A Matariki Wedding Editorial About Place, Identity, and Belonging

Bride in the Huia gown walking through a dark doorway beside a large artwork and timber wall.

Photographer Education

10 July 2026

A journey of reconnection

It was easy to live Pākehā. The whakapapa on my dad’s side was broken and I don’t present particularly Māori. I wanted to feel connected to the language and my iwi, but I would sometimes find myself wondering if I’m even allowed to be Māori.

My sister, a teacher in Auckland, was saying how this is not a unique experience. Many of her students have grown up disconnected from their reo, iwi or whakapapa, wondering to themselves whether they are Māori enough. Reflecting on this conversation, I realised no one was going to give me the permission I was looking for. I decided to stand proud and start a lifelong journey of reconnecting to my Māori identity.

Double-exposure portrait of a bride in the red and white Huia gown, illuminated by moody window light.

More and more I’ve come to appreciate how Māori isn’t just another culture of Aotearoa; it grew here. Its stories are in the rivers, the stars, and the seasons. Its roots in this whenua run deep. So when Matariki became the first public holiday to celebrate something that was purely Māori, I felt that as a country, we were also reconnecting to this same heritage. We are on a journey, learning how to ‘whakapapa to the land’, and all of Aotearoa is welcome.

This project asks: what happens when a contemporary New Zealand wedding is shaped by the same desire to reconnect with Māori identity; not as something historical, but as something living, personal, and true to who we are.

Bride in the Huia gown carrying a woven basket through a vegetable garden, with sheep in the field behind her.

Close-up of a hand gathering red rhubarb stalks and leafy greens into a woven basket.

Why Matariki

Matariki is a time of reflection, remembrance, renewal, gathering, and looking forward. It asks us to look back at where we have come from, honour those who came before us, gather with whānau and community, and set intentions for what comes next.

Those ideas sit naturally inside a wedding story. Weddings are about lineage, belonging, family, commitment, future generations, ritual, place, and new beginnings. Matariki gave us a way to hold those ideas with a deeper cultural and emotional frame.

We didn’t want Matariki to become a surface-level theme or a seasonal aesthetic. The goal was to let it shape the story underneath the images: reconnection to culture, reconnection to whenua, reconnection to whakapapa, and reconnection to identity within contemporary Aotearoa.

Bride holding a deep red bouquet while standing among toetoe in the red and white Huia gown.

Returning to Hawke’s Bay

We chose Hawke’s Bay as the location. Even though my whakapapa can be traced to Northland, and Wellington is where I reside, Hawke’s Bay is where I grew up. The plains, the limestone hills, the Tukituki River, and Te Mata Peak are the landscape that shaped me.

For a project that was deeply about reconnection, it felt right to return to the place that grounds me. The location is part of the story and our connection to this whenua became one of the anchors of the shoot.

Bride in the red and white Huia gown lifting her veil above her head at Te Mata Peak.

Building the creative team

I’m thankful to the team of collaborators who embraced the kaupapa and each brought their mahi to the story we were trying to tell.

The strongest creative decision was starting with the story to tell before choosing the styling. Once we were clear it was to be about reconnection, place, and identity; every other choice had something to respond to. The location, garments, table styling, flowers, food, even the light/mood started to fall into place.

We had three incredible dresses by Ivonn Bridal Couture, the star of which was the white-and-red Huia gown worn by Te Amokura. Every gown was full of beautiful tukutuku and intricate details, and they allowed our models, Te Amokura and Jessie, to literally wear a piece of their identity.

St George’s Restaurant embodies mahinga kai. Food is grown on site and gathered direct from their garden. But it’s more than just their farm-to-table ethos; in the preparation and artistic presentation you really feel the connection to the harvest.

Josie Brenstrum and Christy Petra Bridal Hair provided makeup and hair respectively. Nat at Sabah Design Studio and Botanical Lane collaborated to bring weaving into the table styling, and installed a hanging arrangement of ferns and orchids inspired by the Matariki sky.

