A destination wedding at Riot Fest?! My literal dream come true!

9.15.23

Here’s a fun fact about me: I am a music photographer! Alongside capturing amazing couples, my biggest passion is photographing music and festivals across the country. Riot Fest is easily one of my favorite weekends of the year-in fact, I often try and keep that weekend open so I can enjoy the festival in its entirety (not in 2022 though, I shot 3 weddings in 2 days!) And yes, Riot Fest performs legitimate wedding ceremonies at their festival, which is so freaking cool. When Roya reached out to me to see if I could capture her and Omar’s elopement at Riot Fest, I nearly shot through the ceiling. YES OF COURSE LET’S DO THIS.

Roya and Omar came to Chicago from Montreal (one of my fave cities, by the way) just to get married at the kickass music festival. We met up at Riot Fest on the first day of the festival around 2pm, and I was floored at how busy the festival already was! Typically, festivals like Riot Fest aren’t hella busy in the early afternoon, but then it hit me: My Chemical Romance was playing that evening. Of course it was going to be packed! But, the crowd was actually a pretty great backdrop for a lot of their portraits. We wandered the grounds and even took a ride on the Ferris wheel! Roya was a little anxious to get on the Ferris wheel (as was I, not gonna lie!), but we did it, and we got some adorable photos of the two of them.

While I only had an hour with Roya and Omar, their elopement at Riot Fest was one of my most memorable weddings of the year. I love capturing nontraditional weddings, and this was easily the most nontraditional of them all! I’m so happy we were able to create such beautiful moments at Riot Fest. I hope I can capture more Riot Fest weddings in 2023, so reach out if you want to get hitched then!

Film developed by Bellows Film Lab // Venue: Riot Fest in Douglass Park, Chicago