Historic Concord Exchange Wedding | Claire + Jesse

Shea McGrath Photography | Colorado Wedding Photographer

How They Met:

Claire and Jesse met while attending Iowa State University. It was Claire’s sophomore year and his Freshman year. They lived in the same dorm and were, respectively, on the men’s and women’s floor of “Barker” house. There was no air conditioning in Barker. So once everyone moved in, it was a Barker tradition to have as many people as possible open their windows and sit in the hallways, hopeful for a cross-breeze. They first met during one of the “hallway parties.”

After their first introduction, Claire was walking down the hallway past Jesse and his twin brother’s dorm room. Their door was open and Claire glanced inside as she passed to see who was around. Both of them were there and they were passing a rugby ball. Claire did a massive double-take because rugby is not a very common sport in Iowa. Even less so 8 years ago, and Claire played a little in high school. She asked them if they played and they struck up a conversation. Shortly after that, as Jesse and Claire spent more time together, they started developing feelings for each other and started dating!

How He Proposed:

Eight years later, they were living together in Minneapolis. After proposal plans A and B went awry, Jesse knocked on the door to their apartment. He was trying to bring Claire out into the hallway so that their cat wouldn’t run out. Instead, he ended up spooking her with his knock on their door (she had no idea it was him who was out there!) While shouting out the door at the perceived “intruder”, she realized it was Jesse and he apologized for scaring her and then got down on one knee and proposed!

Historic Concord Exchange Wedding:

Historic Concord Exchange Wedding — Claire and Jesse got married at The Historic Concord Exchange in St. Paul, MN. The Historic Concord Exchange is a unique, castle-style venue that has multiple levels for weddings and events. This historic mansion also has hotel rooms in the upper levels, where most of their weddings guests stayed. Claire and her girls started the day by getting hair and make up done in the large bridal suite on the second level. Claire chose a vintage style dress, rose gold jewelry, and a birdcage to complete her classic bridal look. She looked absolutely stunning! She and her mom put together all of the bouquets with flowers fresh from the farmer’s market!

Claire and Jesse had their first look just outside of the venue, with the brick and greenery of the building behind them, which made for a beautiful backdrop. Then the entire bridal party headed down the street to the nearby park, where we took bridal party photos and photos of the bride and groom. Since it was October, the leaves were changing and the fall colors made for beautiful photos! They chose jewel tones as their wedding day colors. Their bridal party all wore a different jewel-tone color, which looked amazing together! They also handmade their place cards with jewel tone colors, and their guest book was a colorful canvas of a world map.

They had their ceremony in the main ballroom, where Claire made her entrance from the second level, where she met her father at the bottom of the stairs, then they walked down the aisle together. After their ceremony, they had a fun cocktail hour while the event staff flipped the ceremony space into the reception. After dinner, and several hilarious toasts from their friends and family, they cut their cake on the second level, which was a balcony overlooking the reception space. Their cake had a gold bird and bear to represent their nicknames for each other, Claire-Bear, and J-Bird. Needless to say after seeing their photos, you can tell this fun group had a lot of fun at their reception! The entire dance for was packed until midnight!

Historic Concord Exchange Wedding St. Paul Minnesota