Super excited to bring you another fantastic and super informative article by our guest, Shuhrat of Life and Light Photography! She is bringing all of the most important tips for you to plan the best destination wedding with ease! Hope you enjoy and share with friends!

HOW TO PLAN FOR THE BEST DESTINATION WEDDING

Planning a destination wedding can be an exciting and romantic way to start your journey together as a couple. However, it also requires a lot of coordination and attention to detail to ensure that everything goes smoothly. In this blog, we'll guide you through the steps you need to take to plan a successful and unforgettable destination wedding.

Step 1: Choose the Perfect Destination

The first step in planning a destination wedding is to choose the perfect location. Consider the climate, the availability of venues, the travel time, and the local laws and regulations. You should also think about the type of wedding you want to have and what kind of scenery and activities would best complement your vision.

Choosing the perfect destination for a destination wedding can be a fun and exciting process, but it can also be overwhelming with so many options available. Here are some key factors to consider when choosing the perfect destination for your wedding:

Climate: The weather can make or break your wedding day, so it's important to choose a destination that has a climate that suits your preferences. For example, if you want to get married in the summer, consider a destination with a cooler climate to avoid excessive heat.

Make sure to check the local weather seasons, for example in Puerto Vallarta rainy season starts in June and goes until about the end of August. This can be a factor in deciding the time of year in which you’ll get married. Of course, better weather means you’ll have to book your date ahead of time as it tends to get booked out.

Accessibility: Choose a destination that is easily accessible for you and your guests. Consider the availability of direct flights, transportation options, and the distance to the airport from the wedding venue.

Legal Requirements: Every destination has its own set of legal requirements for getting married, so make sure to research and understand the process for obtaining a marriage license and any other legal requirements.

Venue options: Consider the type of wedding venue that you want, whether it's a beach, a vineyard, a garden, or a mountain resort. Choose a destination that offers plenty of options for the kind of venue that you want

Local Culture: If you want to add a unique cultural element to your wedding, choose a destination that offers a rich cultural experience. This could include incorporating local cuisine, music, and traditions into your wedding celebrations.

Budget: The cost of a destination wedding can vary greatly depending on the location, so it's important to choose a destination that fits within your budget. Keep in mind that the cost of travel and accommodations for you and your guests will be a significant factor in the total cost.

Guest accommodations: Consider the availability of accommodations for your guests, including hotels, resorts, and vacation rentals. It's important to choose a destination that offers a variety of options to suit different budgets and preferences.

Step 2: Determine Your Budget

Once you have chosen the location, you need to determine your budget. This will help you to decide on the size of your wedding, the venue, and other wedding essentials like catering, photography, and music. It's important to be realistic about your budget and to factor in any unexpected expenses that may arise.

Step 3: Hire a Wedding Planner

Hiring a wedding planner who specializes in destination weddings is highly recommended. A wedding planner will be able to handle all the details for you, from finding the right venue and vendors to coordinating travel arrangements for your guests. They will also help you to stay within your budget and will provide you with peace of mind throughout the planning process.

Step 4: Choose Your Wedding Date

Choosing the right date for your wedding is essential, as it will affect the availability of venues and vendors, as well as the cost of travel and accommodations for your guests. You should also consider the climate and weather patterns of your destination when selecting your wedding date.

Step 5: Book Your Venue and Vendors

After you have chosen your destination and wedding date, you should start booking your venue and vendors. You should do this as early as possible to ensure that you get the locations and services you want. Your wedding planner can help you to find the best vendors in the area, including catering, photography, music, and more.

Planning a destination wedding can be a unique challenge, especially when it comes to finding vendors in an unfamiliar location. Here are some tips to help you find the right vendors for your destination wedding:

Ask Your Wedding Planner: Your wedding planner can be an invaluable resource when it comes to finding vendors for your destination wedding. They will have local connections and can recommend trusted vendors that they have worked with in the past.

Search Online: The internet is a great tool for researching vendors in a specific destination. Look for wedding vendor directories, social media pages, and wedding blogs that feature vendors in the location of your wedding.

Check Reviews: Once you have found potential vendors, make sure to check their reviews from past clients. Websites like Yelp, WeddingWire, and The Knot offer reviews and ratings of vendors from real brides and grooms.

