Westminster Boating Base wedding – Anna & James

Reportage wedding photography at the Westminster Boating Base

Last Friday it actually felt like Spring had arrived!  Coverage of Anna & James’s London wedding began in their home in Putney and ended along the river with a wedding reception at the Westminster Boating Base. The ceremony was just around the corner from St Mary’s church next to Putney Bridge. The church has been rebuilt several times over the centuries and has a unique layout – different to the traditional linear nave/aisles/pews configuration seen so often – very nice for photography – access and a bit of light. After the ceremony, the wedding party and guests walked a few yards down to the river Thames to embark on the ‘Golden Sunrise’ at Putney Pier. The reception was held on board as the boat slowly made it’s way up to Westminster, passing in front of the Houses of Parliament and The London Eye.

The boat then returned back upriver to moor at The Westminster Boating Base, where the reception continued and the wedding breakfast/party was held. It was here, after the speeches and just before the first dance, where James seriously ‘raised the bar’ for any future grooms in the room. Accompanied on keyboards by a friend, James, to the surprise of Anna, took up a guitar and sang a brilliant, witty and charming song about his new wife. A show stealer and very difficult to top!

Here a few images from the day, a wedding on the river and at the Westminster Boating Base…

(Plus a ‘it’s a small world/coincidences’ note: Arriving at the house to start the coverage, the door was opened by Anna’s father, Andrew, who immediately said: “I know you!” It turned out he was a former colleague from my days as a photographer at The Times. Furthermore, as the tennis correspondent, my first photograph published in the newspaper was a tennis shot –  easy to remember as the first. I was actually on work experience at the time and uniquely only ‘shadowed’ one of the photographers, as was the norm, a couple of times. Instead, the picture editor sent me out to cover stories on my own. I got about half a dozen images in the paper over the two weeks, after the first week was extended. Including one on the front page. I was told to bring in my portfolio at the end of the time and started working there, as a photojournalist, the following weekend. Small world!)