East Hampton Wedding Photographer :
THE CHURCH, THE CLUB AND THE GARDEN.
It rained for less than twenty minutes on September 7, 2024, and every drop fell while the guests were inside St. Luke's Episcopal Church. That morning Sutton had made the call on the rain plan: "go forward, no rain plan." By the time he and Charlotte walked out as husband and wife, the sky over East Hampton had cleared and their friends were throwing petals at them on the church steps.
East Hampton weddings tend to come with a history. Charlotte's grandfather bought a house here in the 1950s, and she spent her childhood summers in town with her siblings and cousins. Hillary and Amir, who married in Manhattan, met for the first time in East Hampton, in a rented summer house called House 11 during their Columbia Business School pre-term week. These are our notes on the town, from the weddings we have photographed there.
A CEREMONY IN THE VILLAGE AT
St. Luke's
St. Luke's is family ground for Charlotte. Her parents married there, and so did many of her relatives, and her grandfather is buried there. Her father walked her down the same aisle he had walked with her sister a year earlier. The organist played "Moon River," and Charlotte's instruction to herself on the way down was to "avoid my New York City pace and walk slowly."
Sag Harbor Florist built an arch of flowers at the church entrance and kept the altar to two arrangements. For us, a church in the village means a short, quiet window before guests arrive, so we can make photographs of the empty room and the arch. During the service, the parish allows flash but asks photographers to stay out of the sanctuary and not move around in a way that distracts the priest or the guests, and we speak with the clergy beforehand. When the doors open afterward, the steps are where the petals fly, so we are already outside waiting.
THE MAIDSTONE Club
The Maidstone Club is a private members' club at 50 Old Beach Lane, a short drive from St. Luke's and the village. For Charlotte, the club had already hosted years of family occasions. Her grandfather drank the club's house cocktail with a double float of rum, and at the wedding they served it his way.
Charlotte and Sutton's reception was under a Sperry Tent, with chambray blue lampshades from Social Decor and candles hand-painted by MJ Tablescapes on every table. Charlotte credits the club's event coordinators, working alongside Ashley Douglass Events, for how the evening ran. Between the church and the club, Sutton drove her in a 1960s Mercedes SL that belongs to one of her mother's closest friends, and he took the long way. Our Maidstone Club wedding venue notes cover the club in more detail.
LONGHOUSE Reserve
LongHouse Reserve is a sixteen-acre garden at 133 Hands Creek Road, founded by the textile designer Jack Lenor Larsen, who built the house there in 1986. More than sixty outdoor works stand in the gardens. Sunny and Evan married on a lawn ringed by trees on the first weekend of October 2021, under an arch Putnam Flowers built from blush roses, dahlias, hydrangea and pampas grass.
After the ceremony we walked them through the bamboo, along a path lined with ferns, down to a pond with a willow hanging over the water, and out through a long allée of clipped hedges. Most of that walk was on film. Dinner was in a clear Stamford Tent set among the trees. For the rooms, the paths and the questions to ask before you sign, see our LongHouse Reserve wedding field notes.
A WEEKEND Out East
Almost every East Hampton wedding we photograph runs longer than a day. Charlotte and Sutton spread theirs over three nights. Thursday was a rehearsal dinner for the wedding party and immediate family in the backyard of her parents' house, with Acquolina Catering cooking pasta, and Charlotte called it "the best dinner party in the world." Friday's welcome party was by the ocean, with a wood-fired pizza oven from Rolling in Dough and ice cream sandwiches from Drops of Dough, their favorite spot in San Francisco.
If you are renting a house for the weekend, think about the morning as you choose it. Sunny got ready at a house with blue shutters and a pool out back, and her bridesmaids, in different shades of pink, blush and coral, lined up at the edge of that pool for one of our favorite bridal party portraits. A lawn, a porch or a pool gives the whole group somewhere to stand.
TIMING, SEASONS AND Getting Out East
Both of our East Hampton weddings were in early fall. Charlotte and Sutton married on September 7 and Sunny and Evan on the first weekend of October, when summer traffic has thinned out. Sunny's florals were coral and yellow dahlias, straight out of the season. Summer Saturdays book early, and a Friday on the Long Island Expressway in July can run long, so leave room in the getting-ready schedule. East Hampton is about two hours from Manhattan with no traffic, and a summer Friday afternoon can double that.
For guests, the Jitney or the LIRR plus a car or a rental near the venue makes the weekend easier than driving out. If your ceremony and reception are in different places, as Charlotte and Sutton's were, build the drive into the timeline and give yourselves a few minutes alone in the car. Rain plans need a decision time. Charlotte and Sutton made theirs the morning of the wedding.
OUR EAST HAMPTON Weddings
Charlotte and Sutton, St. Luke's Episcopal Church and the Maidstone Club, September 2024. Read Charlotte and Sutton's Maidstone Club wedding.
Sunny and Evan, LongHouse Reserve, October 2021. Read Sunny and Evan's LongHouse Reserve wedding photos.
PLANNING AN EAST HAMPTON Wedding
We're Trent and Dara, and we've been photographing weddings out east since 2010, on 35mm and medium format film alongside digital. BRIDES named us one of the 50 best wedding photographers in the world, and our work has been featured in Vogue and Over the Moon. More on how we work in the Hamptons is on our Hamptons wedding photographer page.
If you are getting married in East Hampton, at a church in the village, a club, a garden or the house your family has been coming to for years, we would love to hear about it. Reach out and tell us your plans.