Table Rock Engagement | Hannah and Brandon

Brandon wanted to propose to Hannah while they were visiting family and friends in upstate South Carolina and western North Carolina. He came across my blog post on where to take engagement photos and decided that Table Rock State Park had the scenery he was looking for. It’s one of my favorite places in the upstate to take photos because you can get mountains, a lake, and some small waterfalls without hiking at all. He specifically mentioned wanting to propose at the pier on Lake Oolenoy with the mountains in the background—perfection!

Before driving down from Ohio, Brandon told Hannah that he wanted to have couple’s photos taken with a photographer who did his friend’s photos, and they shopped for outfits together. Since the family was in on the plan, Brandon made sure someone offered to do Hannah’s nails before the session.

Even though the rain snuck up on us in the forecast, it stopped raining at the park right when Brandon and Hannah arrived, and didn’t start back up again. We didn’t hardly see any other people, probably because the rain had kept them away. We met at the Table Rock trailhead and took some photos at the little waterfalls near the beginning of the trail. After that, we drove to the park headquarters, where we would get the view of the mountains over Lake Oolenoy. Brandon’s friend had set up a beautiful picnic on the pier while we were on the trail, then left the park. Of course Hannah said yes when Brandon proposed, and she couldn’t believe how beautiful the ring was.

After we took photos for a little longer, I went home, and Brandon and Hannah had some alone time in the last 30 minutes or so before the park closed. This was the best summer evening we could have possibly asked for!

Enjoy some of my photos of Hannah and Brandon’s engagement at Table Rock State Park!

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Anniversary Photos at Table Rock | Semeen and Shehzad

I spent a perfect spring evening with Semeen and Shehzad right before their one-year wedding anniversary. We took photos at one of my favorite South Carolina parks, and one of my favorite places in South Carolina: Table Rock State Park in Pickens. I love that Table Rock Mountain is so easily recognizable from a distance, and I love that we can take photos with both water and mountains here.

Semeen and Shehzad had met before Shehzad came to the US for grad school, but they stayed in touch from across the world. Over the years, they became very close, and they knew that they wanted to get married and live in South Carolina together. When Shehzad came back to India, he proposed to Semeen. With Covid regulations in place in India, they opted for a small wedding just a week after their engagement so that they could be married before Shehzad came back to the US. As the Covid situation became more complicated, Shehzad ended up not being able to fly back to the US for four months! They made the best of the situation and spent that time adventuring together around India and Europe until they could move to South Carolina.

We originally had a different state park in mind for these photos, but when it was time to go, it appeared this park was already closed for the day. Shehzad suggested Table Rock instead. This is one of my favorite parks and I even had my own family photos there, so I agreed. They decided to have one outfit that was more American-looking and one that was more Indian-looking. Shehzad wore a kurta, which is like a long shirt, and Semeen wore a dupatta, which is like a shawl. I loved the sparkle and color the dupatta added to the photos!

When I first met Shehzad through the photography club at Clemson, he had only lived in the US for a few months. He said he loved taking pictures of the trees in the fall because he had never seen trees change colors before and he wanted to show everyone in India how beautiful it was. When we got to Table Rock, there was a tree with beautiful pink blossoms that I knew I wanted to use in their photos, but of course Shehzad pointed out an orange tree along the water too.

Enjoy Semeen and Shehzad‘s anniversary photos at Table Rock State Park!

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Table Rock Engagement Photos | Jillian and Vincenzo

Vincenzo left Italy to come work at his uncle’s restaurant in Greenville.  That’s where he first met Jillian!  After they’d been dating a while, they visited Pretty Place Chapel, where Vincenzo proposed.  Even though he was so nervous that he opened the ring box upside down, Jillian said yes! 

Jillian saw my photos in a South Carolina hiking group on Facebook and reached out to me about her engagement photos. I saw she was also a Clemson alumna, so that’s always exciting! She told me she wanted her engagement photos to be in the mountains. I was so excited that someone around here was as excited about pictures in the mountains as I am! We discussed possible places, but we had to hold off on choosing a location and setting a date since a lot of places were closed with the stay-at-home order. We talked about going to the Blue Ridge Parkway, but it would be hard to know what was open until we got there.  When the state parks opened back up, we decided to go to Table Rock on a Thursday to avoid the park reaching capacity.

I think there were more geese than people on the day we had our session!  We also found some ducks, a large snake, and the biggest snail I’ve ever seen.  Even though we couldn’t do the session in the spring, we still got cool weather for June!  The three of us took a trail where we found a few pretty waterfalls. We had so much fun talking about Italy, South Carolina, the mountains, and their wedding plans!  As the sun started to go down, we went towards the lodge, where there was a beautiful view of Table Rock right next to Pinnacle Lake.  The water even glowed orange from the colors in the sky!

Check out my photos of this awesome couple in one of my favorite places in the whole state! 

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