Cenote Trash the Dress – Susana and Jovany

“Our trash the dress was much better than I thought! Much harder than I thought! Much more fun that I thought! It blew away any preconceived ideas we had about “Trash the Dress” or underwater wedding photography.” – Susana

Susana and Jovany’s trash the dress was a special one because Susana is a self-proclaimed mermaid! She and Jovany had one of  the most epic weddings ever – standing chest high in water in the beautiful blue water of Cozumel. Susana and Jovany are pretty much our wedding heroes. They are all about breaking preconceptions and not paying any attention to the “normal” way of doing things! They had their trash their dress before their wedding and Susana “trashed” a wedding dress before she wore it on her wedding day. Their adventurous and open minded spirits for sure make them some of our most memorable couples :)

“The experience was magical and inspiring, I think every couple should consider doing a trash the dress before the wedding.  The site was so beautiful and calming, it literally was “the calm before the storm” of the wedding activities.”

“We were able to enjoy ourselves, nature and our new del Sol family! I can’t think of a more perfect way to begin the wedding celebration. The tequila and Xtabentun didn’t hurt, either.   I think if we did it after the wedding, I would have been too exhausted to enjoy it as much as we did before the wedding.  It also gave us and Sol a great start to get to know each other as couple to photographer, and that can only mean an even more connected experience for the wedding day.  Looking back, it was one of the smartest moves we made – the other being to hire Sol and her team in the first place.”

“I actually thought we were doing a beach and cenote shoot and all of a sudden we are in this ethereal cenote in the most magical of places. There’s copal, birds singing and a shaman, majestic cenotes, a talented crew.  We were absolutely smitten! It was truly the best way to start our elaborate wedding ceremony that was to take part over several days.”

“The entire day was so perfect, so phenomenal, I’d do it again in a mermaid heartbeat!”

“I underestimated the difficulty of swimming in a wedding dress. Especially being a “mermaid”, I couldn’t believe how things change when there is a long flowing dress, crown of jewels, a long veil and the oh-so-talented Sol and Polly looking through their lenses at you!”

“I loved, loved, loved the whole experience though, and I must say after a full day of shooting I have enormous respect for models.  You always hear about then working in adverse conditions; cold, hot, rain, etc and you think, “Puh-lease, just give them a sandwich and they will be fine!” But wow, the effort, the concentration, the work of the entire team, is quite something to behold and a really humbling and wonderful experience.  We are so thankful and honored to have had this experience.”

“I was actually a little disappointed in my “performance” in the water if you will.  Jovany was more nervous than me and he did great, even better than me!  Damn merman!”

“All told I had 5 traditional wedding dresses and 1 white Yucatan traditional terno. But I only brought 2 to the trash the dress.  I thought of my wonderful tailor Emilio during the trash the dress: he painstakingly altered these dresses and there was a plan to put only one dress in the water for the trash the dress.”

“My tailor kept saying, with his thick Italian accent, “You can’ta put thees dress in da watter, it’s a too nice!”

“He was referring to the Pronovias dress, which went in the water second. I thought “Sorry, Emilio!” as I entered the cenote.  It was fine though, I wore it after dinner to cut the cake…. ☺ Emilio will be very happy to see those pictures.”

“The water is so clean in the cenotes, it doesn’t hurt the dress at all! In fact, maybe it even “baptizes” it! All I had to do was pop the dress into the tub with cold water, give it a little rinse, hang in the breeze and it was perfect.  The only thing I ruined was maybe the dry cleaning/preserve the dress myth!”

“The only words to describe it are what I keep repeating: amazing, magical, perfect, inspiring.  Sol inspired us from the moment we met her. Sure, we saw the incredible work on on-line, but you can never really know what it is like to be part of all of that until you actually do it. The team, everyone was amazing, especially our angel Polly who assisted during the trash the dress, created the beautiful Mermaid crown, was always just an arm away in the water, and took amazing photos.”

“Everyone and every moment was fantastic.  The professionalism, the creativity, the craft, we know we were working with some of the best photographers on any continent.”

Principal Photographer: Sol
Assistant Photographer + mermaid crown maker: Polly