Christie and Greg came to Iceland with me for a five-day pre-wedding shoot in the winter of 2018. We flew from Gatwick, which is only a couple of hours in the air, and worked our way from Reykjavík along the south coast to the glacier lagoon and the basalt columns at Reynisfjara, finishing at the Blue Lagoon on the way back to the airport.
The headline detail is the dresses. Christie designed all of them herself, a pink one, a blue one, a silver one and a floral one for the road, and Greg wore suits made for him by Reign Suit Co of Alberta. Deep colours against ice, black sand and snow are what make these photographs work, and the two of them had thought about that long before I got there.
Reykjavík and the Sun Voyager
We started in the city. Hallgrímskirkja gives you something tall and grey to stand a pink dress in front of, and the Sun Voyager sculpture on the seafront gives you the sea and the mountains behind it. Both are a short walk from the centre, so they make a good first morning while you get used to the cold and I get used to the light.
If you are flying in from London, plan the Reykjavík photographs for the day you land or the day you leave. It saves driving back into the city in the middle of the trip.
Sunrise on the south coast
In winter the sun comes up late and stays low, so a sunrise shoot does not mean an early alarm. We stopped on the rocks above the coast as the sky went orange, with Christie in the silver dress, then on an empty road through the lava fields with nothing coming in either direction.
The road photographs are the ones couples ask me about most. There is no trick to them. Iceland has long, straight roads and very few cars on them in winter. You stand in the middle, I stand further back, and someone keeps an eye out behind me.
Jökulsárlón glacier lagoon
Jökulsárlón is the glacier lagoon in the south east, where icebergs break off the glacier and drift towards the sea. Across the road is Diamond Beach, a black-sand beach covered in pieces of ice that have been washed out and polished by the waves before coming back ashore. It is the location I would build an Iceland trip around.
Christie wore the blue dress on the ice and the pink one on the shore. The blue is the one everybody remembers, and it is a good example of why I ask couples to bring one strong colour to a place like this. White disappears against ice. Blue does not.
The Blue Lagoon
We finished at the Blue Lagoon, which is close to the airport and makes a sensible last stop. The steam coming off the water in the cold gives you a soft, pale backdrop that looks nothing like the rest of the trip. One frame on the jetty in the pink dress was all we needed.
Five days of travelling, eating, photographing and laughing. We came home with two new friends, and Christie and Greg liked the photographs enough to book me again for a pre-wedding shoot in Antelope Canyon, Arizona. There are more pictures from the trip in the second Iceland post, along with some notes on shooting the Nikon Z7 in the cold.
An earlier winter trip along the south coast
A few photographs from another winter shoot in Iceland, because they show what the ice caves are like. A monster truck on studded tyres took us out to the ice cave at Vatnajökull, which only exists from roughly November to March and only with a licensed guide. Then it was back to Jökulsárlón to shoot on the ice at the edge of the lagoon while the light lasted, a beach at sunset that was well below zero, and Skógafoss the next day.
The ice caves are the one thing you cannot arrange on the day. If you want them, book the guided tour early and allow a spare day for the weather.
Christie and Greg
Thank you both for five days I still talk about, and for the dresses, which did half of my job for me. Antelope Canyon was the right choice for the next one.
Getting married abroad?
I photograph pre-wedding shoots abroad from London. An Iceland pre-wedding shoot is £2,995 plus travel at cost, with your gallery within a week. Iceland is about three hours from London, winter gives you snow, low light and the ice caves, and summer gives you almost no darkness at all. Send me roughly when you are thinking of and I will tell you what that season looks like and whether I am free.
Related: destination wedding photographer, pre wedding photography London and more from Christie and Greg in Iceland.
More shoots and weddings abroad
If you are planning a shoot or a wedding abroad, the destination wedding photographer page has prices, how it works and the places I have photographed.
Pedro & YiA terrace ceremony and portraits above the clouds at a palace near Lisbon.
Jayssen & KarunaA garden ceremony at Villa Eva and portraits on the Terrace of Infinity.
Post-wedding shootA post-wedding shoot in Paris in the wedding dress.
Layla & RichardThe Plaza, a first look in Central Park and a black-tie wedding on East 91st Street.
