There are times of year when Luttrellstown Castle almost looks like it’s showing off.

And I mean that in the best possible way.

Julia and Kaden got married there at the end of May, when spring seemed to have stretched itself into summer. The wisteria was still out, the gardens were completely in bloom, the lawns looked immaculate, and we somehow had blue skies over Dublin for most of the day.

For about 105 people who had come over from America, it was a pretty good introduction to Ireland.

But one of the interesting things about Julia and Kaden’s wedding was that they hadn’t chosen Luttrellstown simply because they wanted to get married in an Irish castle.

There was quite a bit more thought behind it than that.

Getting Married in Ireland From America

Julia has an Irish connection through her grandmother, whose family came from Dublin and Cork, but Ireland wasn’t an automatic choice.

Julia and Kaden visited before the wedding and looked at a few different venues. What they kept noticing was how easy Ireland felt.

It was somewhere genuinely different for their friends and family to travel to, without making everything unnecessarily complicated.

Everyone spoke English. Dublin was easy for guests to reach. And Luttrellstown Castle gave them the slightly bizarre combination of feeling as though you’re deep in the Irish countryside while actually being remarkably close to Dublin.

That’s a fairly big consideration if you’re asking 100 people to travel across the Atlantic.

Some of the other venues they considered would have meant flights followed by another substantial journey across Ireland. Luttrellstown removed a lot of that.

Guests could arrive in Dublin, settle in and suddenly find themselves at an Irish castle surrounded by acres of countryside.

It’s one of Luttrellstown’s great tricks.

A Castle That Doesn’t Need Much Help

Something Julia said to me on one of our early Zoom calls stuck with me.

Despite how extravagant Luttrellstown Castle is, they felt there was a simplicity to it.

They didn’t need to turn it into something else.

They wanted a beautiful place where they could bring their friends and family together, and the castle was already doing most of the heavy lifting.

That doesn’t mean they didn’t make it their own.

Far from it.

Lennie Wall was responsible for the florals and had been given enough freedom to really go for it. When I arrived, an enormous floral installation was being built at the bottom of the main staircase.

I remember joking with Lennie that she was going to make me look much better at my job because I’d inevitably get the credit for photographing everything she’d created.

I was only half joking.

The flowers were incredible.

There was another floral installation around the front entrance, which would unexpectedly come into play later in the day, and the ceremony itself looked fantastic.

But none of it felt like decoration for decoration’s sake.

The castle still felt like the castle.

“We Are Horrible Posed”

This was probably the most important thing Julia and Kaden told me before the wedding.

They didn’t want their wedding to turn into a photoshoot.

Julia was particularly good at explaining what she didn’t want.

No generic photograph of the dress hanging somewhere simply because that’s what you’re supposed to photograph at a wedding. No elaborate arrangements of stationery. Nothing felt like we were working our way through a standard wedding photography checklist.

And definitely no disappearing for hours to make portraits.

They wanted photographs that felt like what had actually happened.

Little interactions.

People’s expressions.

Kaden’s grandmother.

Their friends being themselves.

The beautiful bits, certainly, but also the funny and slightly strange things that happen around the edges of a wedding.

That’s largely how I photograph anyway, so we were speaking the same language pretty quickly.

The only slight contradiction is that I still think portraits matter.

You are getting married in Luttrellstown Castle, after all.

It would seem slightly mad not to make a few beautiful photographs of the two of you there.

The trick is not allowing those photographs to consume the experience you’re trying to remember.

Doing the Photographs Before the Wedding

So we did something that made an enormous difference to the day.

Julia and Kaden had a first look.

At around 2.15 pm, well before their 4 pm ceremony, we met in the gardens.

Kaden genuinely didn’t know what had hit him when he saw Julia.

Those first few seconds were lovely. I photographed the initial reaction, then gave them a little space to talk to each other and take everything in.

After that, we made some portraits.

Not an hour of portraits.

About ten minutes.

Julia and Kaden had sent me some photographs beforehand showing the sort of portraiture they liked, which I always find really useful. It doesn’t mean we’re going to copy somebody else’s wedding photographs. It just removes the guessing game.

I know what they’re drawn towards. They know I’m not going to suddenly turn their wedding into a fashion shoot.

We got what we needed and moved on.

The families then met us, and we photographed those combinations too.

Aoife from Blue Blossom Creative was brilliant here. Everything was incredibly well organised, so if somebody was required for a photograph, they appeared.

No wandering around looking for Uncle Whoever.

No twenty-minute delay because somebody has gone to the bar.

Done.

Julia also had a particular photograph she wanted on the winding staircase outside the castle. The wisteria was still out, her friends were there, and we made that happen, too.

And then something slightly unusual happened.

We ran out of photographs to take.

Julia went back to her room with roughly 55 minutes remaining before her wedding ceremony.

That’s exactly what I want.

Then They Got to Get Married

At 4 pm, Julia walked into the ceremony with her dad.

