Hyden & Alyson
Hyden and Alyson, married on roughly a hundred acres in the Santa Ynez Valley. Sound on.
Out past the hedges.
Hyden and Alyson were married at Kestrel Park, the English country estate set on roughly a hundred acres in the Santa Ynez Valley. The frame that opens this page has the two of them walking away hand in hand across a dry mown field, bare golden hills either side, her long veil still trailing behind her, the dry mountains stacked up in the far distance.
The film runs four minutes and fifty-eight seconds. Out past the gardens and the trees is where the light lasts longest at Kestrel Park, and where the frame empties out to just the two of them.
Notes on the place.
Kestrel Park is a garden estate wrapped in ranch land, and the two halves need different handling. Inside the hedges you are working with enclosure: trees, walls, a great deal of green, and light that arrives filtered and leaves early. Step past the hedge line and it flips. The ground is open, the hills read bare and golden, and the sun stays on them long after the gardens have gone cool. Anything you want lit at the very end of the day belongs out there. It is also where the property gives you scale, because the hills keep going and the mountains behind them finish the job. Wear boots and give yourself the walk.