Chippenham Park Wedding
Emily & Josh
A Wedding in the Formal Gardens
The gap in the hedge, a gasp from the garden, and a first dance in dog masks.
I'd already spent an afternoon with Emily and Josh at Brandon Park, their two dogs running ahead of us through the trees, before their wedding at Chippenham Park in September 2024. Some of that same ease turned up again on the day itself, just with better outfits.
They married in the Formal Gardens, closed in by hedges so old and so precisely kept that they gave real shelter from the breeze. It is one of three ceremony spots at Chippenham Park, and on a day like this one, easily the right choice.
Through the Hedge
Emily walked through a gap in the hedge with the house behind her, and the whole garden gasped, quietly, all at once.
"Josh's face when Emily came through that gap in the hedge. That's the frame I'd keep from the entire day."
Juan
Portraits, Mostly Left Alone
This session gave me one of my all time favourite images from any wedding. Emily and Josh just walked together and talked, and I gave them almost nothing to do. They looked happy and natural enough that I didn't want to interrupt them.
The Reception
The speeches were properly good, the kind that actually land rather than just fill time before the cake.
Chippenham Park doesn't allow dogs at the venue, so Emily and Josh brought theirs a different way. After an epic first dance, they pulled out two oversized cut-out masks with their dogs' faces on them and danced the rest of the night wearing them.
The Formal Gardens
Ancient hedges, closely kept, framing the ceremony from every angle.
Into the Evening
Fairy lights and a marquee, and by the end of the night, two very good dogs watching from a couple of cardboard masks.
This day was also beautifully captured on film by Ed Bray, a videographer I get to work with often and always look forward to sharing a day with.
Emily and Josh's wedding is exactly why I keep coming back to Chippenham Park. Fifteen years in, it still finds new ways to surprise me.
Your wedding.
Your story.
Two ways to tell it, both documentary at the core. See which one is yours.
Explore The Two Approaches