Cali and Ben’s PAIKKA St. Paul wedding felt like having all of your favorite people over for a really good night, which was exactly what they wanted. When they first reached out, they told me they hoped their friends and family would feel like guests in their home. Their record player would be spinning during cocktail hour, their cats would somehow be involved, and once dinner was over, they fully intended to tear up the dance floor. After ten years together, they weren’t interested in making their wedding into something it wasn’t. They wanted it to feel like their life together, just with considerably nicer outfits.

That intention showed up in the pace of the entire day. There was no frantic running around, no sense that we were racing a timeline, and honestly, not much nervousness. Cali and Ben just seemed ready. Ready to get married, ready to hang out with their people, ready to enjoy the thing they had spent all this time planning.

And visually, I loved what they chose. Ben and his groomsmen wore brown suits, which was such a refreshing departure from the black, navy, and tan we see constantly. Against PAIKKA’s industrial textures, greenery, and warm wood, the brown felt perfectly at home. It gave everything a subtle vintage quality without screaming that we are having a vintage wedding.

A PAIKKA St. Paul Wedding Filled With Pieces of Their Actual Life

One of my favorite things about Cali and Ben’s wedding was that the personal details weren’t there only to fill space on a table. They had context. These two love records, so their record player and some of their favorite vinyl came with them. During cocktail hour, the music their guests heard was music they actually listen to together. Their two cats, Chili and Pepper, obviously couldn’t exactly work the bar themselves—lazy—but little nods to them were worked into the day, including having them “host” the drinks.

Every year, Cali and Ben take photo booth pictures together at the Minnesota State Fair. When Cali asked me to photograph her details, she specifically wanted those strips included. I loved that request because they weren’t technically “wedding details” at all. They were evidence of the years that came before the wedding.

Those are the things I want to photograph. Pretty invitations and rings deserve their moment, obviously, but give me the slightly beat-up photograph you’ve kept for eight years. Give me the record you’ve played a hundred times or the dumb inside joke that only six people at the wedding understand. Those things create a much more interesting visual history because they actually belong to you.

About Cali + Ben

After three years of long-distance, they eventually landed together in St. Paul. They share a 1900s duplex with Chili and Pepper. Their version of a good time is pretty simple: lake days, reading, swimming, paddling, card games, board games, and laughing together. Their wedding carried that same unpretentious energy. Nothing felt like it had been chosen because weddings are “supposed” to have it.

The ceremony followed suit. PAIKKA’s white walls, huge plants, and industrial architecture didn’t need much intervention. The room was filled with the people Cali and Ben had been talking about since their very first email to me.

They told me one of their favorite photos together was a candid someone took at a friend’s wedding when they were simply being their goofy selves. Because of that, they wanted their guests photographed almost as much as they wanted photographs of themselves. That is basically music to my introverted-extroverted photographer ears. I can step in and direct when we need the beautiful portrait, then happily disappear into the room and photograph everyone doing their thing.

Como Park Portraits

We did leave PAIKKA for part of Cali and Ben’s portraits and headed to Como Park, just a few minutes away. And I’m glad we did.

The greenery and stone architecture gave us a completely different setting without turning portraits into a two-hour field trip nobody asked for. We created the classic images, played with the architecture a little, let Cali’s dress actually have its moment, and then got them back to their wedding.

That last part matters to me. I love making beautiful portraits. But I don’t want you spending half of your wedding day away from everyone you invited to be there.

Dinner + One Very Ready Dance Floor

Back at their PAIKKA St. Paul wedding, the industrial space shifted as the evening went on. The long wooden tables, tiny lamps, florals by Kalie Nicole Events, and string lights overhead made dinner feel warmer and more communal than overly styled. As people settled in with drinks and raised glasses across the tables, it started to feel exactly like the version of the wedding Cali and Ben had described months earlier: everyone they love hanging out together in one room.

And then, naturally, shit got a little less sentimental. They had promised me a dance floor, after all. Once dinner was over, the energy changed. I could lean all the way into documenting it—flash, movement, weird dance moves, ties coming loose, people forgetting a camera was anywhere near them. The polished parts of the day had done their job. Now everyone could just have fun.

I think that’s what I liked most about this wedding. Cali and Ben had been together for a decade by the time they stood in front of everyone at PAIKKA. They didn’t need their wedding to prove anything about who they were as a couple. Instead, they brought pieces of the life they’d already built, and let those things matter.

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