Why We Choose NOT to Wear All Black for Weddings

We have been asked by several different vendors and other photographers why we don’t wear all black when shooting a wedding. And before I write this post, I’m going to make a disclaimer and say that we do not think it is wrong or bad to wear all black to shoot a wedding. Also, the idea to wear things that make us look more like guests was not our original idea, we didn’t think about this all on our own. There are industry leaders that have been doing this longer than we have and they have shown what they wear and their reasons behind it. As a trusted Wedding Photographer New Jersey couples love working with, we’ve learned that looking approachable and blending in with the guests often helps people feel more comfortable in front of the camera. Now everyone may have different reasons to wear what they do during a wedding but today we are going to share why we decide not to wear all black while shooting weddings.

1. We want to look like guests

And although it may sound weird, we want to look as close to a guest as possible. We want to blend in with everyone else at the wedding as much as possible to call as little attention to ourselves as we can. I do realize that we usually have a giant camera glued to our faces, but we try to be inconspicuous. During our first few weddings I wore pants and a nice blouse, never all black, but I wore pants. I realized soon after that no one wear pants to weddings, so I switched to dresses or skirt/shirt combos. For the ladies reading this, I always wear biker shorts under my dress in case of any mishap and simply to be more comfortable :)

2. We don’t want to look like a vendor

Although we are technically vendors, we don’t want to look like the “typical” vendor. When you go to a wedding and are looking for the vendors, everyone knows to look for the people dressed in black! Now I am NOT saying that wearing black is wrong, this is just our personal opinion, please don’t take this the wrong way! We chose not to wear all black because we feel that we actually stick out more. We also feel (again a personal opinion) that we look more professional wearing things that assimilates that of a guest.

3. It’s way too HOT!

Here in Miami, it gets hot. I mean drenched-in-sweat-after-three-minutes kind of HOT! All. Year. Round. To this day, I have NEVER had to wear a sweater or cardigan when we shoot weddings. Because of the heat and beaming sun, we have opted out of dressing head to toe in black. I think we would have passed out during a few wedding in particular if we wore all black. Everyone knows that black attracts heat, so we definitely want to steer clear of black. Especially for myself as a girl, wearing black pants and a black shirt, while it may make me look slim, isn’t really a great idea!

 We once again want to reiterate that we are not condemning or saying it’s wrong to wear all black if you are a vendor. This is just our personal opinion. We hope this gives some insight on why we do what we do!

Happy Tuesday friends!