A Canberra Truffle Farm Wedding Photographer’s Take on Christine & Nick’s Spring Day

I shot a Canberra Truffle Farm wedding in November where the first person to walk up the hill toward the groom wasn’t the bride at all. It was one of Nick’s mates, in a borrowed wedding gown, hand pressed to his chest, doing his best impression of a nervous bride. Nick turned around, clocked the wrong person in white, and lost it laughing before Christine had even arrived. Ten minutes later she actually did walk up that same hill, and the laugh dropped into something a lot quieter.

If I had to sum the day up in one line, it’s that Christine and Nick never really stopped finding ways to make each other laugh, right through to the dance floor at midnight.

Christine & Nick

You can tell a fair bit about a couple from the small decisions they make on a day that’s mostly out of their hands. Nick got ready in a green suit first, surrounded by his mates and family, before changing into the black suit and bow tie he’d actually marry in. That’s not a couple who wanted everything buttoned up from sunrise. That’s a couple who wanted some room to mess around before things got serious.

Christine, over in the annex at the farm with her mum, her dad and her friends around her, was the one who planned the prank. She’d organised the whole thing without Nick knowing, which tells you she’s the sort of person who likes orchestrating a good surprise and is patient enough to wait for the payoff. Both families were heavily involved in the day too. Nick was walked down the aisle by his mother. Christine walked with her father. Two different traditions, swapped slightly, done deliberately, which is exactly the kind of detail that made this Canberra Truffle Farm wedding feel like theirs rather than a template.

Why This Canberra Truffle Farm Wedding Venue Works for a Bigger Day

The Truffle Farm sits on Mount Majura Road, about fifteen minutes from the city and the airport, with the hills rolling out toward Mount Majura Winery in one direction and the rest of the valley dropping away in the other. Jayson and Em run it, and it’s a working truffle farm first, a wedding venue second, which is part of why it photographs the way it does. Nobody’s manicured the landscape into a postcard. It’s a real working property with oak groves, paddocks and a barn that’s been refurbished without losing the shed bones of it.

That barn is the thing most couples don’t picture until they see it lit up at night. It’s got a chandelier hanging in the middle of it, which sounds odd in a farm shed until you’re standing under it with the big doors thrown open and the cold spring air coming in. The ceremony spot under the gum tree on the hill is the other drawcard, and it’s the one most photos from this venue lean on, for good reason. The light up there in the late afternoon comes in low across the valley and does something most ceremony spots in Canberra can’t manage.

What doesn’t get said enough about this venue is the walk. Getting from the annex to the ceremony hill, and then from the hill back down to the barn for the reception, takes longer than people plan for. If you’re booking The Truffle Farm and want sunset portraits as well, build that walking time into your timeline rather than assuming it’ll happen on the fly.

Getting Ready for a Canberra Truffle Farm Wedding – Two Houses, One Morning

Nick’s morning happened back at his and Christine’s place in Canberra, surrounded by his friends and family while he got into the green suit first. There’s a particular kind of energy in a getting-ready room when the groom isn’t taking it too seriously yet, and that was the tone for most of Nick’s morning. He didn’t change into the black suit and bow tie until later, which meant his first round of photos has him looking completely different from the man who’d actually stand up at the altar a few hours later.

Christine’s morning was out at the farm, in the annex beside the main property. It’s a big wooden structure looking straight out over the truffle grounds toward the Majura landscape, and the light through those windows in the late morning is soft enough that you barely need to do anything to it. Her mum and dad and her friends were in and out of the room the whole time, and there’s a specific kind of quiet that settles over a bride getting ready surrounded by exactly the people she wants there. Two different houses, two completely different moods, one Canberra Truffle Farm wedding morning.

The Prank, Then the Real First Look

Christine had been planning the gown prank for weeks, apparently, without telling a single person outside her inner circle. One of Nick’s friends got dressed in a borrowed wedding gown and snuck up the hill behind him while everyone else who knew held their breath waiting to see his face. Nick turned around, saw the wrong person in white walking toward him with a hand over his heart, and the whole hill erupted.

A few minutes after that, Christine actually came up the same path. Nick was looking out over the truffle groves when she reached him from behind, and the laugh from minutes earlier dropped straight into something else. The Canberra countryside rolled out behind both of them the whole time, which is the kind of backdrop you can’t fake and don’t need to dress up.

Gifts and the Bridal Party

Back in the annex, Nick and Christine opened gifts from friends before the bridal party photos started properly. It’s a small window in most wedding days that gets skipped over, but it’s one of the only moments where a couple gets to sit still together before the day picks up speed, and Christine and Nick used it exactly that way before the rest of the bridal party arrived for portraits.