Wedding table set beneath a suspended installation of greenery and red flowers in a bright white venue.

Overhead view of colourful plated wedding dishes featuring seasonal vegetables and edible flowers.

The visual approach

We wanted the imagery to feel fashion-forward, grounded, contemporary, and emotionally resonant. The visual language came through texture, whenua, kai, fabric, weaving, movement, and the feeling of gathering.

Finding Yvonne’s dresses was the moment it started to feel possible. They gave the project a visual anchor, but they also showed us that contemporary Māori expression could feel elegant, fashion-forward, personal, and alive.

The dresses carried tukutuku-inspired detail into a contemporary bridal form. The venue brought in food, harvest, and place. The florals and hanging arrangement referenced the night sky without making the concept too literal. The low, moody light gave the images a cinematic feeling.

Close portrait of a bride in a white feathered gown, resting one hand against her face.

Bride in the red and white Huia gown standing in a timber-lined interior while holding a deep red bouquet.

Burgundy became one of the strongest visual threads. Red carries real weight in Te Ao Māori, and these deeper tones felt right for Matariki: rich, grounded, and wintery without feeling heavy. You can see it throughout visuals: in the Huia gown, the rhubarb picked from the garden, the floral choices, and the beetroot folded into the food.

Deep red bridal bouquet resting on a dark platter against an olive-green cloth.

Working with the Fujifilm GFX 100RF

To capture everything, Fujifilm lent us the GFX 100RF, which I dual-wielded with my trusty X-T5 workhorse, while Michelle photographed with two X-T5. I found the wide 35mm fixed lens on a medium-format sensor paired perfectly with the XF 33mm F1.4 (equivalent to ~63mm on GFX) on APS-C.

Throughout the project, the GFX 100RF was awesome to shoot with. I thrashed the aspect ratio dial (it was great knowing the full raw would still be there if needed), and it really gave a new perspective while photographing. My favourite was the ratio. Combined with the low, moody light, it made every shot look cinematic.

The rangefinder + fixed lens combo was just plain fun to shoot with. No need to overthink anything; just grab and go. That simplicity mattered on a shoot like this. It kept me responsive to small moments, textures, gestures, and atmosphere instead of overthinking lens choices.

The GFX worked seamlessly alongside my X-T5. The batteries are interchangeable, and no adjustments to our editing process were needed. However, I would definitely recommend investing in large-capacity (and fast) SD cards.

The huge files have incredible detail and sharpness; the 100% crop shows every thread, eyelash, and leaf vein. The autofocus was equally quick and never struggled, even when shooting through reflective windows. If there was one thing to knock, I would’ve loved a wider aperture for that medium format look, maybe next time I can try the GF 55mm F1.7 on the GFX 100s.

Top-down view of a Fujifilm GFX100RF camera resting on a table beside camera accessories.

Bride in a white tukutuku lace top posing outdoors with one hand in her hair.

Bride in a white gown lying across the steps of a curved concrete staircase with a red bouquet.

What the project taught me

Doing something meaningful is often more challenging and more vulnerable than doing something beautiful. It honestly would have been easier to make something that simply looked Māori: beautiful details, cultural references, a bit of symbolism, and leave it there. But that was also the thing we were most afraid of. We didn’t want this to feel like cultural styling placed on top of a shoot. We wanted it to come from somewhere real.

This really meant confronting own discomfort and my own sense of not feeling Māori enough. I still feel very much at the beginning of reconnecting with my Māori identity. I’m still learning kupu, concepts, history, and how to stand inside that part of myself without feeling like an imposter. But if I waited until I felt fully qualified, fully fluent, like some perfect representative of modern Māori identity, this project probably would not exist.

I think a lot of people feel that same hesitation. Like they need permission before they can create work from the part of themselves they are still learning how to claim. But maybe the work is part of the claiming?

If there is a lesson I’m taking into the future; it’s to leap before I feel ready, and trust that an honest contribution is better than staying quiet.