Chico Wedding Photography: Gina and Brian – Sierra Nevada Brewery

Gina and Brian met purely by chance at the Great American Beer Festival in Denver. Gina was on Sierra Nevada’s beer bike during that fated moment. When the guy running it called out for everyone on the bike to shout “Chico,” Gina, like any good Chico girl or boy, shouted, “I’m from Chico!” Brian heard her and kicked the other guy off the bike so he could talk to her. Based on the number of stories we heard at their wedding about Brian telling everyone about the amazing girl he met, it’s pretty obvious that they hit it off immediately.

Gina got ready at Platinum Salon and the Residence Inn (a.k.a. “The Resi” as all of Dusty’s old consulting friends used to call it since they stayed there so much). It’s always fun to watch the process of getting a bride into her dress. Gina’s friend Amanda laced it up faster than anyone we’ve ever seen!

The ceremony and reception were at Sierra Nevada Brewery, but Gina and Brian wanted some outdoor shots, too. We headed out to Bidwell Park for some gorgeous photos in the sun and the trees. We also loved the conveniently placed wood fence!

Gina’s sister, Amy, was all about her maid-of-honor duty to carry Gina’s dress:

Brian chose a black vest to go with his tux, and it looked really sharp.

The lighting for the ceremony and reception at the Big Room made for such great colors in the background of our shots!

It was dark after the ceremony, so Brian led us all throughout the brewery to some of their favorite spots.

In honor of the day they met, Gina and Brian named their wedding beer Love at First Bike. (Here’s the link to their engagement session in case you missed them making it!)

Special thanks to all the vendors that helped make the day great!
Venue and Catering: The Sierra Nevada Big Room
Makeup Artist: Jen Siqueiros
Hair: Platinum Salon
DJ: Platinum Productions
Florist: Cambray Rose Florist
Cake: Upper Crust

The Knot Best of Weddings 2012 Pick!

Chico Wedding Photography: Lovely Layers Cakery

We love Lovely Layers Cakery, so we were really excited when Emily wanted to go out and do some unique shots of her cakes! Our antique chairs went perfectly with some of them, so we loaded them up basically made a little portrait session of it. It was sort of like doing an engagement session and family session minus the engagement, minus the family, and plus cakes! We kept joking about how her cakes were like their own little families. We had the country vintage family portraits and the elegant, classy family portraits!

Los Gatos Wedding Photography: LeighAnne and Manoj – Nestldown

We started off the day with LeighAnne and Manoj at the Hotel Los Gatos where LeighAnne had her hair and makeup done, then headed up the hill to Nestldown. Nestldown is so beautiful, and it’s like its own little wedding world! There are so many photo spots there that we could literally shoot for hours on end and still have new places to work with. The reception was in the barn in the center of the property. “Barn” doesn’t even come close to doing the best job of describing how beautiful the reception area is.

Calistoga Engagement Photography: Ashley and Gary – Castella di Amarosa

If you haven’t been to Castella di Amarosa, you should definitely go just to see it. It’s owned by the same people as V. Sattui (where Dusty and I got married), and it about as close as you can get to being at a European castle as you can get without going to Europe. Ashley and Gary love the setting there as much as we do, so we met up with them for their engagement session while they were in town visiting family. We love shooting with stonework as a backdrop (there was no shortage of that at the castle) so we pretty much just got to move Ashley and Gary from point to point and let them be adorable together!