trash the dress part 2

when i think about local spots for a trash the dress session, nothing really appeals to me in the same way i was really bored with the overdone hotels and golf courses as reception venues. i love edgy photos which is why i drool over anything taken with a lomo and/or cross processed. my photography heros used to be heather champ, delicious blur, and quarlo, back in the day when i took more photos.


if i could have my reception in an abandoned warehouse i would be the happiest girl in the world! so on this dirty note, let's talk about trashing the dress....

to me, east hastings is an inextricable part of my vancouver. i took these photos years back with the squatters outside the old woodwards building, but if you're unfamiliar with the area, it's shocking but certainly not out of place.

i went down to hastings and main for about three years, spending 6-7 hours of my friday night serving food or singing worship songs at a small, upstairs place next to the balmoral hotel: street church. now it seems so far away, and so far removed from my life. i went back one christmas to revisit the smell of coffee mixed with hot dogs, mixed with an endless line of unwashed men and felt like i was perhaps the only one i knew who understood how i felt about it.
here's some photos i've gathered off of flickr. you'll see it really is skid row, and i think it's one of the worst places in north america. but it's safe. it's so safe. canadians don't carry guns, eh? and i used to leave street church at 1am.

i read about a trash the dress session where a "daring" bride/model posed on an alley mattress and it reminded me of hastings and main. i used to want to take portraits of the people there because there was so much story in each of their faces. give them a meal in exchange for a portrait. but i literally lacked the balls to do it being small, dainty, and female amongst a throng of drunken men and drugged up prostitutes.

enter crazy option number two: wreck beach. it's not the most beautiful beach as you can see, but it's a clothing optional one!

on the big island in hawaii we visited a black sand beach that also happened to be a nudist beach. our guide was incredulous that vancouver had its very own nudist beach (apparently it's more of a european thing i guess, but hey, canada definitely has a distinct british undertone).

now a video shoot running through nude people in a wedding dress (or for the more daring, in simply just a veil) would be a huge youtube hit, or at least a great sum41 music video.