Li Ward photographer of pets and weddings. Fat Orange Cat Studio is a fresh and candid boutique photography service in Boston, Massachusetts.

My modest little wedding season started off with a huge bang with Lindsey and Wilson’s Wedding Weekend Extravaganza. It was 4 days and nights of playing host to a culinary, seafaring, history-book tour of Boston, and they wanted it all captured on film. They just relocated from my home state of Georgia where Wilson recently received his doctorate in physics, UGA style. I met some Georgians among the guests who were visiting Boston for the first time. I wasn’t able to talk physics, but I was able to talk all things North vs South! What a treat it is to see Boston for the first time in this stylish, classy, and fun manner, thanks to the lovely couple and their families.

Friday evening: Rehearsal Dinner
The weekend kicked off with the Rehearsal Dinner hosted by Wilson’s parents at Mooo Restaurant. Everyone started with drinks and hors d’oeuvres on the roofdeck of the adjacent XV Beacon Hotel before descending downstairs to the restaurant’s private wine cellar for dinner. On the bar were the couple’s rehearsal dinner invitations in the form of wine bottles affixed with a custom label. Swoon. Name cards were professionally calligraphed – you know I love that! – and propped up by wine corks. After her speech, Wilson’s mom pulled out party favors for all the guests – collegiate T-shirts with the name “Lindsey” and “Wilson” printed across the front. Turns out, there is a real Lindsey Wilson College located in Kentucky! And the crowd went wild.

{ Custom wine labels created by Ceci New York }

Saturday Noon: Bridal Luncheon
The next afternoon, while the boys were enjoying a tour of Sam Adams brewery, Lindsey’s bridesmaids threw her and her girlfriends a bridal luncheon at Upstairs on the Square in Harvard Square. More laughing and mimosa and bellini toasts clinking over plates of delicious food. It was at this point I wanted to forget the camera, order my own bellini and be one of the girls.

Saturday Evening: Sunset & Cocktail Cruise
After a quick change and a little up-do, it was time to meet more family and friends for cocktail hour aboard a boat. When I arrived the boat’s bar stock was already running half empty. Do these people know how to do it right or DO THEY KNOW HOW TO DO IT RIGHT? We sailed around Boston Harbor and a little into the Charles River during sunset.

Sunday: THE WEDDING!
Ohhhh the wedding. The wedding! Held in Boston’s historic Old North Church in the North End, followed by the reception at the Lenox Hotel in the Back Bay, this wedding was full of old world class and spared no details. I was secondary shooter, Lisa Rigby was the primary. You can see all the gorgeous details from Lindsey and Wilson’s lavish black-tie wedding here on Lisa’s blog.

Here are some of mine at the Church. I was not as quiet as a church mouse as the sexton instructed me to be (”Once you’re up there, don’t move!” Me: “What! And photograph from the same spot?”). Well he should know – the wood floors complained loudly with every tiptoed step I took! It was like I suddenly weighed four tons and had microphones attached under the soles of my feet, just in case you couldn’t hear me, you all the way in the back. Oh I love old curmudgeonly churches!

{ See more wedding photos here }

Monday: Farewell Brunch
Finally, after 3 days of non-stop partying, it was time to refuel with a hearty brunch at Gaslight Brasserie in the South End, before catching your plane, train or automobile, and heading home…

A pretty amazing weekend for these two newlyweds, wouldn’t you say?
Congratulations to Lindsey & Wilson! It was a pleasure getting to know you and all of your friends and family.

I have a corollary to my last “Things I Like” post back in March, regarding calligraphy. I have been keeping up with it, putting in at least one hour of writing every day – calligraphy is such an easy procrastinating device! – that I have gotten much, much better since my first post. I have miles to go before my hand looks strong and sure, and it will be some time more before I feel like I have my own style, but nevertheless I’m feeling confident enough now to offer my hand-lettering services to couples planning a wedding, without too much fear that anyone will laugh in my face.

In fact I have a few couples for whom I’m slated to do some calligraphy work. Some are couples whose wedding I’m photographing, and some are not! There will be menus to write on chalkboard, dessert cards for dessert tables, and even hand-drawn cat and dog portraitures (more on that later). Really, any little bit of writing makes me SO HAPPY.

I always knew I would love calligraphy, if I would just sit down and do it! Why I never did until now, I’ll never know. Well, I’m off and skipping and hopping down this path now, and I hope to talk about my calligraphy progress some more on this blog, as well as my inspiration, so I hope you don’t mind if the topics diverge occasionally from that of pet photography!

