In the south, bridal sessions are normally added onto wedding packages without much thought. It’s just a thing brides are supposed to do when they get married down here! (But things are way different in the northern part of the country. I hear photographers in the north all the time saying they wished brides up there would do bridal sessions. Mostly just because they’re so fun for photographers!)

But some people do question it. Should you REALLY spend extra money on a bridal session? I think the answer is an easy yes, and here’s why—

The least important perk is that you get an excuse to wear your dress more than once! It’s depressing when you think about how beautiful that dress is, and how much money you spent on it, to only wear it once. At least when you do a bridal session, you get another excuse to wear that pretty thing and dress up again!

 

While some people don’t love the idea of dressing up, doing a bridal session is a great day for you to do your hair and makeup trial (and actually have it photographed)! Very, very often brides will change their hair or makeup on their wedding day after seeing their bridal portraits. Sometimes brides think they want a certain look, but when they see the pictures, they don’t look the way they hoped they would. And doing this little trial helps ensure that they LOVE their hair and makeup on their wedding day.

Another good reason for doing a bridal session is to help you break in those shoes (and the dress!). Sometimes brides will decide on different shoes after walking in the ones they bought for an hour because of how uncomfortable they are. And here’s a question for you: can you even sit in your dress? Most people have never tried before their bridal session! Testing it out then helps brides figure out how to sit without looking silly, that way they aren’t fumbling around trying to sit down and eat on their wedding day.

 

Last, but not least, things happen. And it’s much better for things to happen and go wrong at your bridal session than it is on your wedding day. I’ll give you two examples: 1. At my last bridal session, before the bride even showed up, her fake eyelash was falling off. YIKES. I bet on her wedding day, she’s going to make SURE they stay on and that she has some extra eyelash glue with her just in case. That’s something she may not have thought about if it hadn’t happened to her at the bridal session. 2. I had a bride last year whose alterations came UNDONE. Her strap loosened and out came her boob. Thankfully it was at the end of her session, so she held the dress up for the last few shots, and then hurried to the bathroom to change. But you can bet she got it fixed, and fixed GOOD before her wedding day. (Can you imagine if that would have happened during the ceremony?) Yay for bridals!

Hopefully that gives you a good idea of some great reasons to do a bridal session. Plus, you have the perk of always having pretty photos of you in your wedding dress. (And we always have so much fun at bridal sessions!)