Hi, my name is Tom!
I grew up in Maple Grove, Minnesota until I moved to Chicago where I went to college. It was freakin’ sweet, ask me about it sometime. I love rock music in (almost) all its forms. Blues really gets me going though. Something about the gritty unrefined nature of Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears, Jack White, and Stevie Ray Vaughn really resonate with me. I also love amazing coffee and if you haven’t had Dogwood espresso, or Intelligentsia Coffee, you don’t know what you’re missing. I love good clean design, will own an Eames lounge chair someday. These are the small things.
Most of all I love the Lord who saved me from myself, and my beautiful, amazing, wonderful, gracious and talented wife Valerie.
As far as your story goes, I love love. I can’t wait to hear your love story; to hear about the way you serve each other, how you met and what keeps you laughing together. There is more to your wedding than meets the eye. It is not just a pretty dress and a bunch of details. It’s your story, and it’s much bigger than the sum of its parts.
While I am documenting the beauty of your day I won’t be asking you to hug your dad before you walk down the aisle or to make your husband hug you afterwards. These things will happen anyways and they will be beautiful without guidance or intrusion.
The story of your love is central to everything I do. Every photo is taken with the purpose of telling that story. Secondary to documenting your wedding day, creating portraits that capture your personality and love is my focus. This means posing in a natural way that let’s me capture your love. This means allowing time and space to bring forward all of your love and feelings for your beloved and creating quiet moments to treasure each other on your wedding day while being photographed.
After the wedding I give my clients a curated collection of the best parts of their day in an album or slideshow that is remembered and passed down to their heirs. I also provide a full range of prints to be selected and be hung in your home.
It is my dream to document the beauty of your hearts coming together and celebrating that story together. If you resonate with this, please, click here to tell me part of your story. I would love to make you shine.
How I got my start in photography-
I grew up in a very artistic home. My mother is a painter/interior designer turned florist, and my dad loves most kinds of music and was a hobbyist photographer. He always captured our family memories in a beautiful way. As a child I wanted to be many things. It wasn’t until I moved away to college when I discovered my love for photography. About six years ago, every chance I had to pick up a camera, I would and then I wouldn’t be able to put it down. My friends would often be surprised to find many of my pictures on their cameras. (Some of them had my signature silly faces in them.) I started shooting concerts for a magazine, then got a job assisting professional photographers in Minneapolis. I knew I had found something I love, and I haven’t stopped since!
Much love,
Tom
Photo Credit: Brandon Werth, Jacob Menglekoch, Liz Hardt, Eliesa Johnson