This vibrant, autumn Silverbrook Farm wedding in Purcellville Virginia will knock your socks off!  With the vibrant fall foliage, the Blue Ridge Foothills, you’ll see why it’s one of my favorite wedding venues ever! (I’ve seen a whole lot!).

A few highlights include:

• High school sweethearts who incorporated the groom’s Spiderman “prom-posal” into the wedding
• A “Rigged” Bouquet Toss (I call dibs on the wedding ;))
• Adorable rescue dog gets the first kiss with Katy while sitting on her gown!
• Fun farm-inspired decor including a wooden chess board & Doughnut Dessert Board
• Father of the bride, in fully decorated dress blues, seeing his daughter in her wedding gown for the first time
• A unique bridal party who rocks their Vogue inspired portrait
• A Viking-style horn prank goes awry and is hilarious none the less
• Hitting Virginia’s fall foliage peek right on the nose!
• A fun, vibrant, authentic couple who loved every second of their best day ever!

Why Rhinehart Photography?

Austin shared, “Once we saw your work Katy was hooked. Immediately, we loved the “non-traditional” take on photos. When she saw the Vogue inspired photos, she knew that this photographer would be the one for us.  We can’t wait to see our Vogue shots!”

Checkmate!  They are coming, guys…

Katy explained, “As soon as Lisa arrived on our wedding day, we were both very comfortable, even though we had never met her in person before. The many phone conversations really helped us get to know each other! It was like she was just another friend we had there. She made us both feel very confident throughout the entire day.”

They added, “She even helped keep us on time and made sure every part of the day was photographed. When we look at our photos we are extremely excited to see all of the crazy emotions and how she captured everything throughout the day by ourselves and guests.”

Simple Succulents & Vibrant Colors

Katy has always enjoyed bright flowers in different shades of red and yellows so that was the main source of wedding color palette inspiration.

But she deferred to her florist’s expertise and gave her lots of wiggle room, since she knew what would look best.

One nice thing about Silverbrook is that I have a ton to work with and it all goes so well with the elegant farm aesthetic.

I felt like these succulents went with the overall feel of the wedding.  It seemed to echo the many-petaled dahlias that starred in Katy’s bouquet.

There is a lot of math involved in photography.  Here I chose the perfect aperture to get the diamond and succulents in focus.

Let’s Do This!

A bridesmaid peeks in as Katy’s maid of honor puts the finishing touches on her wedding look.

I focused on the bridesmaid and calculated my camera settings to show just enough detail so I could tell the whole “wedding preparation” story in one frame:

Creative Friends Stepped UP!

Katy’s beauty professionals contracted Covid-19 the week of her wedding, so her bridesmaids stepped in!

Katie shared, “My girls watched so many videos on the type of big braid I wanted to make sure they knew what to do!   It took a couple of restarts but I am so impressed with their skills and how beautiful they made my hair and face!”

She added, “It was also very sweet to be able to share that true moment of getting ready together! I am truly really glad that happened as it just made the moments with my girls even sweeter!”

Bridal Party at Silverbrook Farm Wedding

Here Katie’s bridesmaids stand in front of the topiary garden wearing navy blue dresses and holding fall-inspired bouquets:

Katy laughed, “I get the whole stand-in-a-line thing, but really wanted something more unique and authentic for my wedding party.  When I saw Lisa’s Vogue inspired photographs, I was sold.  I can’t wait to see them!  She made us feel so comfortable and brought out our inner models!”

I love creating these unique posed shots!  I can really bring out people’s personalities and help everyone to feel confident and beautiful.  Here Katy’s maid-of-honor leans on her shoulder, as the bridesmaid to her side rocks chucks with red socks, and that’s just the beginning…

“I bet I can fit under there!”

Why yes, yes you can!”

Let this be a preview of how much fun these folks will be on the dance floor!

Parents of the Bride at Silverbrook Farm

I wanted to find a special place for Katy’s first look with her parents.  I used this beautiful hand-made bridge, and it was so intimate, authentic, and just felt perfect at her Silverbrook Farm Virginia Wedding!

Here, Katie looks at her father, making his way down the hill, all decked out in full Army garb.

The look on her face says it all:

Katie shared, “My dad and I have always had a really special bond. Just be able to share my wedding day with him was truly incredible, as many military kids don’t get to have that experience.”

She continued, “I’m planning to follow in his footsteps.  I’m currently in the process of also joining the Army as an officer.  I will gain her commission in May when I finish graduate school.”

Katy smiled, “My first look with my parents was an extremely amazing experience.”

She added, “My mom has seen me in my dress many times, yet when she saw me on my wedding day, waiting at the foot of the hill, she broke down and cried so hard.

She concluded, “It just was such a special moment.”

So many Emotional Moments!

There are sooo many images I could share, I literally have hundreds!  I don’t have a limit on the number of photographs I will take so when I see emotion, beauty, a story, I snap away.

