Do not sleep on a fall wedding at the beach.

Marissa and Matthew got one of the nicest days of the whole year. Clear, bright, warm enough to stand on open sand in November and not think about it once. The kind of day people assume you can only get in June.

They were married on the sand at ICONA Avalon, in front of a timber arch made for the day, with the ocean breaking directly behind it. If you are working out whether a beach ceremony is possible on your own date, I wrote a full ICONA Avalon wedding guide that covers the beach, the timing and the rain plan.

Morning in Avalon

Matthew got ready first, and that room stayed loose the whole morning. There is a frame of him and his dad mid laugh, both already in their boutonnieres, that tells you most of what you need to know about how it went.

Marissa’s morning was the loud one. Her bridesmaids opened a bottle in the room and the frame of that pop is one of my favorites of the morning, six people mid reaction and nobody looking at the camera.

Her mom ran that room. She was in it the whole way, helping with the dress, keeping the timeline honest, doing the thing that most of the day depends on and that almost never gets photographed. She is in a lot of these on purpose.

Aerial view straight down on the surf line in Avalon, New Jersey, green water breaking into pale sand

Aerial view of Avalon, New Jersey, showing the ICONA Avalon resort, the dune line and the open beach on a clear November morning

The groom pins an orange rose boutonniere to his tuxedo jacket, photographed in black and white

Black and white portrait of the groom seated in his tuxedo and bow tie with a rose boutonniere

The groom laughs with an older man in a grey suit and burnt orange tie, both wearing orange rose boutonnieres

The bride opens a bottle of champagne in the getting ready suite while her bridesmaids cheer, in black and white

A white hanger lettered Bride holds the wedding gown while an attendant in a green gown helps the bride get ready

An attendant fastens the back of the bride's lace gown, her dark hair falling across the open back

The bride fastens the ankle strap of a white pointed heel with her lace train pooled on the floor beside her

Before the First Look

Marissa did her first reveal with her dad, on the staircase.

There is a staircase right off the bridal suite with a big sailboat painting on the landing. He waited at the bottom of it. She came down, and the whole family lined the railing above to watch, from the top of the stairs all the way down.

That is the moment of the morning. There is a version of this where everyone crowds into a hotel room and it is fine. The staircase gave it a shape. Her dad alone at the bottom, everybody else looking down over the rail, and a walk long enough that you actually feel it land.

Seen from the landing above, the bride embraces a man in a dark suit at the foot of the white staircase at ICONA Avalon

Bridesmaids in orange and green look down from a balcony railing as the bride meets a man in a dark suit in the lobby below

The bride holds her coral, peach and white bouquet in front of the large sailboat painting at ICONA Avalon

The First Look on the Dune Path

The second first look was on the sand dune, on the path heading out to the beach.

The frame I keep going back to is the one just before it. Matthew standing with his back turned, and he takes this long deep breath, the kind you take when you have been thinking about a minute for a year. Then she comes up behind him.

The bride walks up behind the groom for their first look, holding her dress and her bouquet, with him out of focus in the foreground

The groom waits with his back turned while the bride comes up behind him, out of focus in the distance

The bride laughs as the groom turns to see her for the first time in the afternoon sun

The groom turns to see the bride on the sand path between split rail fences, dune grass and beach behind them

The Wedding Party on the Beach

Their color was burnt orange. The bridesmaids were in it, with champagne wraps over the top, and the bouquets picked it up in orange and peach and white against a bare November beach.

We worked the wedding party on the sand and then out on the dune. The groomsmen frames are the ones I would show you first, all five of them walking into a low sun on white sand with the shadows running twenty feet out behind them.

Then a dolphin came through.

Right off the beach, porpoising, close enough that the whole wedding party stopped and looked. I turned around and photographed it because nobody was going to believe it otherwise. That frame is in here.

Family formals happened inside, next to the sailboat painting. Some of these groups were big and that room is not enormous, but it fits more than it looks like it will, and the painting gives you a background that is not a hotel wall.

The full wedding party walks the Avalon beach together, bridesmaids in burnt orange and champagne, groomsmen in navy, a lifeguard stand up in the dunes behind them

Five groomsmen stand on the open beach in black and white, their shadows stretching far across the sand

The groomsmen break into a kick line on the empty beach, photographed in black and white

The bride and her bridesmaids turn to look back over their shoulders at the water's edge, burnt orange gowns against blue ocean

The bride and groom walk hand in hand down the wide open beach under a clear blue November sky

The couple walk toward the surf and the bride turns to look back, her veil and lace train trailing on the sand

The bride and groom stand nose to nose at the water's edge with her orange and ivory bouquet between them

Black and white silhouette of the bride and groom walking hand in hand across bright open sand

A dolphin fin breaks the surface just beyond the Avalon shore break, seen from the beach

The bride and groom smile together in the dune grass, her veil lit from behind by the low afternoon sun

The bride in the dune grass with her lace train spread out behind her and white sneakers showing under the hem

Both families gathered for a group portrait in the ICONA Avalon lobby in front of the sailboat mural

A Beach Ceremony at ICONA Avalon

The ceremony was on open sand.

