Being that Jillian and Sean are both Irish, and after hearing Jillian’s cute story about her connection to the Left Bank…we decided to create our love story around everything Ireland..stormy weather, Guiness beer, rainboots and umbrellas, and Jillian’s beautiful claddagh ring. And last, I suggested my favorite location at Sutro Beach as I always find it wildly romantic and it has the perfect European flaire. After a SF morning of hail, rain, and thunder…the day cleared away and we had the most amazing and perfectly dramatic sky for our backdrop. {See the whole shoot here!}

More of this amazing shoot in the SMP Photo Gallery!

Jillian and Sean’s story …

My older brother is Sean’s best friend. I was visiting my brother in Arizona one summer when Sean and I met. We decided to do a long distance relationship. I was in school at Indiana University. The first year of our courtship was spent on the phone and flying back and forth from Arizona and Indiana about every 4-6 weeks. On our one-year anniversary I transferred from Indiana University to Arizona State to be closer to Sean.

On our two year anniversary, Sean asked me to marry him. We spent our anniversary at a romantic hotel in Scottsdale. He led me to the rooftop over looking all of Phoenix/Scottsdale and the city lights. When I opened my eyes there were twinkle lights everywhere, rose petals sprinkled along the floor, my favorite champagne and Sean down on his knee. I of course said yes!

We are getting married May 7, 2011 in St. Helena, California. Sean and I both came from big Irish Catholic families. Both of our mothers are children of 10. We wanted to have a theme to our wedding that represented us. My Grandfather passed away in the spring of 2008. His funeral reception was at the Irish Bank in San Francisco. He would go there everyday and sit at the bar and order a whiskey. Everyone knew him by name. It was his favorite hang out spot. He would have been happy to know Sean and I had our engagement shot there.

We asked Lauri Levenfeld to be our photographer, because she combines artsy with traditional. She made us feel very comfortable right away. She is perfect for us. She really loves what she does and cares about her clients and telling their story.

Our congrats and best wishes to Jillian & Sean … and a Happy Birthday to Lauri! (just a wee bit late)

© Style Me Pretty : The Ultimate Wedding Blog, 2011. | Permalink | 6 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Lauri Levenfeld, Zoom Photography
Post categories: engagement session, Little Black Book Blog, Wedding Photography

Lauri Levenfeld at ZOOM Photography never ceases to amaze us with her creative spirit and her eye for the divine! So it comes as no surprise that when her clients came to her with their story, the three of them began to script a multi-faceted love shoot that was full of passion AND brimming with exhilaration!

You see, Suzi and Joe have just published their first novel ~ during their whirlwind courtship, they had discovered more than just a keen desire for each other … they discovered that, as writers, together, they were smashing! And now, they were going to elope. They wanted to go all out with their engagement shoot. To practice … what they were preaching!

Their novel? With the help and support of her husband-to-be, Suzi’s book The Love Habits was born and published!

“The only way to find the best possible love is to be the most irresistible you … give a girl a solid love habit and she will follow it the rest of her life …”
-Suzi McCluskey

Lauri tells us this … Going off the couple’s running Latin theme in their relationship as well as Joey’s Portuguese heritage, the couple planned a romantic elopement ceremony (their philosophy being, “never forget that marriage is first and foremost between the two of us”) on Cinco de Mayo (5.5.10). They wed at The Four Seasons Biltmore in beautiful Santa Barbara. Being that the Biltmore is a sprawling Spanish hacienda only added to their Latin theme. They JUST celebrated their marriage with family and friends at Malibu Wines on July 18th.

In order to take the shoot from a typical engagement to something much more fabulous, I enlisted the amazing stylists, Jessie Gainsley and Lindsey Colhoun, of the Two Shoppers. Lindsey and I have been friends for a long time, as I photographed her wedding several years ago. While the girls have been focused on celebrity & high profile clients, they are now breaking into the wedding business with amazing packages for brides & grooms. The collaboration continued with one of my favorite makeup/hair artists, Missy Sandora.

I love the fact that Suzi has made her love story an accessible and inspirational novel to others.

Suzi and Joe definitely mastered the art of irresistibility … and Lauri was spot on!

There is no end. There is no beginning. There is only the infinite passion of life. -Federico Fellini

ZOOM Photography ~ IRRESISTIBLE

Makeup & Hair: Missy Sandora

Styling: Jessie Gainsley & Lindsey Colhoun, Two Shoppers, 310-867-4888, email twoshoppers@gmail.com
With combined resumes that include designing clothing and accessories for major brands, as well as their own, working in leading retail stores, Jessie Gainsley + Lindsey Colhoun developed a personal styling company called Two Shoppers. They are in the know as to what’s hot, what look is appropriate and current and most importantly, how to make their clients look effortlessly chic – no matter what the occasion. One unique aspect of their business is their specialty in wedding styling. Each bride is unique and so are their packages.

