The Connection Rhodes Wedding Photos
A waterside function room on Shoreline Drive, on the Rhodes peninsula between Brays Bay and Homebush Bay
The Connection is a council community precinct with an event space for hire on Shoreline Drive at Rhodes, 12 km west of the Sydney CBD. Rhodes is a peninsula on the southern bank of the Parramatta River between Brays Bay and Homebush Bay; it spent most of the twentieth century as chemical and manufacturing land and has been rebuilt since the early 2000s as a high-rise suburb with foreshore parks, including Brays Bay Reserve and the Kokoda Track Memorial Walkway that runs from there to Concord Hospital.
Veri photographed Sumaira and James’s mehndi ceremony here, the night before their wedding at the InterContinental in Double Bay: henna, colour, music and family in a packed room, with the water outside. A mehndi is a photographer’s night, all hands and faces and detail, and the venue’s role is to hold a big crowd close together.
Photographing a wedding at The Connection Rhodes
Pre-wedding functions here run late and indoors, so we work with a single bounced flash and fast lenses and let the decor colours do the rest. The henna itself needs macro frames early, before the dance floor fills. Arrive before dusk if possible: Shoreline Drive faces the water and the last light on the bay gives a few outdoor frames of the couple and their families before the room fills. Parking is on the street and in the towers. The gallery above is Sumaira and James’s mehndi.
Read the wedding venue guide
An evening on the foreshore
The Connection suits a celebration where the room does most of the work: a reception, an engagement party or the gathering the night before your wedding. Guests come in through tall glass doors to a broad hall with space for a stage, a long food table and a full dance floor. Right outside, a terrace under a shade sail sits above the water, and the timber boardwalk along the river is a short stroll away, so a few portraits by the water need no car at all. Everything else happens indoors, with the evening moving from the stage to the dance floor.
Weather by the river
Sydney summers are warm and often humid on the river, with light until after eight, so the terrace is lovely for drinks and dancing once the heat of the day eases. Autumn evenings are mild and settled. Winter brings cool nights and dark before five, so any time by the water has to come early. A breeze off the river is common and lifts veils and scarves on the boardwalk. If it rains, nothing important is lost, because the celebration lives inside, and we keep any portraits close to the glass doors.
Light, colour and sound
Try to arrive before dusk. Late sun comes in low across the water, flaring behind dancers on the terrace and turning the river gold, and the boardwalk rail gives a clean line for a walk together with the towers soft behind. After dark the hall runs on stage lighting and coloured dance floor light. The timber slat screen glows at night and throws stripes of light across faces, a calm spot for a quiet portrait away from the crowd. A packed room with music gets loud, so a microphone for speeches and blessings gives your videographer clean sound.
Planning tips
Put a short portrait block in the half hour before sunset, before the room fills and the music starts. If you are styling an entrance with canopies or an umbrella arch, set it at the glass doors so every arrival passes through it. A colour palette that differs from your wedding day helps the two celebrations feel distinct in your album. Later in the night, slip away to the slat screen for a few minutes alone.