I had photographed the Quinn family before this, so Jordan and Chase were not strangers to me when they asked me to come down to Cape May for their engagement session. That changes a shoot more than people expect. Nobody spends the first twenty minutes getting used to the camera.
We were supposed to do it the week before. Chase emailed me the day ahead with the forecast, eighty percent rain, and of course it was the only bad day down there all week. They shuffled some shifts around and we met on a Tuesday instead.
Willow Creek Winery
We started at Willow Creek, off Stevens Street in West Cape May. It is a farm first and a winery second, and that is why it photographs the way it does. Vine rows, a rose garden, barrels stacked out behind the building, a small yellow cottage at the end of a brick path. You can walk fifty feet and be somewhere that looks nothing like where you were standing.
Jordan wore a pink dress. Chase wore a blue shirt, jeans and brown boots. I asked them to run the vine row, which I ask a lot of couples to do, and most of them jog. These two ran.
Late in the day is the whole reason to be there. The sun drops behind the tree line at the back of the property and comes through sideways, and the rose garden goes gold for about twenty minutes. We stayed in it until it was gone.
Chase picked her up on the brick. Then they sat down on the porch steps and she put her hand on his face, laughing at something I never heard, and that one is still my favorite frame from the winery.
The Cape May Point beach I do not usually name
For sunset we drove out to Cape May Point. I have a spot out there I have been using for years and I am quiet about it on purpose. It is not the Cove. The Cove at sunset means parking blocks away, walking in, and then standing with a few hundred other people watching the same sun go down. The one I use is a dune path with a split rail fence and pines along one side, and most evenings you have it.
They changed in the car. Blue dress, white shirt, khaki shorts, nobody in shoes.
They also brought the puppy, who was new enough to still be working out what sand was and had exactly no interest in the plan.
After that it was the two of them and the water. They sat in the dune grass for a while, then went down to the waterline, and then they were in it. Nobody came out dry.
The whale watch boat crossed back in front of the sun on its way home and I turned around for one frame of it before we walked out.
What happened after
A year and a half later Jordan and Chase got married at the Collingswood Grand Ballroom, and I covered the whole day, photographs and video. That is what an engagement session buys you. By the time the wedding came around they had already spent a whole afternoon in front of my camera, so on the day itself nobody was paying attention to it.
If you are planning something down that way, I wrote a full guide to the best spots in Cape May. Another shore session worth a look is Mary and Doug at Barnegat Lighthouse.
Ready to Start Planning?
If you are engaged and thinking about Cape May, or anywhere along the shore, tell me about your date and we will talk it through.
Venue: Willow Creek Winery, West Cape May, New Jersey
Photography and cinematography: Jordan Brian Studios