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Post tags: Lauri Levenfeld, Lulu, Missy Sandora, Suzi McCluskey, The Love Habits, Two Shoppers, Zoom Photography
Post categories: engagement session, Little Black Book Blog

Jennifer and Russell were married in a traditional Jewish ceremony at the Mosaic Law Synagogue where Jen grew up.

From Jen,“I made all of the bridesmaid’s jewelry to mimic my necklace. I chose four colors of pearls that worked together. Each girl’s necklace was slightly different, but incorporated all of the bead colors so they worked together. The color of the earrings was determined by the most prominent color in each girls necklace. In that sense they were all unique but together they worked very well as a set.”

I wore an Alita Graham gown from Kleinfelds. Since I live in New York, I knew that if I didn’t set any guidelines to finding a dress, it would have been a never-ending search. That being said, I gave myself one weekend to find a dress. My mom, maid-of-honor and mother-in-law all joined me in my search. We went to five different bridal boutiques. In each place, I left thinking that I had found “the dress”. I really wanted to work with a smaller boutique, but the dress from Kleinfelds kept on floating to the top as my favorite. After we had narrowed it down to 3 dresses, my father looked at all of them and started crying when he saw me in the Alita Graham gown. That is when we all knew that it was the one!

Since there were so many out-of-town guests at the wedding, we wanted to make sure that the site of the wedding location itself was easily accessible. We saw around 20 venues in one weekend. To not mix any of them up, we had sheets to rank all of the venues. After everything, the Sheraton Grand seemed like the most ideal venue. We really liked the modern architecture of the ballroom. It was in downtown Sacramento and since it was a hotel, we didn’t have to worry about the guests making it back to their hotel all right.

The colors of our wedding were chocolate brown, coral and a light, bright blue. The flowers and bouquets were made of dahlias, ranunculus, orchids and hydrangeas. Instead of searching for the perfect coral colored flower, we chose to blend pink orange and yellow flowers together to make coral instead. We didn’t have a specific theme, but we had a very clear aesthetic we were going for. We wanted everything to be very clean, modern, sophisticated and natural. Since we are both designers, we had a hand in designing as much as we could, despite us living in New York. We designed and letter-pressed the save the dates, all 7 pieces of the invitations and the table numbers. We also designed our wedding logo, the menus, the napkins and the programs for the ceremony. I even hand bound the sign-in book.

When asked what her favorite moment of the day was, Jen said, ” …  seeing Russ for the first time. I was so nervous and excited that I almost started crying. It was really emotional. That was when the realization hit me that it was really our wedding day. After I saw him, I completely relaxed and had a great time. I just couldn’t stop looking at him, holding his hands. It was so emotional for me that I was speechless. I will never forget how I felt. It was as if time stood still.”

And Lauri ~ with her golden lenses ~ was there to capture it all!

My own personal favorite shot from the day?

Congratulations to Jennifer and Russell!! And thanks, Lauri, for sharing!!

To see more of the wedding invitation and suite of papers, take a look at the bride’s new website:  Press Engaged!

To see the whole SMP gallery from the wedding, click here.

At the time of this writing, ZOOM Photography has 46 pages (that’s 500+ images) in their SMP Portfolio!

Jennifer and Russell
May 2, 2010

how they met
I grew up in California and am a graphic designer. Russell grew up in Westchester, NY and works in advertising as an art director. We are both interested in art and design. We like working in all medias ranging from letterpress to the web. We also really like nature and being outside. We live in Brooklyn, NY.  We met freshman year of college in English class at Washington University in Saint Louis. If we saw each other around campus or at parties, we would say hello but that was about the extent of our friendship. At the end of sophomore year we both decided to transfer to the art school and study Visual Communications. Our mutual friend told me this and I was excited because I always had a little crush on Russ.  The first day of our major we had to chose our seats for the year. I asked him if he wanted to sit by me. He agreed. Our class hours were long and we had to stay late several nights for projects. We became great friends over that year and were there for each other’s highs and lows. At the end of junior year we started dating. We have been together ever since.

the proposal
The proposal came as quite a surprise. The morning he proposed he told me he wasn’t feeling well and took the day off from work. While he was home, preparing to propose, he found a ring that I had lost. This ring was very important to me and I was devastated that I couldn’t find it. At work, I got a message that he had discovered it; I was so excited to come home and get my ring back. I opened the door and there he was, apartment clean, beautiful flowers and him dressed very nicely. I walked in, looked around, and then asked him for the ring that I had lost. He showed it to me and put it on my finger. I thought to myself, that’s funny; it’s like a proposal. After that he looked at me and said that there was another ring he wanted to give me as well. Then he took a different box, opened it and proposed. I said yes!