In this case, I narrowed down all of the hugs to one super sweet teary-eyed hug from one of Katy’s brothers:

The bridesmaids watched the interactions, getting teary themselves.

Look at these ladies Covid-19 flexing with their gluttonous use of take-out and toilet paper, haha!

Personalized Men’s Details, too!

A wooden watch with their faces, and cufflinks that are a nod to Iron Man’s arc reactor

And so the superhero subtlety begins…

Red and blue weave in the concept of Marvel’s Spiderman, a nod to Austin’s “prom-posal.”

His Spidey-Sense is Tingling!

Katy explained, “Spiderman was the first movie Austin watched as a kid and began his love of all things, Marvel.  We dressed up as Spiderman and Spiderwoman for our first Halloween together.  Austin brought the whole theme full circle, when he ‘prom-posed’ to me in his spiderman costume!”

Katy’s mom did our flowers and she wanted to surprise him with some fun and different!  The red on blue just works and while it seems obvious now, I didn’t notice it right away.  Here my second photographer, Priscilla, perfectly captured the whole “spidey” look:

Katy laughed, “It was really sweet, and actually his groomswoman, Laura, was involved from the start!”

She giggled, “Austin told me he was going to the bathroom.  I expected it to be quick.  He was in there for so freaking long that it was starting to get awkward.  After at least ten minutes, came out of the bathroom fully decked out as spiderman!  He was holding a sign asking me to prom!”

Austin chimed in, “My goal was to surprise her and have her say yes.  It worked.”

Gone to the Dogs

Austin shared, “Maia is the dog that we adopted together very shortly after our engagement and Austin’s move to Knoxville. Katy grew up with many dogs throughout her life and can never imagine her life without one, so the minute we were both in Knoxville together we decided to adopt!”

He continued, “We got her from the shelter when she was a 10-month-old puppy and we wouldn’t trade her for a thing! She is our sassy little hound mix that for sure has a mind of her own.”

This speaks volumes about Katy’s dog-loving personality and in particular, her love of Maia.  Here she sits with all four paws on Katy’s gown and kisses her right on the lips, haha!

And so the Silverbrook Farm Wedding Begins…

Katy and her father process down the farmhouse stairs together…

Austin watches through the crowd.

Their Vows Were the Cutest

Katy smiled, “For us, the whole idea with the vows was that we wanted them to be fun. Neither of us are very traditional or religious people, and we didn’t think that traditional wedding vows would fit in the ceremony.  So, we came up with fun ones together based on our past experiences to keep the atmosphere fun and make people laugh.”

• Austin, do you promise to listen to Katy when she says it’s not appropriate to wear a hat while you’re dressed up? Katy, do you promise to nicely help Austin match clothes, so he doesn’t leave the house looking a mess?
• Austin, do you promise to always share your fries when Katy decides to not order them herself? Katy, do you promise to always order an extra quesadilla when you drive through Taco Bell?
• Austin, do you promise to not slam the door when you come to bed at 2 AM? Katy, do you promise to not slam the door when you wake up at 5 AM?
• Austin, do you promise not to go to the grocery store and “accidentally” come back with expensive bourbon? Katy, do you promise not to go to the grocery store and “accidentally” come back with puppies?

The wedding officiant is always a guest of honor at the wedding, but this one was also incredibly close to the bride, groom, and family, too!

Katy shared, “Marci, what a dime she is!  She is so special and we were lucky to have her officiate!  She is a Special Ed teacher at Austin’s dad’s school.  We both bonded with her while we worked as substitutes and teachers’ aids.”

Here they exchange wedding rings:

The Kiss / Blowing of the Horn (kind of) LOL

Here Austin and Katy kiss as several others break out in roaring laugher!

Katy laughed, “As for our friends, none of us are really the serious type. We all like to joke around and have fun every moment we can.”

Austin laughed, “One of my groomsmen thought it would be funny to blow while we had our first kiss so he went ahead and bought it, but didn’t actually know how to use it.  That was even funnier!”

She went on, “Being able to have you capture the personality of our friends in our pictures was important to us. We want to look back on our wedding day and remember all the jokes and fun we had not just with each other but also with our friends.”

Husband and wife!

Time to Relax

Austin smiled, “Once the actual ceremony was over, we got to finally relax!  Before we went over to the reception, we spent some time together for the first time in almost a week and just ate and talked about how it all went.”

Katy shared, “It was my favorite part.  We were able to talk about all of our experiences from the day and share how everything felt for each of us.  It was just a very intimate, sentimental time together.”

This ‘time alone” is something that is encouraged by Dot, the owner of Silverbrook Farm.  It is truly a lovely tradition!

Silverbrook Farm in Purcellville is the Prettiest!  I tell Dot this every time I’m there, but there is something really special about this land.

