Practical Magic Family Photoshoot
Growing up my sister and I loved all things magical. We believed and we believed hard. It’s really no surprise that one of our favorite movies was Practical Magic. We deeply identified with the bond between the Owens sisters Gilly and Sally. The story wove magic into the fabric of every day life and that was something we could understand. In our eyes magic wouldn’t be something grand and fantastical instead it would be the spin of untouched coffee straw or the suddenly modified PTA phone tree.
While 2020 has often felt bereft of any type of magic I wanted to produce something special this Halloween season. Not only is Halloween my favorite time of the year but this year it also happens to be the month both my sister and I reached a year alcohol free. I wanted to do something beautiful and meaningful to represent the journey we shared together and the magic it created in our lives. What better way to celebrate than to recreate the sets from our favorite childhood movie with our mother and my beautiful niece.
So we got to work. I begin to conceptualize the sets down to the smallest detail and search high and low for thrifted pieces that could really bring our favorite scenes to life. I began by collecting a ton of photos on the theme I waned to create and then narrowed those photos down to include the scenes I wanted to incorporate into the shoot. As the overall concept was created I went through each scene to add fun little touches that brought the story to life. This is my favorite part of photo styling and always makes me extremely happy ! Lastly, costumes always have such a unique way of taking a shoot to the next level, so thrifting the perfect outfits took place over a couple of weeks!
The images that Nicole captured will be part of our lives forever. Bringing to life this movie with my niece and passing on our love of all things spooky and magical to her has been such a joy. Sharing the magic of my work with my family was an added treat. The process behind these sets and images creates shared memories with family that these beautiful photos capture. Working together with my dearest family produced an extremely unique and special collection of images. Let me know in the comments what inspiration you would use for your own family photo shoot !
Photography- N. Mickle Photography