Some couples don’t want a big wedding. They want something real, unhurried, and completely theirs. That’s exactly what this elopement at the Bürgenstock Resort was — just two people, a celebrant, and a commitment made in one of Switzerland’s most beautiful settings.
What made this day particularly special to me is that I had already been part of their story. Two years earlier, I accompanied them for their engagement at the Bürgenstock — and they fell in love with the place just as completely as they had fallen in love with each other. When it came to planning their elopement, there was never any question about where it would happen. They were so taken with the location and the whole experience that they returned to the resort and asked the hotel to contact me directly. That kind of trust means everything.
The morning started with the bride preparing in her hotel suite — light falling softly through the curtains, her friend beside her, laughter filling the room. In a white silk slip dress with a deep backless cut and button-tie detail, she was radiant and completely at ease. A close-up of the backless dress on the balcony, Lake Lucerne stretching out below, is one of my favourite images from the whole day. The groom, sharp in a classic black tuxedo and bow tie, got ready on his side of the hotel. His entrance through the long corridor beneath the crystal chandelier — striding towards the ceremony room — is the kind of frame you don’t plan; you just have to be ready for it.
The ceremony was held in one of the Bürgenstock’s most extraordinary spaces: a cave-like room of rough stone, lined with candles in glass hurricanes, deep red roses, and dozens of antique gold-framed mirrors catching the candlelight. The celebrant led them through their vows in a space that felt completely suspended from the outside world. And when they read their own words to each other — she burst out laughing, the kind of laugh that comes from being completely overwhelmed with love. That photograph is everything. Their first dance followed immediately after, spinning slowly in the centre of the room with the golden mirrors all around them.
Afterwards they stepped out onto the terrace. The bride had wrapped herself in a white feather stole, her anthurium bouquet deep red against the white — and beyond them, the snow-capped Alps stretched across the horizon. As the light dropped and the evening turned a soft blue, her sister joined them for cocktails on the terrace. The day ended with a dip at sunset, Lake Lucerne glowing far below, and a solo portrait of the groom against the city lights and twilight sky that still stops me every time I look at it.
Elopements like this are my favourite kind of work. No timeline pressure, no crowd, no compromises — just two people fully present for each other. If you’re dreaming of something intimate and meaningful in Switzerland, the Bürgenstock is one of the most extraordinary places to make it happen.
