I DO AT 180 METRES OVER LONDON
GHERKIN WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHER
It’s not the tallest at 41 floors, but reaching up majestically through an urban business district cityscape, The Gherkin as a wedding venue in London is, I am sure, one of those bucket list ticks for a wedding photographer. The conically converging glass across the two event spaces at the summit provides a style and quality of light unmatched by pretty much everything else I have encountered as a wedding photographer across the two decades I have shot these unique days. Sure, if the sun geographically dips low in the sky, you can encounter some interesting exposure problems to solve, but that in itself is equally a further delight about photographing this location, as you find yourself playing shadow games.
So, what The Gherkin may lack in manicured lawns and mature landscaping (even Capability Brown would have struggled here,) it makes up for with a myriad of photographic gifts, not least the incredible views of what I still believe to be one of the most stunning historic capitals in the world. Besides, just a stone’s throw from the entry doors back down on terra firma, as you’ll see from the collection below, there’s scope to make some more traditionally styled pictures, if as a wedding photographer, formal portraits are a part of your act. I’m a hybrid in that respect. Congratulations Robin, Rebecca. It was a pleasure to be there for you both right to the very end, when the shoes came off and the real dancing happened.
“Walk the spiral up out of the pavement into your own reflection, into transparency, into the space where flat planes are curves and you are transposed as you go higher into a thought of flying, joining the game of brilliance and scattering where fragments of poems, words, names fall like glory into the lightwells until St Mary Axe is burning.” Jo Shapcott’s ‘Gherkin Music’, a Poem on the Underground.
