Tiny Wedding Tales: Orthodox Micro Wedding

White Plains, NY

2020 has been a hell of a year for anyone trying to plan a wedding (and anyone working in the wedding industry), but lets not dwell on the negatives. Instead, I want to highlight some of the unconventional, small but sweet weddings I’ve photographed this year. Love wasn’t canceled, even if you weren’t able to have the wedding you thought you would.

One of my favorite things about Jewish weddings is the concept of ‘bashert’, literally ‘destiny’. Specifically, the destiny to find your soulmate. As someone who met their husband on a subway platform while he was visiting from another country, I can totally vibe with that!

Ilana & William’s love story starts in true millennial style, on J-Date. Finding your soulmate on a dating app is difficult enough, but what if that soulmate had recently emigrated all the way from Iran? Now that's destiny.

Soulmate found, now they needed to plan their wedding. The phrase ‘orthodox micro wedding’ probably sounds implausible to anyone familiar with the customs of the Orthodox Jewish community. Weddings are a big deal, and it’s pretty typical for the guest lists to be anywhere from 200-400 people.

With limitations on indoor gatherings and travel, their original plans for a more traditional wedding had to be adjusted. Less than a third of the guest list was able to attend in person. Luckily for them, we live in a digital world and they were able to hire a local video company to live stream the wedding for friends and family around the world.

In a nod to the realities of having a pandemic wedding, they created goodie bags for the guests that included items like personalized masks and hand sanitizer, and created cute signs encouraging everyone to take precautions. It always helps to keep a sense of humor about things!

Unexpected rain forced us indoors for the ceremony, but the staff were able to quickly move the chuppah and chairs inside to an unused space. Not quite as pretty as the garden would have been, but just as meaningful. The colorful chuppah was made by Ilana’s grandmother and has now been used at all of her siblings’ and cousins’ weddings.

The reception was relaxed, as guests enjoyed lunch, gave speeches, and watched video messages from loved ones unable to attend the wedding. During one of the speeches, it came out that Ilana had actually wanted a small, laid back wedding all along. Silver lining or destiny?