Attend Local Bridal Shows: Attending a local bridal show in your destination can be a great way to meet vendors in person and get a feel for their style and services.

Ask For Referrals: If you have friends or family who have gotten married in the same location, ask them for vendor recommendations. They may be able to provide insight and tips based on their own experience.

Visit the Destination: If possible, visit the destination ahead of time to meet with vendors in person and see their work first-hand. This can help you to feel more confident in your choices and ensure that your wedding day runs smoothly.

Ask Your Venue: The wedding venue may have a list of preferred vendors that they work with regularly. This can be a great starting point for finding vendors that are familiar with the venue and can provide excellent service.

Step 6: Send Out Invitations and Manage Travel Arrangements

Once your venue and vendors are secured, it's time to send out invitations and manage travel arrangements for your guests.

You should provide them with detailed information about travel, accommodations, and the wedding schedule. You should also consider organizing activities and events for your guests to enjoy during their stay.

Step 7: Finalize the Details

As the wedding date approaches, it's important to finalize all the details with your wedding planner, vendors, and venue. You should do a final walkthrough of the venue and make sure that all the details are in place, including decorations, seating arrangements, and any other last-minute changes.

Step 8: Enjoy Your Wedding

Finally, it's time to enjoy your wedding day! Take a deep breath and enjoy the moment. With all the planning and preparation, your big day will be a memorable and joyous occasion that you will cherish for years to come.

Planning a destination wedding can be a wonderful way to start your new life together. By following these steps and working with an experienced wedding planner, you can create a magical and unforgettable experience that you and your guests will cherish forever.

Let us know if you liked these tips! As always, share with a friend who’s thinking of having a destination wedding!

Yellows, whites, blues, and greys match really well together.

This is probably the most asked question I get when planning photo sessions. Rightly so! You’re packing for your trip, you want to make sure you bring what you need, I get it!

So here are a few suggestions with examples of what you can wear to make your session yours.

WEAR OUTFITS THAT CAN ALSO DOUBLE AS VACATION OUTFITS

The last thing you want to do is bring EXTRA luggage. I would suggest you bring outfits that work with your vacation wardrobe as well as for our session.

When we’re out on the beach, keeping it light usually helps. So any sundress, shorts, or button-up, etc will work for your session as well as lounging by the pool or a day trip in town.

This is not to say you shouldn’t or can’t bring something just for your session, I’m all for it! I’m just saying that you don’t have to either ;).

SAY NO TO SHOES

Unless we’re going to be walking around exploring the city, I would suggest you bring your comfiest sandals. We’ll most likely take them off once we hit the sand anyway.

I understand too that some people might have aversions to the sand and THAT IS OKAY! Whatever makes you feel the most comfortable during your session the better. If that’s the case, make sure your sandal is a bit more polished than say a flipflop.

COLOR SCHEMES OR MATCHY-MATCHY

I prefer that you coordinate color schemes. Warm blues with mixed grey, reds, beige, and black for example. Pastels work great against the blue of the ocean and sky.

If you can coordinate your family with colors rather than a set outfit, you’ll look more put together as different jeans have different washes.

However, being matchy also works if that’s the look you want! Again these are YOUR PHOTOS and I want you to have exactly what you’re looking for so if matching outfits is what you’d like, then I’m all in!

When it comes to bigger families, I would suggest you coordinate within individual families and then as a whole group. This way each family can stand out but also be a part of the whole group.

I wrote a more in-depth post on multi-family sessions and you can read those tips here.

IN THE END, EVERYTHING LOOKS GREAT

At the end of the day, everything tends to look pretty great against the beautiful background of Puerto Vallarta!

I would say don’t worry about it too much as long as you’ve followed these tips and feel comfortable in what you’re wearing.

If you are going for multiple outfits, please let me know so we can time the session accordingly. We’ll need more time for you to change outfits and coordinate which will look best at what time.

Other than that I hope this article helped you get a better idea of what to wear!

If you need more examples, I suggest that you head to my Instagram and check out my client’s photos and outfits. It’ll give you a better idea of what you’d like to wear and how it all looks put together.

I love it when families coordinate colors/styles in their wardrobe! It can be hard to think of what to wear for a session while on vacation. My best recommendation is that you take something you can wear for the session as well as by the pool or on a night out.