Here are some samples of fictitious addresses that I had a grand time concocting. (Except for Edward Gorey. He’s real and his illustrations are another source of inspiration.) My stock pile of Crane’s stationery is finally being put to good use. And yes, Jane Austen et al. are totally #1 on the list of Things I Like. I kind of localized all the characters. It is not hard to picture Emma Woodhouse as a Connecticut-suburb kind of gal, or that Rochester might be found brooding away in the bayous of Louisiana…

So if you or anyone you know is looking for calligraphy needs, and you don’t think I stink, let me know! My fingers are itching to write.

Sarah Parrott is not the only one who’s counting down the days to her wedding to Rich this September. I am too! I cannot wait to photograph this DIY, homegrown, on-a-farm wedding. Their lovely letterpressed Save the Date card, which Sarah designed and produced herself, just landed in my mailbox this week. If so much love and attention to detail was poured into this little 5×7 piece of paper, I can only imagine what would happen when given a whole farm to dress head to toe! (Oh there IS another indicator: Sarah’s growing vintage plate collection to be used as the china at he wedding!)

This past November we had our engagement session and Sarah brought along her magnesium plate that would be used for her letterpressed Save the Date card.

Since then she’s been busy putting the plate into action, and you can see it as the rectangular piece raised slightly between the red sparrows. It’s actually a magnet!

Calligraphy by Grace Edmands Calligraphy. I want to be a calligrapher too. So badly.

The wedding will take place at Pineland Farms, an equestrian center and working farm in Maine, and so of course everything horse-y, farm-y and Maine-y is reflected in the cards, right down to the vintage postage stamps.

Yes Sarah has introduced me to the strange and wonderful world of vintage stamp collecting. Now, I’ve heard of collecting postmarked stamps of course. I did a little of that myself as a kid. But this notion that people have held onto sheets and sheets of stamps for ten, twenty, thirty years – unused! – that then sell for 2 to 3x’s their face value is something else altogether! I am fascinated. And here is Sarah painstakingly collecting and using only the right ones, some of them from the 80’s I think, for her Save the Dates. I can only imagine what the invitations are going to look like…

Read more about Sarah’s Save the Date cards here on her wedding blog.

Just a few quick photos from 2009. A few days after Christmas I assisted Lisa on a night-time engagement shoot at La Salette’s Festival of Lights, Attleboro, MA. What a scene! What a couple! The groom-to-be proposed with a “will you marry me” tatoo on his inner arm. He stripped in the sub-freezing temps so we could photograph it. It is really beautiful. I love the typography, the curlicues and all the flourishes. I wonder if they will use the same on their invites? Anyway, in between holding off-camera lighting and coats, scouting out spots and directing pedestrian traffic, I sneaked in a few shots. These are more “in betweeners” – moments when they’re waiting for equipment to be set up, moments just after the main shutter’s been clicked.

See more of Lisa’s pics – and my mad lighting skillzzz – on Rock ‘n Roll Bride too!

So speaking of curlicues, I tinkered with a temporary wedding logo. A calligrapher is devising a new one, and if she follows my wishes it will be chock-freaking-full of gratuitous curlicues. You won’t be able to read the text, the cat will look like he’s sitting in a briar bush, it’ll be nothing but scrolls. Yeah! Hopefully she won’t listen to me. It’s been hard to hold back with the flourishes. I think it’s related to my ruffle kick of late. And my goal to wear more red lipstick and more heels in the new year.

I’ve known my good friend T. now for ten years now, holy goodness, and just by the nature of being in your twenties and hawt, you may imagine that during those years I have met and/or have heard about a boyfriend or two. Or three. Or eleven. Heh heh. So when T. brought her latest boyfriend C. for us to meet several years ago, I was friendly but cautious. When they stayed together, I was optimistic. When they moved in together, I was impressed (I’m so mean). When they went on vacation to Budapest and Nice together, I was jealous. And when she came back and showed me her flawless rock of an engagement ring, I was convinced. He finally wants to keep you, hooray!

I like giving her a hard time. ;)

Their lovely and intimate wedding & ceremony were held in October at the beautiful Roger Williams Botanical Garden in Providence RI. There was not a hired photographer to be found. Between me, the groom’s sister-in-law who is a professional photog, and especially the Uncle Bob Studio of Photo and Videography, we got the whole thing covered.

Actually it was a good thing they didn’t officially hire a photographer, because methinks there would have been a serious thrown-down in the aisles, with possible spilloverage onto the guests…

The ceremony was officiated by an old family friend of the bride’s, the DJ played both hip-hop and Cambodian line dancing music – yes there is such a thing – the open wine and cordial and cupcake bar made overindulging a little too easy, and the maid of honor cried even though she said she wouldn’t. All in all, a fun and beautiful wedding. I am so happy for my little friend T. and most thankful to C. for finally making an honest woman out of her. Oh I only jest! Congrats to you both!!