We traveled up to NYC for Emily & Brad’s Manhattan engagement session. They live in Manhattan and are both veterinarians, two people who spend their days caring for animals and their evenings looking out over one of the most dramatic skylines in the world. Emily & Brad have an affinity for their little dog Pippa, and of course Pippa came along. We started their session around their apartment and walked down to Riverside Park on the Hudson River. The light in the park shifts beautifully in the colder months, and the covered walkway with string lights overhead gave us a setting that felt pulled from a different century. We finished the night on their rooftop deck with the city spread out below us, low clouds catching the glow of Manhattan at night. They had an amazing summer wedding at Rehoboth Beach Country Club that I can’t wait to share. You can view our last published wedding at the Rehoboth Beach Country Club here. We were hoping to get Emily & Brad’s wedding published in The Knot Magazine, following our last Rehoboth Beach feature.
Riverside Park stretches four miles along the Hudson River on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, a green corridor carved out in the 1870s by Frederick Law Olmsted, the same landscape architect behind Central Park. The park mixes wooded paths, Hudson River overlooks, and a marina that transforms completely with each season. In winter, the bare trees open up dramatic sightlines across the water to the Palisades in New Jersey, and the covered promenade near 79th Street shelters couples from the wind. It is one of those rare New York spots where the city feels genuinely quiet. For engagement sessions, the mix of organic textures, string lights under the sheltered walkways, and the river as a natural backdrop creates photographs that feel cinematic without being staged.
Engagement Photos at Riverside Park by the Hudson
The Riverside Park is amazing! There are incredible views of the Hudson River as well as parks and beautiful landscaping everywhere. There were still a ton of trees that had fall colored leaves on it even though it was pretty late into the season. It was a rainy cold winter day but they were in great spirits. We found this covered area that was stunning with string lights the blanketed the ceiling above. I climbed up on this bar to get a couple unique angles looking down at Emily & Brad.
The rooftop views from their apartment building at night were surreal with the low lying clouds and mist from them. It was pretty freezing at this point so we did not stay very long on the rooftop and I did not have a tripod so I was either handholding or resting my camera on a table and using a timer because it was so dark. I think if I lived there I would visit their rooftop pretty much everyday!
Emily and Brad went on to get married at a beautiful Delaware beach venue. If you are planning a beach or shore celebration, take a look at our guide to Jersey Shore wedding venues for inspiration on locations, vendors, and what to expect from a coastal wedding day.