the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
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A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex

Nick’s white smoking jacket was already hanging ready when I arrived. Black bow tie laid out, whiskey poured, cards on the table – and that image, shot in the deep moody light of The Rex Hotel’s rooms, set the visual tone for a The Rex Canberra wedding that was cinematic from the first frame and never really let up.

Getting Ready

Nick’s getting-ready room had actual atmosphere. Him and his dad and his mates, the kind of easy unhurried energy that comes from people who have known each other long enough that dressing up together is just another version of hanging out. The smoking jacket. The bow tie. The whiskey. There was something to photograph in every corner.

  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex

Kasey was upstairs in an apartment with a fireplace, kids running around underfoot, and an energy that was warm and unhurried. The detail that set the tone for her aesthetic: white Converse heel boots among the bridal accoutrements. Not an afterthought. A deliberate choice that told you something about who she is.

  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex

The Howling Moon

The ceremony took place in the Howling Moon – the Rex Hotel’s glass conservatory on the upper level, red roses lining the stairs and woven throughout the space, sunny Canberra visible through the glass walls. The couple had made a custom heart-shaped cut-out for guests to use as a photo moment. Red rose petals scattered across the floor. A content creator working alongside me. The room was packed and warm and ready.

The Howling Moon is one of those ceremony spaces that doesn’t need a lot added to it because the architecture is already doing the work. Glass, elevation, city light – a completely different visual language to garden or countryside venues, and one that rewards couples who bring bold details rather than soft ones.

  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex

Considering The Rex Hotel?

I’ve shot at most of Canberra’s best wedding venues. The guide covers what I know about the light, the hidden spots, and what makes each one work on the day.

Honest notes from someone who’s been in all of them with a camera.

The Rex Canberra Wedding Ceremony

Kasey came up the stairs on her father’s arm, red roses framing the staircase, the room quiet around the moment.

Nick fell apart. Immediately and completely and without any attempt to hold it together. Tears before she reached the top step, the room reading his face and going with him. There’s a version of this that feels performed and a version that feels entirely real – this was the second one. The guests around them responded the way people do when they can see that what’s happening in front of them genuinely means something.

Celebrant Michelle Wells held the ceremony with warmth and skill, letting the emotion settle without rushing past it. The room was full and close and exactly right for the occasion.

  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex

If you want a photographer who knows when to be in the room and when to disappear – I’d love to hear about your day.

Start the conversation

The James Turrell Skyspace

After family and group portraits, we moved to the National Gallery of Australia – specifically the James Turrell Skyspace, which remains one of the most distinctive portrait environments in Canberra. Salmon pink walls. A dark, moody interior. The iconic blue reflecting pool. The light inside behaves differently to anything else in the city and the resulting portraits have a quality that is genuinely hard to get anywhere else.

Both bridal party shots and quieter couple portraits worked in here. The space is small enough to feel intimate and large enough to give you room to move.

  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex

Then into the National Gallery’s car park, which sounds unremarkable and is anything but. Nick’s father restores cars as a passion, and he’d brought along a custom converted vehicle – large engine sitting proud – for portraits that had a completely different energy to everything else in the day. Bold, mechanical, high-contrast. The kind of shot that doesn’t come from planning but from knowing what a couple’s people are willing to bring.

  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex

From the gallery, the group made their way to Queen Elizabeth II Island at the Carillon for a final round of portraits, including some deliberately blurred motion shots that added an editorial quality to the set – movement and light and the lake behind them.

  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex

The Reception

Back at the Howling Moon for the reception. Wedding favours were scratch cards – a few guests walked away with small winnings, which is the kind of touch that gets talked about. Entrees moved into speeches that again pulled tears from multiple corners of the room.

Nick and Kasey gave their welcome, cut the cake, and then the Hollywood spotlight came on for their first dance. A single beam, cutting through the room, the two of them in it. The Howling Moon’s interior – already dramatic by architecture – became something else entirely. It had a genuine cinematic quality, the kind you usually have to manufacture and here just arrived.

  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex

After that the floor opened and stayed open. Dancing, singing, karaoke, guests of every age fully committed. Flash photography through the chaos. The energy in the room by that point was the kind that doesn’t need documenting so much as keeping up with.

The night closed with group portraits back inside the custom heart cut-out – a full-circle return to one of the day’s personal touches, the room still warm, everyone still in it.

  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex
  • the rex canberra wedding, A Smoking Jacket, a Skyspace, and a Hollywood Spotlight – Nick & Kasey at The Rex

My favourite moments from Nick and Kasey’s day

  • Nick’s white smoking jacket and the moody getting-ready atmosphere that followed
  • Nick falling apart the moment Kasey reached the top of the stairs
  • The James Turrell Skyspace doing exactly what it always does – making the ordinary impossible
  • Nick’s dad showing up with the custom car in the NGA car park
  • The Hollywood spotlight first dance – the room going dark around them
  • Scratch card wedding favours and the small winnings that followed

Planning a wedding at The Rex in Canberra? If you’re looking for a Canberra wedding photographer who knows the Howling Moon light, how the Skyspace photographs, and what this city offers as a backdrop – I’d love to hear about your day. You can see more across the Canberra wedding venues guide or get in touch here.

Vendor Credits

Venue / Getting Ready / Reception / Catering / Cake: The Howling Moon at The Rex Hotel | @thehowlingmoon_ Celebrant: Michelle Wells | @michelle_m_celebrant MUA & Hair: Infinite Hairstyling | @infinite_styling Groom’s Suit & Bridesmaids: Black Tie By Xavier | @black_tie_by_xavier_ Bridal Gown: Angelic Inspirations | @angelicinspirationsact Shoes: Converse | @converse_anz DJ: Adam Brideson | @adam_brideson