The Ceremony Under the Gum Tree

Guests started arriving at the farm with that particular excitement that builds when everyone can see the hill and the gum tree from the car park and knows that’s where it’s about to happen. Mickey Sulit was on guitar as people found their seats, setting the mood before anyone official had even walked out.

Celebrant Teegan Townsend ran the ceremony, and the family detail that’s stayed with me from the day is the aisle walk. Nick was walked down by his mother. Christine walked with her father. It’s a small swap from the usual setup, done on purpose, and it changed the shape of the whole ceremony in a way that had more than a few people in the crowd wiping their eyes before the vows had even started. Family and friends gathered around as Christine and Nick exchanged rings, and the emotion in that crowd was the real kind, not staged for the cameras.

Cocktails, Pizza and the Barn

Family portraits wrapped up and the reception kicked into gear straight after, with cocktails, old school drinks and a pizza station running alongside canapes and nibbles. All of it happened inside the refurbished barn shed, with that chandelier hanging overhead giving the whole space a strange but genuinely good mix of rustic and properly dressed up.

Speeches and Cake

Speeches led into the cake cutting, then more speeches followed before the party reopened properly. There’s a rhythm to a reception that runs speeches in two halves like this one did, and it tends to keep the energy in the room higher than one long unbroken block would.

Golden Hour Back at the Vow Tree

I pulled Christine and Nick away from the reception for sunset portraits, walking them back up to the same tree where they’d exchanged vows a few hours earlier. The light in the surrounding groves had gone properly golden by then, low enough to come sideways through the trees. There’s something about photographing a couple back at the exact spot they got married a few hours later in completely different light. It’s the same place doing something entirely different.

The Fire Pit and Dancing Until Late

Back at the reception, a fire pit had been lit for the evening and guests gathered around it while the night cooled off. Christine and Nick had their first dance with the barn doors thrown wide open to the night air, which is one of my favourite things about this venue at night. Once that dance finished, the floor filled properly, and it wasn’t just the usual crowd. Elderly relatives were out there too, dancing well into the night alongside everyone else, and the party kept going until the very end.

My Favourite Moments from This Truffle Farm Wedding

• The friend in the gown getting Nick before Christine did
• Nick’s mother walking him down the aisle
• Christine’s dad walking her the same distance from the other direction
• The chandelier in the barn against the cold night air with the doors open
• Cake cutting sandwiched between two rounds of speeches
• Elderly relatives still on the dance floor well past the point most weddings have wound down
• The exact same tree, two completely different kinds of light, a few hours apart

Vendor Credits

Venue & Catering: The Truffle Farm
Celebrant: Teegan Townsend
Ceremony Music: Mickey Sulit Music
Hair & Makeup: Infinite Hairstyling
Bridal Gown: Affordable Bridal
Groom’s Suit: Rodger Bartholomew
Bridesmaids Dresses & Shoes: JJ’s House
Rings: Diamond Boutique Canberra
Decoration & Florals: Mayflower Designs
First Dance Choreography: Koko Loco Dance Studio

Planning a Canberra Truffle Farm Wedding: What to Know Before You Book

If you’re looking at The Truffle Farm for your own wedding, there are a few practical things worth knowing before you book.

Timing and capacity

The barn comfortably handles a reception in the 50 to 100 person range, which is where Christine and Nick’s wedding sat. Truffle hunts run through winter, from early May to September, and the venue gets booked out fast on weekends during that window, so if you’re planning a spring wedding like this one, you’re working with a different calendar than couples chasing a winter truffle-season date. The barn doors-open setup we used for the first dance only really works once the evening cools down properly, so build a fire pit or heating into your plan if you’re getting married outside of summer.

If you want both a hillside ceremony and golden hour portraits back at the same spot, like we did, factor in the walk between the annex, the ceremony hill and the barn. It adds up across a day that’s already full.

For a sense of how other Canberra venues compare on space, light and logistics, our Canberra wedding venues guide runs through a handful of the properties I shoot at most often. If you’re still working through your shortlist of photographers, here’s where I talk through how I actually work on a wedding day like this one.

The Truffle Farm isn’t the only rural property in the region that photographs this well. I shot a similarly relaxed celebration out at Poachers Pantry, near Murrumbateman, and a more rustic Canberra day at Gold Creek Station, if you want a feel for how a few of the other farm and vineyard venues around Canberra and Murrumbateman compare for light and layout.

If you’re planning a day with this much going on, big families, two getting-ready locations, a barn reception and sunset portraits squeezed in between, I’d love to hear about it.