Several weeks ago I was blessed with the opportunity to shoot engagement photos at the Chicago Botanical Gardens in Glencoe IL which is just north of the city. If you live north of the City of Chicago and are looking for a place to do engagement photos or
even pictures on your wedding day, the Botanical Gardens need to be at the top of the list because you simply can not find a more beautiful setting for portraits. I met up with Mike and Niki in the evening just after a rain storm which made for beautiful light and fewer people during our photo shoot. The shoot lasted just a couple of hours most of which was spent walking from one
amazing portrait location to another. I think the hardest part of the entire shoot was choosing which location to pass up because there was just soooo much potential wherever you looked for beautiful engagement pictures. As you can tell by looking at the photos the light was fading rapidly and we really only had time to walk though about 1/4 of the gardens… but that was enough to
capture some really incredible pictures and I just love what we came away with! While this is the only time I’ve ever actually shot any wedding or engagement photos at the Chicago Botanical Gardens one thing was obvious immediately, if you want to come to the Chicago Botanical Gardens on your wedding day you are going to need to have a lot of TIME! Talk to your wedding
photographer about where in the gardens you want to do your pictures, the grounds are huge and it takes time to walk them so have a plan. For the best results choose just 1 or 2 locations in close proximity to one another that you can spend the majority of your time at. This will allow you to get in get your wedding pictures taken and get out without having to do too much hiking around
the Botanical Garden looking for shots. Doing this will allow you to focus on getting GREAT images at your top 2 locations and then as you walk out you can stop for pictures throughout the gardens as time allows. One other thing to keep in mind is the traffic… while the Chicago Botanical Gardens is just off the highway traffic can be unexpectedly heavy on Saturdays due to cubs games
and any other number of Chicago events. IF I were planning a wedding and it was close to the gardens I’d definitely take advantage of the incredible facilities, but if your wedding is more than 15 or 20 minutes away use all that travel time to get fun pictures somewhere else and just have your engagement photos done at the Botanical Gardens instead, that way you have the time to completely relax and enjoy the experience!
Check out even more Chicago Engagement Photos here!
by Ben
Hong Nguyen - these pictures are amazing !!!! great job!! mind me asking what lens did you use?
Ben - I think for this shoot I primarily used the 50 1.2 or 85 1.8 both of them canon! There may be some 35 1.4 mixed in there at times as well.