Her brother Jack conducted the ceremony, which obviously made the whole thing considerably more personal, and there was a lovely sense that both Julia and Kaden were properly taking in what was happening.

Sometimes you can actually see the gravity of the moment hit people.

This was one of those ceremonies.

They had written their vows together and delivered them beautifully.

The setting wasn’t bad either.

Every so often, while photographing a ceremony at Luttrellstown, I’ll find an angle that reminds me how extraordinary the place actually is.

You’re standing in this enormous Irish estate, surrounded by gardens and woodland, and Dublin city centre really isn’t very far away at all.

It’s a peculiar place in that regard.

Ten Minutes Alone

After the ceremony, there was no portrait session.

We’d already done it.

Instead, Julia and Kaden disappeared into the grounds for about ten minutes.

No photographer.

No guests.

Just the two of them.

I think that little period after a ceremony can be incredibly valuable, particularly with a destination wedding.

You’ve spent months planning it from another country. A hundred people have travelled to Ireland. You’ve just stood in front of everyone and got married.

Ten minutes to go, “Jesus, we actually did it”, isn’t a bad idea.

And then they came back and joined their own cocktail hour.

Actually Attending Your Cocktail Hour

This became one of my favourite things about the wedding afterwards.

Because people apparently couldn’t believe Julia and Kaden were there.

The falconry was out. Drinks were flowing. Suitcase Trio were playing. Friends who had travelled across the Atlantic were all together at an Irish castle.

And the bride and groom were in the middle of it.

Not standing half a mile away having their 47th portrait taken.

Julia and Kaden later emailed me and specifically mentioned this.

People kept telling them they couldn’t believe they’d actually attended their cocktail hour.

For me, that’s the whole point.

Particularly with a destination wedding.

If you’ve asked the people you love to travel thousands of miles to Ireland, surely you want to spend time with them when they get here?

From a photography point of view, it’s better too.

Cocktail hours are brilliant.

People are meeting each other. There are hugs everywhere. Someone is inevitably doing something ridiculous. Drinks loosen everybody up. You’ve got people interacting naturally rather than being assembled for photographs.

And when the couple are there, even more happens.

That’s the stuff I’m looking for.

Sometimes the Best Portrait Takes Two Minutes

Later, just before dinner, I noticed something happening with the light at the front of the castle.

It was strong, angular evening light hitting the entrance and the flowers Lennie had installed earlier.

It looked incredible.

So I grabbed Julia and Kaden.

We made a couple of photographs and sent them back inside.

Those turned out to be some of my favourite portraits I’d taken all year.

That’s another reason I don’t particularly believe in scheduling enormous portrait sessions.

I’d rather take ten minutes when we need it and then remain open to what the day gives us.

Sometimes Ireland gives you rain.

Sometimes it gives you ridiculous sunshine and a floral installation at the front of Luttrellstown Castle.

You take your chances.

Dinner, Confetti and No First Dance

The speeches were spread throughout dinner, which kept everything moving nicely.

Then Julia disappeared and changed into a shorter second dress while we prepared for one of the more ambitious photographs she’d wanted.

Remember that enormous floral installation on the staircase?

The plan was to bring everybody into the inner hall, get some guests onto the staircase, bring Julia and Kaden down, cut the cake and fire confetti into the whole thing.

There are certain photographs where you’re never entirely sure what’s going to happen until it happens.

Thankfully, this one worked.

Afterwards, there wasn’t actually a traditional first dance.

Instead, Julia had planned a surprise, rehearsed dance with her dad.

It brought the house down.

Kaden and Julia eventually ended up dancing together anyway, which gave me the final piece I wanted for their story.

Then the dance floor filled.

And stayed filled.

Suitcase Trio were superb, and by that stage there wasn’t much left for anybody to do other than have a very good time.

What Does a Luttrellstown Castle Wedding Actually Feel Like?

I suppose that’s the question I’d want to answer if I were sitting in America considering bringing my family and friends to Ireland.

Yes, Luttrellstown is spectacular.

The photographs will tell you that much.

But I think Julia and Kaden spotted something more important when they first visited it.

For somewhere so grand, it makes things remarkably simple.

Everyone is together.

You can get ready there.

You can have your ceremony there.

You walk outside and have cocktails.

You eat there.

You party there.

And despite feeling like you’ve transported everybody into the Irish countryside, you’re still close to Dublin.

Julia and Kaden had 105 people at their wedding, many of whom had crossed an ocean to be there.

So their priority wasn’t spending their wedding day taking photographs of their wedding.

It was experiencing it.

The photographs came from that.

A few weeks afterwards, Julia told me that friends and family had been complimenting the pictures constantly. She said people had seen photographs she’d posted on Instagram and thought they were looking at something from BRIDES or Vogue Weddings.

Obviously, I’ll take that.

But the comment I liked even more came in the email before that.

They told me we’d helped them stay present.

That’s the bit that matters to me.

Because if you’re bringing the people you love all the way from America to an Irish castle, I think you should probably get to enjoy the party with them.

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