Why Small Weddings Moved Me More Than Grand Affairs

Why Small Weddings Moved Me More Than Grand Affairs 

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I’ve photographed weddings in grand ballrooms with ceilings higher than most people's expectations. The kind with 300 guests, three outfit changes, and 30 people trying to wrangle a family photo.

I’ve also photographed weddings with five people on a quiet lawn, where the couple read vows through tears, and the wind carried the sound.

Guess which ones stayed with me?

It’s not that big weddings aren’t beautiful. They absolutely can be. But somewhere along the way, many of them feel like productions. Choreographed, timed, and sometimes oddly detached from the couple themselves.

Small weddings?

They’re intimate. They’re real. They cut through the noise.

There’s a moment I think about often: a bride fixing her own veil in her NYC apartment, laughing with her partner while a violinist played in the park. No crowd, no pressure. Just love. And light. And the kind of intimacy you can’t fake.

As a photographer, those are the moments I live for. The in-between, the unscripted, the “this is so them” kind of energy.

Small weddings make space for that.

They allow you to breathe, to feel, to actually experience your wedding day rather than perform it.

And my job?

To capture it all. Not just how it looked, but how it felt.

So if you’re planning something micro, or on the smaller side, intentional, and maybe a little unconventional, I see you.

You’re not scaling down. You’re cutting straight to the heart.

That’s where the magic lives.

with Love 

Deva Akman

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The Dream Vendor Team Behind the Magic:

Floral Artistry : Wild Blooms Bridal 

Website

Jessica Scalamandre,  [email protected]


Dress : Lovely Bride 

Website
 

Venue & Caterer: The Vanderbilt Lakeside

Website
 

A few black & white beauties, and a couple of candid ones snuck in — because some moments just belong in monochrome. :)

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