INTERVIEW / 5 MINS WITH BOW & ARBOUR
Sleek newcomers to the wedding scene hailing from the Sunshine Coast, are Bow & Arbour, and they are a photographer's dream! Hence why I have partnered with them to offer wedding zines in my portrait and wedding photography packages.
What's a wedding zine you might ask? Short for magazine, contemporary for wedding album. Lovebirds, creatives + design extraordinaries, Sammy and James, tell us all about their beautiful creation.
Why were you inspired to start Bow & Arbour?
Ah… Lots of reasons! Probably the most compelling was a desire to share our wedding photos in a meaningful way with our loved ones. Conventional albums, photo books and social media just didn’t tick the boxes for us, and we eventually conceived the wedding zine idea.
Where do you get your inspiration from?
A variety of sources – we really admire Australia and New Zealand’s independent wedding magazines, so much so that we advertise in all of them including Together Journal, Hello May and White Magazine.
In terms of the publishing industry at large, we are always on the lookout for a standout aesthetic and we’ve spent many hours paging through the likes of Cereal, Kinfolk, Collective Hub and Design Anthology.
We’re also very fortunate to draw a lot of inspiration from our couples’
wedding photos as they’re all so different and inspiring in their own right. We're sure other creatives can relate but sometimes you just run out of creative juice and we’re lucky enough to visit Southern Africa regularly; we find these trips so important for rejuvenation on so many levels.
How are Wedding Zines different to other wedding albums out there?
Two things above all - they tell a story, and they’re always visible in someone’s home.
One of our issues with a conventional album is that the focus is normally solely on the couple, and our wedding day was about far more than just us. Many people contributed to the day somehow; we had guests from as far as South Africa, our ageing grandparents made the trip from Perth, our speeches and dancefloor action were hilarious – it all deserved to be shared, and it has been in our wedding zine. Furthermore, we believe in the power of words, and vows, speeches, song lyrics, guest messages and the like, really accentuate the imagery and enable a story to be told. AND, finally, the multiple copy element really was a game changer in that for the same price as a normal album, we could take care of a few Christmas gifts. Our 10 copies went to parents, grandparents, siblings and aunts and uncles.
What other magazines do you print?
Bow & Arbour is our first foray into publishing but we do have another magazine in the pipeline. We can’t give the name away at the moment, but it’s connected to our wildlife conservation/safari travel work with Diwa Zambezi.
Your best piece of advice for a couple on their wedding day?
Plan as best you can, but when the day starts, enjoy and savour every single moment. Don’t stress the little things! Make that ceremony kiss last, have a crack at the lawn games, enter the reception memorably, laugh out loud during the speeches, dance like no one’s watching and then try not to start a fire during the sparkler exit ;) And last but not least, invest in a great photographer, because after the vows and speeches have been said, and the wedding day ends, your wedding photos will be the window to your memories.
What’s next for Bow & Arbour?
The unknown! We’re confident in our product and it’s definitely a problem solver for couples, but as to the rate of growth, we will have to wait and see. Wedding zines is a registered trademark in Australia, and several potential key markets overseas, so we’ll see where that goes. One of the most rewarding aspects so far, has been working with photographers from all over the world. We really hope that in time we have quite the sizeable family, all committed to making a couple’s wedding photography experience the absolute best it can be.
And finally, if you could invite each invite two people to a dinner party, who would they be?
Sammy:
Tess Robinson from Smack Bang Designs - Girl crush! To pick her brains on all things creative and running several businesses (are they all start-ups?!).
David Attenborough - what a legend. I am constantly amazed by what our environment, and in particular what the animal world, can teach us and I’m sure David has nearly seen it all - tell me all!
James:
J. K. Rowling – what an imagination! And fiercely committed to philanthropy.
Nelson Mandela – to learn how to forgive and forget so effortlessly.
Can I cheat and mention one more?! Paul Allen, for his commitment to philanthropy, albeit different causes to Joanne Rowling – the debate would be interesting!
A huge thanks to Sammy and James for sharing some of their world with us.
Their version of wedding photography albums, are seriously coffee table worthy and you will not regret having such a special and unique memento to house your wedding photos forever.
To find out more about Bow & Arbour and their wedding zines click here, or to see more on how you can book a photography session and have your memories printed as a magazine, click here.
MNDY x
Images credit: Janneke Storm
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