Mercedes & Keegan’s Wedding

Sep 17

Mercedes and Keegan’s wedding at Carondelet House in Los Angeles was intimate, personal, and full of the kinds of details that make a wedding feel completely specific to the people getting married. With approximately 50 guests, they planned a celebration centered around their closest friends and family in one of LA’s most character-filled wedding venues.

From thoughtful fashion choices and personal vows to a ukulele duet between the couple, this was a wedding that prioritized personality over convention—and exactly the kind of day we love photographing.

Mercedes & Keegan’s Story

Mercedes and Keegan don’t really have a traditional first-date story. They met at a spoken Latin immersion program they affectionately call “Latin camp.” They made each other laugh, kept finding excuses to spend more time together, and continued talking constantly once they returned home. Eventually, as they put it, they simply realized that being together was better than not being together.

A few months after they first kissed, Mercedes mentioned on her birthday that she wished Keegan were with her in Los Angeles. Keegan responded by driving straight to the Atlanta airport, getting on a plane, and flying to LA for less than 24 hours just to see her.

Their relationship is also clearly rooted in the quieter parts of sharing a life. Mercedes described loving the thousands of small things Keegan does—cooking dinner, tidying their home, folding laundry—and said she’s happiest when the two of them are simply at home being best friends. After ten years together, they described a life filled with travel, laughter, learning and the ability to have plenty of fun without ever leaving the house.

An Intimate Wedding at Carondelet House in Los Angeles

Mercedes and Keegan chose Carondelet House for both their ceremony and reception.

The intimate guest count made the celebration feel less like a large production and more like an incredible dinner party surrounded by the people who have been part of their lives together.

That intimacy also fits beautifully with the way Mercedes and Keegan wanted their wedding photographed. Mercedes grew up with a darkroom in her house and has always loved photography as an art form. She told us she gravitates toward photographs that tell a story through composition and the way people and places are framed. Keegan, meanwhile, gave us a considerably more succinct answer: candids.

Luckily, those two things happen to work very well together.

Our approach to wedding photography has always been about creating images that feel considered without making the day itself feel overly produced—combining editorial portraits with documentary photographs of everything unfolding naturally around us.

Personal Details That Made the Day Their Own

One of our favorite things about intimate weddings is how much room there is for personal details.

Mercedes wore two different looks for the day. Her ceremony dress came from Lili Bridals, while her reception dress was created by House of Mooshki. Finding the latter became an adventure of its own: after struggling to find the A-line, tea-length silhouette she envisioned in Los Angeles, Mercedes traveled to a trunk show in New York and met designer Vikki McCarthy-Wright. Her custom look was based on the designer’s “Edwina” dress in a color Mercedes described as “Bridgerton Blue,” complete with a detachable lace jacket.

Their rings had stories behind them, too. Mercedes’ engagement ring came from Moondance in Santa Monica, while she found her wedding band from Sarah O. during a trip to Denver after months of searching unsuccessfully in LA.

And perhaps the most personal photo request of the entire wedding: Mercedes and Keegan planned to sing a duet together while playing their ukuleles. Naturally, that went straight onto the must-photograph list.

A Carondelet House Wedding Focused on the People

For Mercedes, one of the most anticipated moments was reading the vows she had written for Keegan—and knowing there was a pretty good chance he would cry. Keegan was most excited about having time with his best friend while being surrounded by everyone he loves.

That sentiment really sums up why intimate weddings photograph so beautifully. With a smaller guest list, there’s space to actually experience the people around you. As photographers, it gives us the opportunity to pay attention to those relationships and make photographs that go beyond documenting what everything looked like.

For couples planning a Carondelet House wedding in Los Angeles, we love approaching the venue with that balance of candid storytelling and editorial imagery—photographs that capture the architecture and atmosphere of the space while still feeling completely centered around the people inside it.

The Wedding Team

Mercedes and Keegan worked with a wonderful group of vendors to bring their Carondelet House wedding together. Karen Sieger of Blissfully Styled Events handled planning, Dogwood Florals created the florals, and Soundwave Productions provided the music for the celebration. Their dear friend and Mercedes’ former student Zoë Burgard officiated, making the ceremony even more personal.