Emily Callahan + Luke Hazelwood

June 23rd, 2018

Moosehead Lake, Maine

When your wedding guests include wild deer from a protected herd, you know the day is going to be magical! That was the case with Emily and Luke, who chose a rustic woodland setting for their nature-made wedding.

The site was her family’s long-time vacation home at Tomhegan Wilderness Cabins, perched on the shores of Moosehead Lake in northern Maine. Although Emily and Luke met in California, her roots remain in New Hampshire; she fondly remembers childhood summers spent at Tomhegan.

Emily says it was an emotional moment for her and her dad as they walked down the bark-strewn “aisle” toward a birch arbor created for the wedding day by family. A rustic sign with the sentiment “Rainbows end here” hung over the arbor. “It was like coming full circle for me,” she says.

Another favorite moment was when Emily and Luke first entered the tent after the ceremony. “Every single person we love was there,” she recalls, “from California and New England and the Seacoast.”

Natural elements were woven throughout every aspect of the wedding and its lakefront setting, from the ptarmigan feathers sprouting from Emily’s lush bouquet to the groomsmen’s fly-fishing-lure boutonnieres and a graceful antler chandelier. And then, of course, there were the deer that made an appearance as if on cue, wowing the couple’s guests and adding the perfect woodland note. “It very much felt like a wedding made just for us,” says Emily.

• by Pat Chaudoin