A bare timber arch, custom made, dressed on two corners with palm fronds and orange and white florals. White folding chairs straight on the beach, a bamboo runner laid over the sand for the aisle, and the Atlantic breaking directly behind the arch the entire time.

Here is the honest version of a November beach ceremony. It was warm through the wedding party portraits and then the sun dropped behind the dunes during the ceremony itself and the air changed inside about ten minutes. You can see it in the frames. Guests are in coats and nobody minds, because the light that comes with it is the trade you are making. That low sun coming across the sand behind the guests is not something an August ceremony can give you.

The other thing a late date buys you is the beach itself. There is nobody on it. No umbrellas in your background, no crowd behind the arch, no walkers cutting the aisle. In August you are sharing that sand with a few hundred people.

The bare timber ceremony arch standing on the sand, dressed with palm fronds and orange and white florals, with a bamboo aisle runner leading up to it

The groom waits at the front of the beach aisle with his groomsmen behind him and the arch florals at the edge of the frame

The groom watches the bride arrive at the arch while the officiant reads from a folder, guests standing on the sand behind them

Guests seated in white folding chairs on the sand in coats and wraps, the low sun coming over the dunes behind them

Wide view of the beach ceremony at ICONA Avalon, the couple at the timber arch with open ocean and breaking surf directly behind them

The bride and groom kiss beneath the palm and orange floral arch with the ocean behind them, guests watching from both sides of the bamboo aisle

The groom throws a fist in the air as the couple turn to face their guests after the pronouncement at the beach arch

Twenty Five Minutes to Sunset

Right after the vows I asked for five minutes.

Sunset was at ten to five, so this was the last of the light and there was not going to be more of it. Not fifteen minutes. Five, before they went in for cocktail hour, because the sky was doing something and it was not going to keep doing it. Some of the best photographs of the entire day came out of those five minutes.

The sky went to cotton candy. Pink and lavender and blue all at once, and the wet sand took the whole thing as a reflection, so there are two skies in some of these.

She swapped into white sneakers and they ran the surf line. They met playing flag football, so of course it turned into football poses, him throwing a stiff arm at her down the beach in a tuxedo. Those are the frames they will still have on the wall in thirty years, and they cost five minutes.

If you take one planning idea off this page, take that one. Ask your photographer to steal you for five minutes right after the ceremony. Not a long portrait session, five minutes. Cocktail hour will survive it.

The bride looks back over her bare lace shoulder as she and the groom walk the wind rippled sand after the ceremony

The bride and groom face each other on the empty beach under a pink and lavender sunset sky

The couple walk the wet reflective sand at the surf line, the bride holding her dress up clear of her white sneakers

Black and white frame of the bride running along the surf line in white sneakers while the groom reaches out for her

The bride and groom run together down the beach in black and white under heavy sunset cloud

The Reception

They came into the reception throwing beer koozies.

That was Marissa’s idea, mentioned almost as an afterthought on her questionnaire, and it is exactly the sort of thing that makes an entrance theirs instead of generic. First dance under the chandelier, then the floor filled and the glow sticks came out.

Late in the night we stepped back outside. There is a lit pathway between the rooms, right by the pool, strung the whole way with lights, and it makes a completely different photograph from anything else on the property. That is the thing about ICONA Avalon. There are so many nooks and crannies there that work, and none of them are more than a two minute walk from the party.

The bride and groom enter the reception with their hands raised, each holding a drink koozie

The first dance in black and white, the couple alone on the floor under a candle chandelier while guests watch from the tables

The groom lifts the bride for a kiss on a walkway strung with lights outside the resort at night, in black and white

The bride laughs as the groom spins her off her feet on the lit walkway, photographed in black and white at night

The bride dances with her bridesmaids on a dark floor with glow sticks streaking through the frame

Planning a Beach Ceremony at ICONA Avalon

If you are weighing a beach ceremony here, especially off season, the short version is that it works and the light is better than the summer version of the same day.

What you are actually planning around is the sun, not the temperature. Sunset moves early in November, so the ceremony start time drives everything, and your portrait window sits after the vows rather than before them. Build the day backward from sunset and you get a beach with nobody on it, low gold light across the sand, and a sky at the end that you cannot book in July.

Bring a coat for the ceremony and a pair of sneakers for after. That is most of it.

Everything else about the venue, the ceremony options and the timing sits in the full ICONA Avalon wedding guide.

The Team

Venue: ICONA Avalon, Avalon, New Jersey
Photography and cinema: Jordan Brian Studios
Florals: Marie’s Floral Shoppe
Hair: Say I Do Hair
Makeup: Makeup by Michele Eva
Cake: The Bake Works
DJ: Chris Camp, Limelight Entertainment
Gown: Allure Bridals, from Castle Couture
Bridesmaid dresses: David’s Bridal
Tuxedos: Biltmore Tuxedos

Ready to Start Planning?

Tell me about the day you are planning and where you want to be photographed, and I will take it from there. Start here.

A Beach Ceremony at ICONA Avalon: Marissa and Matthew