I also recommend that you book your session two to three days into your vacation so you’re not so sunkissed and this way you can wear the outfit for the rest of the vacation in stead of trying to keep it clean the whole time.

This family was so fun, thank you so much for having me! The Hyatt Ziva is also a very beautiful location for portraits.

Most of the Nuevo Vallarta resorts have strict policies on letting outside vendors in, and so we have a couple of options when it comes to this issue.

One, we can meet beachside of your resort OR we can meet somewhere that offers a little color, vibrancy, and also beach access - the Nuevo Vallarta Marina!

It’s about 10 minutes by taxi from pretty much any resort in the Nuevo area. It has a cute sign, cute shops, color, a little greeny, boats, and also beach access close by. It’s a great mix of all good things.

It’s perfect for families because kids can explore and run and get their wiggles out before heading down to the beach. It’s safe and away from the main road as well.

The Vanstone family and I had such a great time during our session! It was the perfect spot for the portrait session.

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So your WHOLE family is going on vacation and of course it’s the ultimate perfect moment to have portraits taken.

But how does it work?!

Let me tell you that after 15 years as a pro photographer, multi-family sessions are still my favorite! Mostly because it’s so fun to see big families enjoying the sun and surf and also make time for a quick session.

Here are some tips to help it all go smoothly on the day of our session!

TIP 1

Dress in similar colors but not too matchy-matchy. Each smaller family can coordinate further but it’s good to have a color scheme that everyone can wear so that it looks cohesive and coordinated while still giving each family the opportunity to shine.

TIP 2

We’ll get the big group first and from there break up into smaller families. It’s also fantastic if one person can help with coordinating which family is next as well as any variations you’d like. I don’t know your family the way you do so if there’s an aunt you want a photo with or a variation of grandparents with grandchildren, etc, please let me know!

I do not mind taking more photos and getting all of your loved ones photographed in all of the variations possible, I’m here to serve you and these are YOUR photos, so let’s do it all!

TIP 3

Choose one location first and then after we get all the main photos out of the way we can try another. So for example, this family was at a Villa and so we chose this beautiful lush green wall for all of the portraits.

We did have the option of heading down to the beach but they opted not to. Some families like to have a combo and some families are fine with one location.

So just keep in mind if you’d like to change the background, we’ll probably end up doing the second location after we get everyone at the first location.

Uff, I hope that wasn’t confusing!

There you have it! Those are my main tips! For large families, we often won’t get too many candid photos given that we gotta work quickly before we start losing people, 😅.

With kids, it’s difficult to know how they’ll react to a stranger with a camera 🙈 It can go any which way and this is why I super recommend letting them play and getting to know me. Or rather, used to me lol.

It’s much easier to go with the flow and let them play. Plus, images like these are just GOLD! ✨

There is something special about taking one last trip before the baby arrives to disconnect and reconnct with your partner. Also, best location for your maternity photos - but I might be biased!

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Stella scheduled a portrait session for her mama and I was loving both of their styles so of course we had a full on session with both ladies!

Walking around and chatting about the town, where people are visiting from, what they like about Mexico I love it all!

Also finding little spots with color and that iconic Mexican charm is the best!

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I LOVE photographing large multi-family sessions! I have such a great time and here are a few tips to help you have the best session possible!

Tip 1: It can be a little stressful gathering everyone especially little ones. It’s good to have eaten before hand or have snacks and drinks available during the session.

Tip 2: Let me do the wrangling and posing to keep it flowing quickly as sometimes the kids can get restlses waiting their turn. This way I can work quickly and easily if I’m the only one directing.

Tip 3: We’ll start with the whole family and then quickly go through each family to make sure we get that ONE group photo while the children are less tired of me lol.

If you’re interested in a multi family session, please let me know! I have special pricing just for you!

Quick session with the Molina family! Here is what Lynnea had to say about the photos:

I LOVE our photos! Thanks so much for doing these for us. It's always kind of scary choosing a photographer with no personal recommendations to photograph your family (especially in such a special place!) but you really came through! I don't think I could be happier.

It’s always a joy when my clients LOVE their photos and trust in me even from far away! The session was absolutely fun and I enjoyed playing with this family!

The ocean was really showing off this day too!

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