Jen and Russell’s Engagement Feature on Little Black Book Blog

the wedding
For the most part, our ceremony was very traditional. One main exception was our flower girl. Instead of a young girl, we chose to have my next-door neighbor throw the flowers. Since my entire extended family lives in Chicago, my neighbor was like a grandmother to me. She mentioned after we were engaged that being a flower girl was the one thing she had never done so we decided to give her the honor.  Also, instead of having the bride circle the groom seven times, we decided to each circle so that we would be building a home together.

the celebration
For me, best moment of my wedding day was during our first dance when Russ and I realized that we knew every single person there and we are so happy and excited to see everyone. It was so incredible that they were all there to celebrate with us.  We had 200 people at our wedding. Although I grew up in Sacramento, my entire extended family is from Chicago. A majority of Russ’ family is from the east coast so we had a lot of out of town guests at the wedding.

why Russ?
It was really easy to fall for Russ. He is so kind and generous and helps bring out the best in everyone he is around. He is also incredibly creative and a great person to go on adventures with. From the moment we really started getting to know each other, I realized that there is no one else I would rather be with.

why Jen?
Jen has the ability to light up a room. Everybody loves her and she is able to talk to nearly anybody. Jen finds hilarious things in the otherwise mundane. We have little inside jokes that perpetuate themselves for years. Some come from Pixar movies and others come from onions. You never really know what Jen is going to say at any given moment. I couldn’t imagine life without her.

why Lauri?
When I first saw Lauri’s photographs, I was blown away. My husband and I both agreed that she made every wedding and every person look incredible. After talking to her, I knew that we would have a great time working together. She has such a fun, relaxed, yet very professional personality. We had such a natural first conversation and she understood all of the different things I was looking at for a photographer. We wanted a hybrid between photojournalism and traditional shots. Lauri was capable of both, so it was the best of both worlds. Another great thing about Lauri is that I was able to consult with her not only on the photography but on other aspects of the wedding as well. She always gave her honest opinion about ideas and I was very thankful for that.

the honeymoon
Russ and I went to Belize for our honeymoon. We spent 6 nights on the beach and then 5 nights in the jungle. It was so nice to get away after the wedding and relax and enjoy each others’ company. We did everything from hanging out on hammocks, to eating delicious meals, to snorkeling, going cave tubing, visiting Mayan ruins to having hilarious encounters with monkeys. It is a trip that we will never forget.

Vendors
Day of Event Planner: Jill Anapolsky Reiser: jillanapolsky@sbcglobal.net
Photography: Lauri Levenfeld/ ZOOM Photography, studio@zoomphotography.net,
2nd Shooter/ Jessica Epstein
Hair&Make up: Sabrina DeMarco, sabrinabritschgi2000@yahoo.com
Flowers: The Party Concierge, Inc: Tom Ursini
Lighting: PSAV, Matt Satterfield
Music: Hip Service

Venues
Ceremony : Mosaic Law Congregation-  Rabbi Taff
Reception: Sheraton Grand, Sacramento

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Post tags: California Weddings, Centerpieces, Hip Service, Inc., Jewish, Lauri Levenfeld, PSAV, Sacramento, Shearaton Grand, The Party conciere, Zoom Photography
Post categories: Contemporary, Cultural Beauty, Little Black Book Blog, Real Weddings, Traditional Elegance, Wedding Photography

After that, they didn’t see each other again for several years. However, as fate would have it, they met again, and they both happened to be in the right place at the right time and a college-crush developed into true love.

And yet, once again, career opportunities and obstacles got in the way, and for a while it seemed that is where this story would end. Three years of long distance phone calls and all too brief weekend trips ensued. Finally those came to a halt when Maya joined Jonathan in Northern California. Together again, they decided not to wait any longer to start a new chapter in their lives.

On May 1, 2009, among a small circle of friends and family … in a low-key ceremony in San Francisco, they were married at San Francisco’s City Hall …

After the wedding, they left for the romantic island of Bora Bora in French Polynesia, and spent an unforgettable week in paradise.

From Zoom Photography’s blog … “They found their piece of paradise watching the sunrises and sunsets from a bungalow deck, overlooking a perfectly azure lagoon.”

Ahhh Lauri …. quite the story-teller, aren’t you!

to see the full gallery, click here!

Our sincere congratulations to Maya & Jon!!

* * *

Lauri Levenfeld’s expert and powerful images are splashed all over the pages of Style Me Pretty! Her work is pure, unequivocable art. To see 15 of her MOST incredible weddings, go to her website and click on ZOOM. Then click on WEDDINGS. Then just take your pick! They’re all incredible … from California to around the globe. Pure art.

