Fionna and Jean’s Alexandra Palace château wedding took place on 13 June 2026 in Mazières-en-Gâtine, Deux-Sèvres, in western France.
They met in 2016 and have lived in London since 2017. Fionna grew up in Malaysia. Seventy-eight guests came over for a two-day celebration in western France, and I photographed the second day.
The ceremony was held outside, in front of the chapel. Fionna arrived in a buggy with her father, and the two of them drove off in it again after the kiss, through flower confetti, with a pianist playing.
Cocktail hour filled the courtyard: champagne on the stone table, an oyster bar, family portraits in front of the château. Two group photographs, one taken from the balcony and one from the pool, then a drone pass over the estate while the light was still high.
Dinner was in the Orangerie. Fionna and Jean spoke together and closed with a round of shots, the first yum seng. The wedding cake was a wheel of cheese, cut to Tim Minchin. Jean had a performance nobody knew about. The first dance was Fly Me To The Moon, and at midnight forty Happy Meals arrived on the dance floor.
I photograph weddings across France and abroad, and an Alexandra Palace château wedding sits close to home: I’m based between La Rochelle, Bordeaux and Paris, an hour from Deux-Sèvres. My approach is documentary: I photograph what happens, without staging it. Fully bilingual after five years shooting weddings in the United States, I work often with couples living abroad who marry in France.
