For some time I was toying with the idea of a maternity photoshoot. A part of me said "nah, you don't need it", but the other part longed for some lasting beautiful memories. When I chanced upon this particular German photographer's maternity pics on Instagram, I fell in love with her works and reached out to her sometime in October. Turned out her prices were pretty reasonable by London's standards. Katharina's based both in Cologne and London, and she requested that I pay a deposit of £50 first, and we agreed on a date for the one hour shoot. With that I hoped that she would turn up on the agreed date, time and place. To be honest it was quite a mission and when she was uncontactable leading up to the day, I told K that my £50 has probably gone down the drain.
Finally on a sunny wintry morning in Danson Park in Bexley, Kent, she turned up with her family no less. See, she is a stay at home mum, and for shoots such as this, she will always bring her boys and her husband will be the driver (a family mobilisation). Whilst she does the shoot, her husband will bring the boys to run around and wait. I think it's a fab model. What is so great about her business model in my view, is that she supplies the maternity dresses and flower crowns. Things which you don't necessarily own or want to own just for an one hour shoot. We met at the carpark and in the most non-dodgy fashion, they opened their car boot and showed us plastic boxes full of dresses. She helped me narrow down to 3 choices - they were all big and dramatic dresses - and said I could choose two for the shoot. She would then bring out the matching flower crowns. Wow ok, this wasn't quite how I envisioned it to be, although I didn't quite know what to expect either. She asked me to change in the nearby pub, and she will be waiting. Well, ok let's do this!
It was about 8-10 degrees that morning but thankfully with the sun it felt a little warmer than that. I had asked K to wear a formal shirt with jeans but he is very camera shy and therefore needed some encouragement to take a few shots with him in them. He volunteered to sit on the bench and watch our belongings. Katharina said for maternity shots, there are very limited poses to what I can do, other than look at the bump lovingly, or look at the camera whilst holding the bump, or look very much in love with your husband/partner and hold the bump together.
I shall spare the in between details of how I had to chase her for the photos afterwards, but suffice to say, I love how they turned out so I shall rate her 4 stars out of 5.
I saw this figure hugging lace dress from one of her Instagram posts and loved it, so I picked this and she matched it with her white flower crown. We spent most of the time in the Old English Garden of Danson Park.
Then I changed into this big and dramatic pink dress because we are having a girl you see ;)
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| K was tasked to throw the dress high up in the air and he was photoshopped away lol |
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| This was my closing shot, on the steps of Danson House |
Although the package was for 10 photos, I couldn't resist and bought 2 more. Loved them and her dramatic dresses really made a difference, do you think?
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