Gabi & James · Niepołomice, Poland · Three days of celebrations, photographed in 2012.
Gabi and James divide their time between Toronto and New York. Their Niepołomice Castle wedding brought together 250 guests from around the world for three days. There were outdoor gatherings, a church ceremony and a reception at the castle. Before any of it, Gabi sent us a brief we were very happy to receive.
Gabi is a photographer herself, and she knew what she wanted: classic, high-contrast documentary photographs, from getting ready to the end of the party. She wanted us to work unobtrusively, without directing the day. Every photograph was to be black and white. We even put it in the contract. At dinner, she wanted us to preserve the candlelight, preferring grain to harsh flash.
This was the kind of commission we had been waiting for. We love black and white, and the chance to make an entire wedding story that way gave us so much freedom. We could think in light, shadow and contrast from the start. We were so excited that we rented Leica M Monochrom cameras especially for the wedding – cameras that record only black-and-white files.
After the wedding, Gabi wrote to say that it had all been so wonderful and colourful that she would love a few colour photographs after all. That is how this gallery came about: mostly black and white, with colour photographs from our other cameras. The Monochrom pictures stayed black and white – those files contain no colour information to recover.
This was a full wedding weekend, with time together beyond the ceremony and reception. There was a trip to the forest, a carriage ride, an evening around a fire and Sunday brunch. With 250 guests flying in from around the world, brunch the next day gave everyone another chance to spend time together.
Kasia Wachułka and Kinga Nowakowska of Once In A Lifetime planned the celebrations. In their account, they described a year of preparations and a major change just a month before the wedding, when the guest list doubled. They also told us about a bottle the family had bought on the day their daughter was born and kept for her wedding. A photograph alone cannot explain every family tradition. This one deserves a few words.
A dress made for Gabi
Gabi’s friends Ray and Craig designed her gown. Its three tiers represented her past, present and future with James. They sent us a description of the embroidery before the wedding, so we knew which details to look for during the preparations.
The making of the dress spanned four continents: design and construction in New York, the initial pattern in the United Arab Emirates, fabric from Europe and embroidery in India. Eight craftspeople worked on the embroidery for two weeks. After midnight, the gown became a short dress for the dance floor.
The ceremony and the return to Niepołomice Castle
Gabi got ready at the castle. The ceremony took place at the Church of Ten Thousand Martyrs in Niepołomice, before everyone returned for the reception. The church interior, courtyard, musicians and guests all have their place in this Niepołomice Castle wedding story.
Between the ceremony and reception, we also photographed Gabi and James beside the car and in the woods. These portraits give the gallery a quieter stretch before the crowd returns.
Candlelight, speeches and the dance floor
At dinner, we photographed by candlelight, preserving the way the room and the guests around the tables actually looked.
Then came the speeches and dancing. The dress got shorter, ties loosened, and people paid less and less attention to the camera. That is why we like to stay beyond the first dance. There is still a great deal to photograph.
The embroidery and its meaning
According to Ray and Craig’s description, monograms around the skirts honoured the women in Gabi’s family: her mother, grandmothers and great-grandmothers. A symbol of the Szeliga family appeared at each wrist. Poppies, lilies that James liked to choose for her, and motifs from traditional Polish paper cuts were worked into the embroidery.
The word “inshallah” at the hips and geometry inspired by the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi referred to the couple’s years in the Gulf. Their wedding date appeared in Roman numerals around the hem of each tier.
The designers also described astrological references: the ninth-house symbol on the train and the constellations of Aries and Capricorn. Wheat represented prosperity, while a bumblebee among the lilies at the neckline stood for fertility. The techniques included satin-stitch embroidery, silk appliqué and a stitch inspired by Bedouin craft.
Ray and Craig intended the gown to connect family history with Gabi and James’s future together. These details come from the letter they shared with us before the wedding.
Photography: WhiteSmoke Studio Planning: Kasia Wachułka & Kinga Nowakowska, Raz w życiu / Once In A Lifetime Dress design: Ray & Craig
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