The land is unique, I feel attached to it.  I felt the same way the first time I went to Harper’s Ferry.  Is it the mountains?  The peaceful farmland?  It just feels like home.

It is such a pleasure for me to capture such a beautiful environment!

Boring, Stiff Photos with This Wedding Party?  Never!

While my main focus of the day is capturing authentic moments, I do take a few dozen posed portraits throughout.

I try to be quick and make it as painless as possible.  Also, I try to get genuine happy expressions, even if it means being a little silly.

I knew Katy wanted Vogue and I was so excited to pose the groom’s party, too for these.

We have a serious photograph too (a similar feel to the one of the bride’s party earlier) but I really like this smiley one!

Romantic Wedding Portraits at Silverbrook Farm

While most of their romantic photos opened up this blog post, here are a few more for you…

This photo feels like a fairy tale to me.  The ivy combined with Katy’s braid, and wow!

Again I like to give couples a nice mix of photos.

A little bit of everything: scenic views, emotional moments, quirky details, all the things that come together to make a wedding day unique.

I take a few more traditional shots of the couple, and make sure to have nice framing and composition.  Just sayin’, how cool does Austin’s hair look here?

Austin shared, “Katy and I have been together for over 6 years, which is a quarter of my life so far. In reality, I think we are lucky to have ended up together, and we also worked hard to stay together. The first four years of our relationship were long-distance.  At that time, we were anywhere from 100 to 350 miles apart. We would visit each other as often as possible, and by the time I finished undergrad, I knew that I was done waiting to ask her to marry me.”

He continued, “We had once talked about it and agreed to wait until she finished her degree, but with me moving to Knoxville and finally living less than 5 miles apart, I decided I was done waiting. We have always had fun together and I wanted to make sure that fun lasted a lifetime. Now we are in the process of figuring out where she will go for graduate school and what new adventures that will bring for us, and there is no one I would rather figure this all out with than Katy.”

Wedding Reception Details in the Silverbrook Barn

Katy wanted to incorporate sunflowers (which have always been her favorite) into the wedding but did not want them to be too attention-grabbing.

The florist worked in red sunflowers, that were more subtle into her vibrant farmhouse style.

Many of Katy’s wedding details were found on-site and not only because they were fixtures at the property.  Dot actually keeps rustic chic, farmhouse decor in her “Pinterest Barn” which she allows couples who book their wedding at Silverbrook Farm to use.

Katy shared, “The “Pinterest barn” as Dot calls it was another amazing selling point. It helped create a vision while also limiting the cost. It is essentially a building that Dot has filled with wedding decorations that couples didn’t want to have to clean up and take home after their wedding, so Dot keeps them for future couples to use.”

The donut board was very important to Katy as donuts are one of her favorite desserts! She really wanted to be able to incorporate donuts in a fun way.  She convinced her dad to make her the doughnut board.  It was a cool tie in because she and her dad really bonded in his woodshop in the past.

The cookie table below is a Pittsburgh wedding tradition.  It actually started during the great depression, rather than having one huge cake provided by the couple, each family would bring a few dozen cookies to share as a dessert!

Katy grinned, “The cake was a naked cake that was made by the Maid of Honor’s mother. She was a pastry chef and agreed to make us a Lemon cake with a blueberry filling. Lemon is one of Austin’s favorites and Katy loves lemon with blueberry! We decided on a naked cake because neither of us really likes icing.”

Their grand entrance:

“You are My Sunshine” Let the Tears Begin!

Austin shared, “For the mother-son dance, we danced to You’ll Be In My Heart by Phil Collins. My mom had decided this was the song that we would dance to about three years ago, and when she told me about it she said ‘when you and Katy get married, this is the song I want us to dance to.’ So I didn’t even need to check with her when letting the DJ know what our song would be.”

Katy shared, “As for my dad many bets were going on for how long he would hold out before he cried on the wedding day (he made it to the first dance).”

She continued, “My dad use to sing to me almost daily the chorus of “You are my Sunshine” when I was a little girl. Johnny Cash was one of the very few artists I would hear my dad listen to too growing up.”

She concluded, “As my dad went to grab me for our dance the first thing he said to me was “what song are we dancing to?” and I just looked at him and said “you’ll figure out very soon” and the minute he figured out the song, that was when he started breaking down in tears causing me to cry.”

First Dance as Husband & Wife

Austin explained, “Our first dance song was Flaws by Bastille, which comes from an album that brings us a lot of good memories. I have an eclectic taste in music, which does not always line up well with Katy’s.”

He went on, “Early on in our relationship, there was a period of time where I really enjoyed Bastille’s album Bad Blood. This ended up being one that Katy did like, and we ended up listening to it for hours one night on repeat until we both fell asleep with it still playing.  It was perfect.”

