Should You Have a First Look on Your Wedding Day?

Does every wedding day need a first look? Does yours? Read here to find out all about first looks and why you should consider doing one!

As you start planning your wedding day you might have heard the term " first look” for your day and wondered if it’s right for you. Is there a right and wrong answer for whether or not a wedding should have a first look? What exactly do they look like and why do people choose to do them? Today we’re going to cover all of these questions and get to the bottom of whether or not your wedding should have a first look so that you can continue planning your dream wedding day.

What is a First Look?

Before we take a deep dive into whether or not you should have a first look on your wedding day, we first should go over just what exactly it is. A first look like the name suggests is a moment during the wedding day where the bride and groom see one another for the first time prior to their ceremony. This is a relatively recent trend that has grown to be more and more commonplace for weddings as the years have gone on. While there are still plenty of couples who wait until their ceremony to see one another, more and more people are adding a first look into their timelines, and with good reason!

Does Every Wedding Need a First Look?

The short answer is no, as every wedding day is different and so is every couple. Everyone has their own preferences when it comes to their wedding day, so there’s no one size fits all answer. Even so, while not every wedding will need a first look there are still a ton of positives to having one! This means that even if you haven’t considered a first look for your wedding day, or don’t think you can make it work with your wedding day you shouldn’t rule it out completely.

Pros of Having a First Look

Helps Your Timeline

While it may seem like a first look would hurt your timeline on the surface, the truth is quite the opposite! Having a first look in your timeline gives you a set time that you and your partner have to be dressed and ready by. This helps keep the timeline on track and ensures everyone is well set and ready when it comes time for your ceremony. Not only that though, but a first look also means you’ll be able to schedule some time for portraits of either just the two of you or with your wedding parties as well. This can be huge in freeing up your timeline later on in the day as you can get a large amount of your portraits out of the way early.

Personal and Intimate Moment

Wedding days are a whirlwind, there’s really no way around it. There isn’t really another day where all of your friends and family come together for a full day of celebrations revolving around you. With everything going on throughout your day and everyone there that you’ll want to talk to, it can be hard to get a moment with just the two of you on your wedding day. A first look lets you do just that. You can be with one another and truly enjoy the moment as just the two of you.

Helps You Relax

Similarly to how wedding days feel like they fly by, they also inherently come with a lot of pressure. No matter how relaxed of a person you are and how loose you keep your timeline and wedding day, wedding days are always at least a little stressful. A first look gives you that moment alone with your partner though, the person you can count on to ground you and help you keep your cool in situations like this. It’s a great way to prepare yourselves for the day and regroup as the nerves start to ramp up before your ceremony.

Gives You Options

Having a first look on your wedding day gives you more flexibility when it comes to the layout of your day. Having a first look and taking your couples portraits immediately after frees up some time later on in your wedding day. You can also share private vows with one another at your first look which I absolutely love! Private vows can be a super sweet way to make the moment more intimate and emotional. It also lets you say the things you really want to say to one another without the pressure of being surrounded by all your wedding guests. If you’d like to see an example, check out Lexi and Sam’s wedding day where they read their private vows back to back before turning around for their first look.

Pros of No First Look

All of the Anticipation

Without a first look on your wedding day you are going to be feeling a lot of excitement and anticipation leading up to your ceremony. There’s a lot of time from the moment you wake up until your ceremony happens. Throughout that time you’ll be thinking about your spouse and seeing them for the first time on your wedding day. While this excitement might be too much for some couples, some may actually enjoy this anticipation and the build up and opt to not see one another until their ceremony.

Gives You More Time in the Morning

This one is a bit of a trade off. While it is true that without a first look the morning portion of your wedding day timeline will be more open, that also means you won't be able to take any couples portraits until after the ceremony. This can work well depending on the layout of your day, but from my experience having some of your portraits done earlier in the day makes things flow so much more smoothly in the afternoon!

A First Touch

If you like the idea of being with your partner prior to your ceremony, but don’t want to see one another, one fun alternative is to have a first touch instead. Just like how it sounds, a first touch is where you both will hold hands while still not seeing each other. This can be done either back to back or with each of you around a corner. A first touch also allows you to have that private vow reading moment which can make it even more of an emotional moment while still keeping that anticipation of seeing one another intact.

So the question is should your wedding day have a first look? Ultimately the choice is up to you. There are positives to both sides so it really comes down to what you and your partner both want to experience on your wedding day. The important thing to remember is this day is about you. It is a celebration of your love and your next step in your relationship together, so celebrate it how YOU want to! Looking for a photographer for your own wedding day and want to talk through having a first look more in depth? Send me an inquiry through my contact page and we can get to planning! And if you’d like to see more of my work check out my Instagram.