“To see, or not to see: that is the question…”

Traditionally brides and grooms would not see each other on their wedding day until the bride was walking down the aisle or it could be “bad luck”. Thankfully, nowadays you have an option. To see each other for the first time in a private moment before the ceremony or follow tradition and wait until the ceremony time.

As a bride and as a photographer I am completely biased towards seeing each other in a private moment a couple of hours before the ceremony. In my personal experience as a bride, I was never given the choice and just went along with what I thought I had to do and didn’t see Curtis until the ceremony time. In all honesty, the moment was not at all what I had envisioned. I dreamed of a movie moment. Our eyes locked together, both of our eyes tearing up with excitement, and my heart beating a little louder as if to confirm how perfect that moment was. Hmm, well, that’s not at all what happened. As I walked down the aisle, all my friends and family, some of whom I had not seen in a while were all staring, smiling and waving at me. I smiled and waved back. Somewhat of a movie moment, just not the right movie. I didn’t really look at Curtis until I was right in front of him. I hugged my parents and the priest started the ceremony. We couldn’t hug each other, we couldn’t talk. We never had a moment alone our entire wedding day. I wish I had been given the choice and I would have for sure chosen to have seen my love and spent some time telling him how much I loved him on that day. Just the two of us.

Now, that’s just my personal experience. Everyone is different and so to help you decide I’ve compiled a list of “pros” and “cons” of each option and tried to be as unbiased as possible based on all of the couples I’ve photographed this year. Weather you choose to see each other before the ceremony or not will not only impact your “first look” experience, but it will also greatly affect your wedding photography and the flow of your day.

Option “see” pros:

• You are guaranteed a few moments alone with your spouse-to-be. This is often one of the most special moments of the whole wedding day. It allows you to take it all in and let each other know how you feel in that moment.
• Guests appreciate it that they don’t have to wait 1 ½  hours to be able to see the bride and groom.
• You are guaranteed to be focused on your groom when walking up to him and not be distracted by all the smiling guests ☺
• The bride and groom, family and bridal party get to participate in and enjoy cocktail hour. The bride and groom can mingle with guests during this time instead of having to formally go from table to table during the reception to greet their guests.
• It is much easier to get family together for portraits before the ceremony and before other guests arrive than during cocktail hour.
• Everyone will be looking their best before being outside in the heat and/or wind, lipstick kisses from loved ones and happy tears.
• The ceremony can take place close to sunset.
• Allows for photographer to take pictures of reception site during cocktail hour before guests have placed their personal items on tables and chairs and the setup is intact.

Option “see” cons:

• Traditionally brides and grooms would not see each other before the ceremony. This is still important to some families and required by some religions.
• If you are having a morning wedding, you’d have to wake-up really early!

Option “not see” pros:

• To be able to follow religious and/or family traditions.

Option “not see” cons:

• The ceremony needs to ideally end 2 hours before sunset to allow for natural light to still be available during portrait time.
• It is often difficult to “hide away” from guests during portrait time.
• It is also often difficult to get family to gather for portraits when they would rather be enjoying a refreshing drink or an appetizer and be mingling with guests who are eager to congratulate them and celebrate.
• Everyone may no longer be looking their best due to being outside in the heat and/or wind, crying during the ceremony, as well as lipstick marks from loved ones right after the ceremony.
• If your cocktail hour must be exactly one hour, family portraits, bridal party portraits and bride and groom portraits will have to be shortened to just 20 minutes each.
• If things run late, we may run out of light before being finished with portraits.

I hope this helps! And here are a few images from Amanda and Eric’s First Look this past Saturday.

If any of you can think of any other pros and cons please feel free to add a comment. And for all of you newlyweds out there, let us know what you chose and what your experience was like. I’d love to hear from you.