A creative view of the first dance through a knothole in the barn wall:

Silverbrook Farm Wedding Reception

While the women flocked to the dancefloor, the gentlemen were mostly wallflowers at the start.

Here you can see the string lights lining the barn, the light fixtures including a chandelier.

I like to play with interesting lines, light layers, and composition like this:

Katy laughed, “Special Thanks to Emily, the maid of honor, for helping Katy keep sane and for listening to all of my moaning about planning a wedding during COVID.  I don’t know what I’d do without her!”

Haaaa, I don’t know exactly how this moment played out, but the dude’s expression in the background is totally priceless!

Austin smiled, “Katy was soooo ready to get married and have a blast while doing it! The planning was stressful and crazy so by the time wedding day came around Katy was ready to let go and enjoy it.  And she did.”

While I pride myself in capturing authentic moments, somehow I feel that I should have got what was happening about 5 feet to the left, haha!

Full Access at Silverbrook Farm

Another fantastic part of having a Silverbrook Farm Wedding is having full access all day long to the entire property.  This includes a treehouse, outdoor clawfoot tub beneath the stars, and so many other incredible places and experiences.

For me, this means having full access to every crazy angle.  Anything I can imagine can easily become my reality.  Hayloft access, yes, please!!!

How cool is this view, seriously?

The Boquet/Garter Toss was Rigged, Really!!!

Austin shared, “A bunch of our friends are in pretty serious relationships.  We planned to rig the game.”

A fantastic shot by my second photographer, Priscilla.  Garter in perfect focus and mid-air– that is not easy.

While she was at that angle, I was at this one:

Now you can see Katy clearly aiming specifically at this dude’s girlfriend.

Another moment that I’m not exactly sure how it played out, but I’m guessing she figured it should go to his girlfriend, too, haha!

Katy found that *hilarious*

I call dibs on this wedding guys 😉

The DJ Can Wobble!

I’ve been photographing weddings for over 10 years, and I can tell you the DJs who get out on the dance floor and teach wedding guests how to dance, and do it well, are few and far between.

This DJ was awesome!  More about him and the other wedding vendors involved in this event below at the end of this blog post.

I used a slow shutter to capture the movement on the dance floor from the hayloft, so fun!

Katy was excited to see everyone progress throughout the night.  This shot is on the money, haha:

I love getting right in all the action, in this case, I was able to use people surrounding Katy as a frame.  I also added some visual interest by capturing the bokeh from the string lights in the background, too.

Night’s End at Silverbrook Farm

I love to get unique angles and perspectives and show off unusual aspects of a wedding venue.

I love the “stolen moment” vibe of this shot of Katy & Austin just outside of the bar…

Silhouetted by uplighting and string lights, illuminated by chandeliers seemed to be the perfect “happy ever” image for these two colorful characters:

Silverbrook Farm Wedding Vendors

Katy smiled, “We would recommend any and all of our vendors to everyone! Each and everyone played such a special role in our big day!!”

• Venue- Silverbrook Farm “I could not say enough amazing things about Dot and Silverbrook Farm! The venue is amazing and certainly unique! Dot was the most charismatic woman in the world and made sure my day went perfectly! She is very accommodating and easy-going on last-minute changes! I can only imagine the stress she has gone through with COVID but none of that stopped her from making our day PERFECT!”
• Florals – Growing Wild Floral “Barbra was the greatest florist ever! She truly was an expert in the field and I was completely okay giving her all my trust to make my flowers something special! I had little elements and ideas about what I wanted and she listened, suggested, and made my dreams a reality! Everything I wanted she was able to do!”
• Entertainment- Hercules Entertainment “DJ Tadeo (Todd Robbins) was awesome! We gave him a big long list of music that we like and rolled with it! He even managed to find some new songs for us that we long now! He was very easy to work with and made the last minute changes we had a breeze! Fun fact: at the wedding, one of Katy’s friends from high school recognized the DJ as one of her high school Spanish teachers!! So we found out the day of the wedding that our DJ was a teacher at the same high school that Katy attended!”
• Catering- Balsamo’s Pizza “We are so happy we went with the food we love! All of the food was so delicious and the pizza was definitely something to remember for all! Balsamo’s was always quick to reply and make sure everything was set for the wedding day.”
• Gown- Global Bridal Gallery “Thought finding my dress was going to be the most challenging part of getting married!!! But little did I know when I walked into the second dress store that they would have the actual dress that I was using as inspiration. They have so many dresses to choose from and made the whole process very easy! They were even very flexible working with my crazy college schedule to get my fittings done!”
• Photographer- Rhinehart Photography “If you are looking for a creative photographer that will be a true professional but feel like a friend, you’ve found her!  We are so glad that Dot from Silverbrook Farm recommended Lisa to us!”

Want More Silverbrook Farm Weddings?

No problem– I have several featured on my blog.  You can check them out here at this link.