Ashley and Tyler’s Memorial Gardens Engagement Session downtown Concord, NC

This fun and outgoing couple’s decision to use Memorial Gardens for their engagement photos in Concord, NC wasn’t just a whim. Ashley felt strongly about feeling comfortable for their session and staying true to themselves and their relationship. They both grew up in the area, and in fact started dating in high school! So they wanted to hit some of their favorite spots during their session. They also wanted to make sure we choose spots where they could include their pup, Margo.

As I mentioned above, Ashley and Tyler are high school sweethearts. They will be getting married this December at the Hotel Concord, where they went to high school Prom together! How special is that you guysss?! I love that this location will have multiple meanings for them.

Anyways back to their engagement photos. We started these off at Memorial Gardens Park which unfortunately we didn’t realize was closed that day. However there’s plenty of gorgeous flowers, trees and interesting background right in front of the gardens, so we used those. Sometimes during these sessions things don’t go 100% according to plan but that is okay! It just makes us have to get a bit more creative. Thankfully Ashley and Tyler weren’t bothered and were willing to trust me that we’d still get killer photos. I can’t tell you how important it is that my couples trust me and lean into the entire experience.

I probably could have shot their entire session in the 20ft by 5ft gardens entrance and been thrilled with the outcome. However there were a couple other downtown spots they had in mind, so we took a walk.. We took a couple shots at a church right around the corner from the gardens. Then we made our way down to a couple of murals they both like. Once we were done there, we drove a few minutes down the road to Cougar Run Winery. We got a couple shots there before the sun set, including a fun champagne pop!

Check out some images from Ashley and Tyler’s session!