to worry about missing out on portrait time. There are a number of reasons a ceremony could run long or have a delayed start. At our wedding it took a long time to set up Zoom on the ipad which delayed our ceremony start time. Even though  you may have planned for a cocktail hour this can easily be shortened to 30 minutes to ensure the reception starts on time. If you’ve already done your portraits and wedding party photos, you won’t even bat an eyelash.

  In my opinion, sharing a first look takes the pressure off both of you and soothes those pre-ceremony nerves. I don’t know about you but I hate being the center of attention so the idea of walking down the aisle already made my nerves sky rocket. The whole way down the aisle I kept telling myself “don’t make eye contact” “just smile and look at Jonathan”. I can’t promise a first look will remove all those nerves but the explosion of emotions will happen when it’s just the two of you – not 102 of you.

  

• You won’t have 100 people staring at you with the expectation of emotion!

• If you choose to share a first look, the two of you will see each other privately without all of your guests staring at you down the aisle. So many of my couples, especially those who were initially on the fence about a first look, often remark that the first look was their favorite moment of the wedding day. By being able to have a few peaceful and private minutes alone, it greatly lessens their nerves and allows you to experience your emotions without a large audience.

  You will be able to enjoy your ceremony emotions without going straight to posing for the camera. If you choose to do a first look, you’ll be able to ride the high of your ceremony emotions throughout cocktail hour. Going straight from the aisle to posing for formal portraits will absolutely dampen those vibes, so it’s great to be able to fully enjoy them with your spouse and friends instead.