Jam Handy Wedding Fun In The “D”!

Congratulations, David and Josh!

So by now, most of you can either guess or you know that blogging is my LEAST favorite part of my wedding photography business. It takes a LOT to get me motivated and inspired to add extra hours into what is always a long process to get photos ready and delivered to my clients. But there were a couple of things about Josh and David’s wedding day that was unique. It’s always a great day (in the world according to Marci) if I can see something new, try something new and learn something new.

For starters, Josh and David’s wedding was at the old Jam Handy building just down the street from the Fisher building. You wouldn’t think twice about it and would probably drive by it without even realizing it’s there. But that’s the place that brought my father in law to Michigan to start his career back when they used to produce and create industrial movies. The owner/manager of Jam Handy, Simeon, was available throughout the day for questions and helped to coordinate all of our comings and goings. Very helpful chap to have around, indeed. The space is industrial and has four spaces (well, five if you count where they set up the kitchen). It took me a while to figure out what was on the walls at the Jam Handy’s windowless room where they held the reception. They are dark gray with what appears to be dark chicken wire holding stuff to the wall. Ah… it must have served as soundproofing back in the day when they were using it as a “sound stage”. I loved the main room and the planner, Andy Keina from “Top That Table” really made the joint stand out and soften the industrialness (not a word) for this amazing wedding.

So enough about the Jam Handy building as the “newest” cool location for Detroiters to hold cool weddings and on to what was perhaps the most amazing wedding ceremony I’ve ever seen. Josh and David offered up a lot of firsts for me as a wedding photographer. Their parents joined in for the family photos and DIDN’T stand by their children! They mixed and matched and didn’t want “our photos” and “their photos”. Never seen that wonderful family dynamic before. Also, when I went to see what they were doing before the ceremony, all the siblings and Josh and David were playing games from youth group camp. You know, the kind that involve standing in a group, laughing, concentrating on a task and then eliminating each of them one by one. I’ve never seen that as a way to keep each other occupied before heading into a ceremony!

So the ceremony. Ah… the ceremony. They did many things in their own unique way. One of the main differences was that they had one friend officiate / mc the order of things. But they ran the show. Each of the grooms had three friends and/or family members come up and speak about them, their relationship to them and their relationship as a couple. It was lovely. It was heartfelt. They weren’t your typical speeches (aka toasts), but rather a way for everyone to learn something about them and to get a sense of them as a couple. And then there were the vows. Unique, funny, insightful, joyous, intellectual and sob inducing all at once. Quite an act to follow, gentleman! I’ve had many of my couples ask about where to find officiants for same sex couples and honestly, whether you’re gay or not, if you don’t want to have a religious officiant, this is an amazing way to accomplish having an intimate, heartfelt ceremony done on the couple’s terms and imbued with their personality.

The dancing all took place in a small side room. You’ll see I included two photos that are very, very similar. I couldn’t pick a favorite of Josh and his mom and my photo editing hubby could not pick a favorite, so… you get to see both of them. Besides Josh’s great expressions, what really makes this series of photos (and is SO sadly unique) is that all of their friends and family in the background are a) watching them, b) reacting to this wonderful moment and c) NOT TAKING FREAKING iPHONE PHOTOS!!!

Loved this wedding! Hope you do too!

Lastly, I’m including lots of photos of Jam Handy because there aren’t a lot of good wedding images of the Jam Handy online! What I have seen doesn’t often include off camera lighting, so it looks weird, so I wanted to post lots of photos that show what it can look like when it’s properly lit with extra lights and a bit of technical know how!