Beverly Hills Engagement Photo Guide

Away from the shopping streets, Beverly Hills photographs in greens: palms towering into open sky, green walls of leaves, cypress standing in tall rows, and gardens planted like a desert, with white stucco in between. That palette of green, white, and pale winter sky keeps every backdrop calm, so clean, simple colour is all the two of you need to stand out. Dillon wore white linen and Jennifer navy and white on the first evening, and on the second a dark floral dress and a pale button down gave the gallery a whole new look.

The first evening began beneath a glossy red sculpture of two hands meeting in the shape of a heart, and it is where we would start again. We shoot through the opening, so the red wraps around the two of you like a frame, with a row of palms leaning into the pale sky nearby. Then we bring the lens close to the red until the sculpture melts into a soft wash of colour and the two of you sit sharp in the gap. It is the loudest colour of the day, so quiet clothes let it do the work.

We photographed Dillon and Jennifer in the evening, and on the twentieth of January the light was silver and forgiving, a Los Angeles winter at its gentlest. Under a pale sky the palms turn into clean, dark shapes, so we keep them tall in the frame and the two of you small beneath them. The shade under the grand fig tree and between the cypress walls is soft and even, made for close, quiet portraits. The best light starts about two hours before sunset, and in January the sun goes down around five, so plan the afternoon around it.

The pond, where a tiered fountain rises behind you and the water holds a reflection of the palm trunks · A wall of green leaves so dense it swallows the background whole, for a simple portrait side by side · The Cypress Walk at Greystone Mansion, a stone walkway lined with tall cypress, and a carved stone niche where you can sit close as the evening goes soft · The Historic Cactus Garden in Beverly Gardens Park, with towering blue cacti and swollen ponytail palms, an unlikely desert in the middle of the city · A carved wooden door beneath a white stucco arch, and a white bench under the magnolias for the last frames

Beverly Hills treats engagement photos as non commercial photography and asks for a permit at its landmarks and several of its parks. Its Wedding and Group Photography Permit covers sessions like ours outside City Hall, in Beverly Gardens Park, on Rodeo Drive, and at a few other spots, for up to two hours, with a certificate of insurance naming the city. Will Rogers Memorial Park and Greystone Mansion have their own photo permits; Greystone needs one for any posed photography, proposals included, for six people at most, counting the photographer, with no props or drones. Personal snapshots with a handheld camera need no permit. Wherever the session goes, we flag and arrange the permits early.

Dillon and Jennifer's session ran over two evenings, which gave the gallery two outfits and two moods. Permits set the calendar here: the city asks for at least seven business days, and Greystone releases each date exactly two weeks ahead, at nine in the morning. Its permits run from half past ten in the morning to half past five in the evening, so in winter the sun sets inside that window, and in summer it closes hours before sunset. Two Rodeo, with its cobbled lane and Spanish Steps, is private and needs its own permission. Keep to three outfits at most, wear shoes you can walk in, and leave bags in the car.

Dillon and Jennifer's January engagement session lives in full in our journal, thirty one photographs from the red heart to the cactus garden.