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Post tags: California Weddings, City Hall, Lauri Levenfeld, San Francisco, Zoom Photography
Post categories: Little Black Book Blog

Lauri is the creative and ever so amazing spirit at Zoom Photography. If you’ve been with Style Me Pretty for ANY length of time, you’ve seen her features. So when she sent us some of the shots from Jennifer and Matt’s San Francisco E*Shoot we wanted to share.

Here’s a bit of their story from Lauri …

Matt and Jennifer both attended the University of California at Santa Barbara and were introduced by mutual friends. Four months after they first met, they saw each other again at a party. Riding home that evening on their beach cruisers, Matt wanted to give her a kiss goodnight, but he paused a little too long. So, teetering on her bicycle she leaned over, gave him a kiss and pedaled away!

On December 5, 2008, after six years of dating, Matt proposed to Jennifer in the Marin headlands overlooking the San Francisco skyline. Close friends were waiting at Harry Denton’s Starlight Room with champagne to celebrate their engagement!

Jennifer and Matt will be married on October 17, 2009 at the Holman Ranch in Carmel Valley, California. The couple fell in love with the property’s Spanish Hacienda charm reminiscent of their time spent in Santa Barbara. They are looking forward to exchanging vows overlooking the stunning hills and autumn colored vineyards of the Carmel Valley.

Pretty darned cute! Our best wishes to Jennifer & Matt!

to see the full gallery, click here!

* * *

Lauri has a self-proclaimed obsession with weddings and babies!

Weddings:  good thing for us ~ she’s totally one of our favorites in the LBB.

Babies: good thing for her ~ because she’s a new mom and a wee bit sleep deprived!

Congratulations Lauri from all of us here at SMP!!

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Post tags: California Weddings, Engagement Shoot, Harry Denton's Starlight Room, Holman Ranch, Lauri Levenfeld, San Francisco, Zoom Photography
Post categories: Little Black Book Blog, Wedding Photography

This very beautiful cake was from Michele’s Corner Custom Cakes.

from Jenne …

Michele and Dave’s relationship with the Sebastiani family allowed for some special perks. The couple was allowed to take 28 of their closest friends and family aboard the Sebastiani trolley ~ Sebastiani, Bartholomew Park, Ravenswood, and Buena Vista Wineries all rolled out their red carpets for them.

Their wedding weekend included a luxurious day filled with massages for the ladies, exclusive vineyard tours and wine-tasting, days filled with fabulous food and friendship.

At the reception, a “Wish Bowl” was available for guests to write their sentiments for the couple to open on their first anniversary.

A scrapbooking station kept guests busy in between dances. By the end of the night, guests had created a beautiful memento filled with Polaroid photos, colorful stickers and hand-written sentiments.  After many many heartfelt toasts, Michele and David danced the night away on a dance floor bedecked with her favorite colors ~ green and purple.

Congratulations to Michele and David! And a huge thank you to Jenne for sending us their wedding!

If a Wine Country Wedding is in your future … DEFINITELY … get in touch with Jenne Hohn Events for a dreamy destination celebration.

And Lauri … what can we say …?  GORGEOUS images to last a lifetime … as always, thank you!!

Lauri Levenfeld is one of our premiere Little Black Book Destination Photographers.

Did you know Style Me Pretty has a whole section devoted to Destination Wedding Professionals?

You can see Lauri’s fabulous talent all over Style Me Pretty’s pages {just type Zoom Photography into the Search box} … or see her website and blog {p.s. Lauri has another great wedding … and a great pair of shoes on her blog right  now!}

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Post tags: California Weddings, Destination Weddings, Jenne Hohn Events, Lauri Levenfeld, Sebastiani, Sebastiani Casa de Sonoma, Wine Country, Zoom Photography
Post categories: Casual Elegance, Little Black Book Blog, Real Weddings, Wedding Photography, Wedding Planners & Designers, Wedding Style

We’ll have all of the delightful details coming right up!

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Post tags: California Weddings, Jenne Hohn Events, Lauri Levenfeld, Parasols, Sebastiani, Sebastiani Casa de Sonoma, Wedding Colors Purple Green, Wine Country, Winery, Zoom Photography
Post categories: Casual Elegance, Little Black Book Blog, Real Weddings, Wedding Photography, Wedding Planners & Designers

From the bride…

At the reception and dinner, we wanted to showcase the very best NZ and Waiheke Island ingredients and highlight produce from the winery’s vegetable garden.  We served the Mudbrick’s own award winning Rose, Chardonnay and Syrah, as well as a special wine from Anna’s family vineyard in honor of Anna’s late brother Kiet who planted the grapes as a boy.

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Post tags: Anna and James, Auckland, Lauri Levenfeld, New Zealand, Oneroa Bay, Waiheke Island, Zoom Photography
Post categories: Casual Elegance