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Mountains! Forests! Caves! Dragons! Goats!

And the most important thing: a happy couple in love.

From my very first lengthy and chatty phone call with Ngan, in response to her enquiry email, I knew this was a wedding that I wanted to photograph. I book most of my couples without meeting up first and I’m used to getting right into the swing of things on the wedding day itself, so it’s such a good thing when you can click so well and have such a cool connection right away.

John and Ngan were married at the Juniper Hotel in Banff, which is a stylish, modern-rustic venue away from the main town. The place has an eco-friendly focus and is entirely wind-powered, which is pretty cool. Ngan and John were ably assisted in many things throughout their day by wedding planner Sonia and her assistant from Cornerstone Events. They did a fantastically amazing job and I highly recommend them.

The first event of the day was John and Ngan’s Vietnamese tea ceremony. We’ve photographed a number of Asian tea ceremonies (Vietnamese, Chinese, Cambodian, etc.) and they have to be some of the most challenging things we photograph. So much happens so fast! And it’s all important! Lol! If you’ve never seen one, imagine a western ceremony where the first kiss happens in the blink of an eye every few seconds for half an hour and that will give you some idea of the timing of it all. Of course, there aren’t actual kisses happening constantly in the tea ceremony; they exchange gifts and greetings and have other traditions.

At the end of their tea ceremony they had a surprise for their guests: traditional dragon dancers! That was so cool! There were eight of them and there was so much sound, colour and energy in the dancing! Then John and Ngan snuck off with us for some quick portraits in their traditional Vietnamese dress.

Their western wedding ceremony was outside on the Juniper’s terrace area and, although the weather had been threatening snow, the sun popped out just for their wedding. After that we visited a few locations around Banff for their portraits. They were so easy to take photos of. In fact, their whole wedding party was very easy-going. And John has to be one of the smiliest grooms we’ve ever seen! He basically didn’t stop smiling all day!

Their reception was full of laughs and there was a touching moment when Ngan gave a speech to her family in Vietnamese. I have no idea what she said, but there was so much emotion in the room that I nearly cried, too!

Thanks for having us at your wedding. Here are some of your photos.