This might be the prettiest City Hall to elope in the USA...

San Francisco City Hall Elopement Inspiration – Peony Park Photography 33

San Francisco City Hall Elopement Inspiration – Peony Park Photography 14

We adore elopements & the reason should be obvious: no peanut gallery to influence your decisions, you can make your elopement exactly what you want.

Usually, we cover the more free-spirited, adventurous style elopements here on the blog, the beauty of such wedding plans is you can still make your wedding day just as lavish, glamorous & elegant as a full-fledged wedding! “How?” you ask? Our first little tip is to start by choosing a venue that exudes grandeur, and if you’re a California bride, look no further than San Francisco City Hall.

We in America aren’t as flush with ornate city halls for civil ceremonies (I spent years shooting weddings in France, and oh are they spoiled with beautiful government spaces!) but the few that wow, truly wow. San Francisco City Hall is one of those places. Grand, opulent & stunning it is, the classic space to run away and say “I do” offers all of the pomp & circumstance you could want from a City Hall wedding.

Fittingly, Peony Park Photography & her team of talented Cali wedding pros styled an equally elegant bride & groom showing how truly glam an elopement day can be.

From Peony Park Photography

As the photographer and also the coordinator that recruits everybody and put a wonderful team together, I must confess that I didn’t expect how awesome this styled shoot has turned out to be. It simply exceeded all my expectations in terms of color palette, floral arrangement, a group of supportive professionals in the industry who are diamonds to me right now, and that creative sparks that I get when we all see aesthetics eye-to-eye with each other.

My very initial idea about SF City Hall was to do something different, something that’s unique enough that when people look through the gallery they would say ‘wow I didn’t know SF City Hall has this spot for photos’ or ‘this elopement styling is gorgeous!’ I remember when I brought this idea to my stylist, Jackie, her response was I would need to have a shot list ready for different angles because everywhere I can think of has already being done before by other photographers.

Our color palette is white, lavender, and peach. This combination of color choices is very modern and classy for an elopement styled shoot. SF City Hall is a grand building, we want to bring out the beauty of it and so our color choice will need to be simple, even muted.

The design inspiration actually came from the word ‘luminous’ because that’s the first thing I think of when I saw how other fine art photographers captured the couples at the third-floor hallway where marble floor and wall reflect bright sunlight on their faces and created that dreamy sheen. Through the shoot, I purposely put my subjects where the shadows and sunlight meet to emphasize how amazing the lighting is inside of this historical venue for ceremonies and receptions.