Lakeside At Medford Clubhouse/Ballroom | Medford, NJ | Elise & Greg

May 1, 2019

Last weekend, I photographed Elise and Greg’s rustic and nature inspired Lakeside At Medford Clubhouse/Ballroom wedding in Medford, NJ! Elise and Greg chose the Lakeside at Medford Ballroom because the venue reminded them of their favorite place, which is Greg’s family’s lake house in Maine.

Elise and Greg met on and off in college, kind of floating through circles that crossed every once in a while but started hanging out more after college through one of their best friends. They never officially had a “first date” but they had both been invited to the beach for a weekend with Elise’s best friend who was mutually friends with both of Elise and Greg. They ended up cozying up on the couch to watch Aladdin, they started spending more time together and the rest is history. Elise knew Greg was the one during their first trip to Maine together. They were unplugged from work and got to really spend more time getting to know one another. During this trip, they started a tradition of making each other mix CD’s for the drive to Maine that still stands today.

Bride and groom on their wedding day at Lakeside At Medford Clubhouse/Ballroom

Engaged on 6/14/2018, the proposal from Elise, “Well it completely took my by surprise, I can tell you that. We had talked about getting married and knew it was the path we were headed down but Greg totally got me with this. We had gotten tickets to go see the musical adaptation of Aladdin when it came into Philadelphia and were planning to go after work. I was of course, having an incredibly rough day and was running late for our plans to meet up at Luke’s Lobster (which Greg had thoughtfully chosen as a callback to our times in Maine) but I finally made it (after poor Greg had sat there waiting for ~45 minutes) and we ate our tasty lobster rolls. Very exciting for me was the fact that he had brought me flowers! But little did I know that was not the only surprise in store for me. We sat down for the show and Greg mentioned that he definitely wanted to ask someone to take a picture of us that night, which seemed a teensy bit out of the ordinary to me but not so much so that it tipped me off, it was a big theater after all. There was a technical issue in act 1 (which unbeknownst to me had Greg sweating because he didn’t know if there would be an actual intermission), but intermission did finally roll around, we asked some lovely people sitting behind us to take a photo of us and at the last minute he slid the camera to video and before I knew it he was down on one knee in front of me. I, being totally overwhelmed, scared him a little by saying “is this really happening?!” but of course, said yes and the whole theater clapped so it was quite an eventful evening. We finished watching the rest of the show together (having just enough time to call our parents before intermission ended because Greg thought this plan up all by himself) and then people from the show were congratulating us all the way home. I found out later that he had talked to my parents months earlier so they’d been waiting and wondering when it would finally happen. Needless to say, I was thrilled and it was a pretty epic evening that we will remember for the rest of our lives.”

A couple of months before their Lakeside at Medford Clubhouse/Ballroom wedding, I met them for their engagement session, which was also photographed in the woods!

Rustic and nature inspired wedding at Lakeside At Medford Clubhouse/Ballroom in Medford, NJ

Elise and Greg may have had one of the calmest wedding days I have ever photographed, when I walked in to the hotel that Elise was getting ready at, I was greeted by her mom (who I have known for a few years!) as well as an excited Elise receiving hair and makeup. I immediately began photographing all her well thought out details, their color scheme was evergreen and teal with jewel tone accents which I immediately found in her bouquet, her engagement ring, shoes and even her hair! I loved the Aladdin pin in her bouquet, which was only fitting as they were engaged at a musical adaptation of an Aladdin show. Another sweet detail I loved was that she wore her late great grandmother’s Chanel No. 5 perfume, it was so sweet being able to photograph the vintage bottle and to have a piece of her great grandmother with her on her wedding day.

Their Lakeside at Medford ceremony and ballroom was filled with DIY touches by the bride and groom (Elise says the cashiers at AC Moore knew her very well!). The wedding arch was decorated by a family friend, Elise painted rocks from Maine to hold the place cards and those were wrapped with wire to hold them by her father and the favor tags were designed by the her mother.

Elise and Greg love nature so it’s no wonder why they chose this venue for their special day. I absolutely loved photographing them all over the woods of this rustic venue!

Lakeside at Medford Clubhouse/Ballroom Wedding Now that Elise and Greg are married, they are currently enjoying a mini moon! Their dreams are to hopefully buy a home, travel and then they’d like to grow in their life together as well as giving their dog Moxie a human sibling and some puppy siblings as well. They would love to one day own their own cabin on a lake to relax in as much as possible.