Felicia is someone who I have known a little bit for awhile. Apparently she’s a regular over at mergeweddings and planning a beautiful Rhode Island wedding this year. Since she had a cute short dress (and lots of accessories) from Etsy, she thought it would be fun to come in for the shoot. We put her dancing skills to work, and I also made her lay down on the floor a lot for some artsy shots.

Both of Felicia’s looks were stunning. I loved what the Jennie-Jenny hair and makeup team did with her. The first dress, the one from Etsy with the puffy neckline, was glammed up with a veil and other hair accessories. The second, simpler dress was jazzed up with gloves and an elaborate half-up half-down hairstyle that is not given justice in the photos.

bride: Felicia Kuo
Photographer: Rachel Hadiashar

Makeup: Jennie-Kay Murphy (jenniekaymurphy@gmail.com, 401-230-5346)
Hair: Jennifer Gonzalez (jennyg9883@yahoo.com, 401-323-8399)

Floral designs: Erica Jones of Orchids and Blooms (info@orchidsnblooms.com, 617-395-8545)

All of these professionals are available to work with you for wedding day styling, photo shoot prep, or any other professional hair/makeup needs.

Jenn is a model and mother to a four year old. As she is no stranger to the photo shoot scene, I was impressed that she knows how to move and could pull off a look even with huge feathers sticking out of her head!

This is the first time I have used a light blue background in the studio. I usually stick with gray seamless as that is the look I see in magazines.

Grace did a regal look for Jenn’s first style. It went beautifully with the ivory floorlength Maggie Sotaro wedding gown. The feathers remind me of “the Duchess” — have you seen that movie?

For the second styling, Jenn wore her own blue and white gown with an embroidered train, and Grace did a sort of 80s-glam rock look with asymmetrical hair, sparkly eyes, and all kinds of attitude. I’ve never seen styling quite like that before! (Go Grace!)

I chose to actually leave elements of the studio in a lot of the photos from this shot. I’ve noticed magazines doing that a lot in the past several months, and I like how raw and real it looks. I’m not a “flawless photo of impossibly airbrushed woman” kind of photographer, know what I mean?

Model: Jenn Castiglione

Photographer: Rachel Hadiashar (rachel@mergeweddings.com, 857-233-0810)

Hair and makeup: Grace Mahoney (gracealanna13@gmail.com, 508-769-1091)

Floral designs: Erica Jones of Orchids and Blooms (info@orchidsnblooms.com , 617-395-8545)

Custom designed jewelry: Lauren Marsh of Ricchezza Mia

All of these professionals are available to work with you for wedding day styling, photo shoot prep, or any other professional hair/makeup, jewelry needs.

Tara is a nurse and friend of Erica’s who was able to come in and model some custom designed wedding dresses by Mandeep. Funky, right? The last dress has a chain metal top.

Jennie and Jenny, who do hair and makeup out of Newport RI but travel all over, work as a great team for bridal and fashion looks. The first style they did for Tara was a softer look with pinks and other colors to complement her skin tones. One rose in her hair complemented Erica’s florals and contrasted the short funky style of Mandeep’s dress design. The second look with the chain metal dress and cool south-asian inspired jewelry was a wilder look which we ended up calling something like ‘bride of frankenstein goes tribal.’  The huge gray flower in her hair you might recognize from other shoots, it’s one of my favorite pieces from Topshop UK, summer 2008.

Model: Tara Hawxwell
Photographer: Rachel Hadiashar

Makeup: Jennie-Kay Murphy (jenniekaymurphy@gmail.com, 401-230-5346)
Hair: Jennifer Gonzalez (jennyg9883@yahoo.com, 401-323-8399)

Floral designs: Erica Jones of Orchids and Blooms (info@orchidsnblooms.com, 617-395-8545)

Exclusive custom-made dresses: Mandeep at Nijlane fashions (info@nijlane.com, 781-721-1442) – based out of Wilmington MA.

All of these professionals are available to work with you for wedding day styling, photo shoot prep, or any other professional styling needs.

Our floral and bridal photo shoot at the Lowell studio space two weeks ago was a success. I didn’t realize how long it would take to shoot three women in two different dresses each, every dress with a completely different look. I had a general idea of what I wanted in terms of looks, but it was important to me that the stylists have fun doing work they enjoy, since often wedding work is very particularly detailed. Lesson: it takes time to style up well! But I was really happy to work with such professional artists.

We surveyed the dresses we had, the accessories from vintage kid gloves to veils and jewelry, to Erica’s beautiful florals.

Many thanks to those who participated in my first truly collaborative shoot. I’m looking forward to more in the future!

All of these professionals are available to work with you for wedding day styling, photo shoot prep, or any other professional hair/makeup needs.

Hair and makeup for Jenn: Grace Mahoney (gracealanna13@gmail.com, 508-769-1091)
Makeup for Felicia and Tara: Jennie-Kay Murphy (jenniekaymurphy@gmail.com, 401-230-5346)
Hair for Felicia and Tara: Jennifer Gonzalez (jennyg9883@yahoo.com, 401-323-8399)

Floral designs: Erica Jones of Orchids and Blooms (info@orchidsnblooms.com,  617-395-8545)

Custom designed jewelry on Jenn: Lauren Marsh of Ricchezza Mia (www.ricchezzamia.com)

Exclusive custom-made dresses on Tara:  Mandeep at Nijlane fashions (info@nijlane.com, 781-721-1442)

source: brides.com

We’re still looking for one more bride with a cute SHORT white/ivory wedding dress for a special photo shoot on the afternoon of April 15 at our studio in Lowell MA. If that’s you or someone you know, please email me at rachel@mergeweddings.com.

I’ve not yet really gotten to photograph a bride in a short (white) dress, so I am really excited about this shoot. I’m working with an amazingly creative floral designer and peonies (which are in season) and I’ve scored some vintage accessories to use on the shoot.

We’re also seeking creative hair, makeup, and jewelry design artists to help with the shoot. My inspiration for the shoot is REAL SIMPLE meets Anthropologie.

ETA: wowsers – just found a shoot collaboration photographed by Stephanie Williams that does what I would want to do from the shoot (but in a different environent). Check this out!

Ann decided to do her bridals at a vineyard! She had visions of stomping grapes and such, but the end of winter is not exactly the most fruity time of the year for a vineyard shoot. We climbed a tree instead!

bride: Ann
location: Sakonnet Vineyard, Little Compton RI
photographer: Rachel Hadiashar
assisted by: Katie (Ann’s sister) and sweet Ali

styling: Jaime Berkman (makeup), Sarah Maher (hair) 617.209.8126 www.eye4beautybiz.com
cape: Kristen Dirmeier – etsy store
more images: here