A Winter Moment at Northern Grade Barn Days

Inside Buck Mason's NYC Shops

A  couple of months ago Buck Mason made the jump from the sunny west coast vibes of Los Angeles to frigid New York City with the opening of their first east coast location. The day before they opened we popped in to see their cold weather inspired pieces and the super clean and modern style of the store. 

These images were all shot with a Canon 5D Mark IV from BH Photo.

The Harvest Dinner

Every few years we like to have a dinner to bring together friends to celebrate the harvest season. Back in 2017 we teamed up with American Field to host a delicious wine and pork filled meal at Cannibal Beer and Butcher in New York City as part of American Field's annual Brooklyn pop up market. 

These images were shot with the X100F and its amazing low light abilities.  

A Kentucky Christmas Moment

On Monday Gina and I did our Christmas tour of Lexington. After college we both moved away from Lexington, so on occasion we like to go down memory lane. Here are a few images from our day in and around Lexington.

Our first stop was to the Bluegrass Stockyards outside town. I apologize that these photos are out of order, but they are largely self explanatory as to what is what. From there we hopped over to Versailles....pronounced Ver-sales...for coffee at our friend Emily's new shop...I'll have a full story on that place next week! We continued on towards Shaker Village and Danville to pick up birthday pastries from Burk's. We ended our night we a stop at Lexington staple Hillenmeyer's Christmas Shop. (be sure to check out our story from last year's Christmas season)

If you're interested in more about Lexington...we have an entire City Guild section dedicated to our favorite Kentucky city. 

A Good Time Was Had By All

Scenes from our annual Downtown Christmas in Beaver Dam. A good Time was had by all.  

New Traditions with Lavazza

Last month I did some images with Lavazza and their Intenso dark roast coffee. The concept was to promote their Lavazza Holiday New Traditions campaign. Lavazza being founded on the very old tradition of coffee making in Turin, Italy has encouraged everyone this year to create new traditions. 

The concept went through a lot of back and forth, but we ultimately decided to base them on a trio of events I did this fall season and ways we were tweaking them to create new traditions.  

For the actual photos it was incredibly hard to create anything that seemed to fit. The new tradition that would be at the center of the series was the idea that my annual harvest dinner was moving from LA to New York City this year and we’d be serving Lavazza’s Intenso coffee at the end of the meal. In theory we’d shoot images of the twentyfive guests enjoying the dark coffee. The problem with this idea soon became way too obvious. The space for the dinner was lit with red light bulbs and candles. The idea of shooting any sort of photos quickly went out the window. The concept then evolved into showcasing natural light flatlays of the coffee , the Lavazza mug, and Fuji’s Instax images from the evening. 

Luckily before going to New York I had created back up images that had doubled as invitations that went out to all of the dinner guests. With the invite images I wanted to create a scenic staged fall moment along my lake in Beaver Dam. The Lavazza coffee would be the centerpiece and the colors for the accessories would pull from the Lavazza packaging. I used vintage elements to continue with pieces I knew I’d be using on the dinner table. I wanted to use elements from my hometown and my family to go along with Lavazza’s tradition of handcrafted coffee since the late 1800’s. Lavazza is four generations deep into creating top quality coffee and a coffee culture that encourages a dedication to quality and excellence. 

Down at the Dam

A series of photos from an autumn day down at the dam and the locks outside town. 

Morning Coffee

 

 

MORNING COFFEE

---

LA PUSH, WASHINGTON

The morning came fast, we had photographed until dark the day before. We began in Seattle and worked out way towards the coast. Stops at Crescent Lake and Forks, and a very long hunt for props and supplies and coffee made our arrival to La Push, Washington very late. We pulled into town as the sun was setting on the horizon. We ran towards the driftwood and rocks to capture the most magical glowing orange light. As darkness swept across the ancient lands of the Native American tribe that lives in La Push we remembered we had yet to find a hotel for the night. 

Along the shore were rows of A Frame cottages. We assumed the red neon sign proclaiming No Vacancy was accurate, but we checked anyways. We were rewarded with the final cabin. No TV, no phone, no wifi, and no cell service were the price we'd have to pay for sunrise views of the Pacific. 

As the sun began to rise I pulled out my camera and began to snap images of Brandon as he prepared his morning coffee. I had already been along the shore for the first hints of the morning greys and pale blues, but by the time I returned a soft light had filled the tiny cabin...